Trump spits in the face of American values; the opposition party has no clue how to respond
to use the powers of her office to pursue them. Instead of introducing articles of impeachment — the only real check on a corrupt president’s power — the Democratic leadership is squabbling with its leftist wing about it. By so doing, Pelosi is helping Trump sweep his wrongdoings under the rug when they should be the primary focus of his presidency and the 2020 election.
As a matter of constitutional duty, the only acceptable answer to the litany of betrayal and obstruction detailed in the Mueller report is impeachment, not “let’s focus on health care.” And if the feckless GOP-controlled Senate won’t convict Trump, expose them for it instead of providing them with cover by not even trying. Keeping the pressure on Trump would also make it harder for him to abuse the powers of his office to help his reelection bid, which he will no doubt do in many dangerous ways.
Trump is so unpopular that his only hope for reelection is convince enough voters that the Democrats are even worse. He needs them to try to fight fire with fire, bombast with bombast, the only type of fight he can win.
So when protesters take down the U.S. flag at an ICE facility in Colorado and replace it with a Mexican flag, they may as well be on Trump’s payroll and making a campaign commercial for him. Worst of all, the Trump supporters who see this a million times on Fox News and Facebook actually vote, while the young radicals who perform these inflammatory acts probably don’t.
Trump’s racism is no surprise. He campaigned promising to block Muslims from entering the U.S. and on building a wall on the border with one of America’s largest trading partners. Every wave of immigrants has been met with a smattering of nativist rancor. Presidential candidates have exploited xenophobic currents in the past, but amazingly it was Donald Trump who rode them to victory. Why was it different this time, and how might it happen again?
Trump isn’t playing chess, but nor is he playing solitaire. The Democratic push to the left was a factor in 2016 and 2020 threatens to repeat the blunder. Trump’s wild-eyed rhetoric is amplified by traditional media, social media, and his allies in Moscow, but there is also enough substance from the Democratic candidates themselves to give potential swing voters pause.
From listening to the current Democratic frontrunners, they don’t think it’s possible for their nominee to lose to Trump in 2020. They are trying to outdo each other in a mad primary dash to the left, leaving even Bernie Sanders’ 2016 platform far behind. Trying to out-Trump Trump with wild promises about free everything, green deals, and open borders is exactly how the Democrats can lose. Again.
When I retired from professional chess in 2005 to join the nascent prodemocracy movement against Putin in Russia, I was warned that politics weren’t the same as my beloved game. “Things are more subtle and complicated,” friends would say about the real world. “It’s shades of gray, not just black and white.” I liked to respond that the main difference between chess and politics in Putin’s Russia was that in chess we had fixed rules and uncertain results, but in Russian politics it was exactly the opposite!
They were right, but only to a point. Politics is the art of the possible, in the famous phrase of Otto von Bismarck. Progress is often attained through compromises, coalitions, and not letting the perfect become the enemy of the good.
But those things are about politics in a healthy democracy, where there is good faith and the rule of law. In Russia, we weren’t trying to win elections, we were just trying to have them. Subtlety isn’t required to march in the streets, outnumbered five to one by riot police. Diplomacy isn’t helpful when desperately raising the alarm over the destruction of democratic institutions and civil society.
Sometimes things are black and white, even in politics. We know what Trump is, and what he’d like to be. I’ve seen his like before, as Putin twisted the fragile Russian democracy into a police state in his own KGB image. Now there’s no more Russian free press to criticize for how they do or do not write about Putin. There’s no legislative opposition to stand up to an all-powerful executive, and no independent judiciary to defend the rule of law.
These things are gone in Russia. First they protested but didn’t act boldly enough, then they went along to maintain position and influence, and then they were swept away.
An America in Trump’s image will be one of extremes, with no moderates in the middle, no compromises or shared principles. Political deals will take place behind closed doors, among oligarch cronies and family members. Policy will be announced at rallies, chanted by a frenzied mob.
This is the nightmare that the Democratic leadership has decided isn’t worth fighting against tooth and nail, preferring to wait out the 550 days until the end of Trump’s term. Depressingly, they and the Democratic candidates for president aren’t doing everything possible to ensure it is his last term.
Kasparov is the chairman of the Renew Democracy Initiative and of the N.Y.-based Human Rights Foundation.