{"id":1098,"date":"2020-08-26T12:49:48","date_gmt":"2020-08-26T12:49:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bikingwithmike.com\/?p=1098"},"modified":"2020-08-26T12:49:48","modified_gmt":"2020-08-26T12:49:48","slug":"august-26-2020","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bikingwithmike.com\/?p=1098","title":{"rendered":"August 26, 2020"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Rep. Joaquin Castro (D), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Oversight and Investigations Committee, has launched an investigation into this whole issue of Pompeo giving a speech at the Republican convention.\u00a0 I\u2019m sure it will go nowhere and all of the Republicans who would have screamed bloody murder if Clinton had done the exact same thing will be characteristically and very loudly silent.\u00a0 Just another example of how Trump\u2019s whole \u2018law and order\u2019 message is a joke.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kelly Ann Conway, a senior advisor to the President, was found by the Office of Government Ethics to have violated the Hatch Act multiple times and recommended she be terminated.\u00a0 Nothing happened.\u00a0 Ivanka Trump was, likewise, found to have violated the Hatch Act.\u00a0 Nothing happened.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump\u2019s idea of law and order is to use the DOJ to pursue, prosecute and punish his real or perceived enemies and to use the same department to benefit himself and his friends.\u00a0 Remember Roger Stone?\u00a0 Found guilty on multiple felony counts and Trump commuted his sentence.\u00a0 The DOJ is trying to get the case against Michael Flynn dropped after Michael Flynn pleaded guilty to a felony.\u00a0 Attorney General Barr launched an investigation into the Russia investigation in spite of both the Mueller report AND the final report from the Republican-led Senate Intelligence Committee coming to the same conclusion \u2013 the Russian investigation was legitimate and that Russia significantly interfered in the 2016 election (and are continuing to do so for this election).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You can bet the findings of Barr\u2019s investigation will hit the street before the election in spite of the standing policy at the DOJ to not publish any significant decisions within 60 days of an election.\u00a0 And you can also bet that the report will provide Trump with campaign propaganda.\u00a0\u00a0 Quite frankly, I\u2019m surprised that Attorney General William Barr is not joining Mike Pompeo and also making a speech endorsing Trump.\u00a0 I\u2019m sure the Republicans could find a way to justify that as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is clear from this convention that it is the \u2018Republican National Convention\u2019 in name only.\u00a0 The fact is, it is the Trump National Convention. If you have any doubts at all about that, just look at the speaker lineup for Tuesday.\u00a0 There is Melania Trump, Eric Trump and Tiffany Trump and, of course, Donald Trump who can\u2019t pass up a chance to get in front of the cameras.\u00a0 And, as I stated yesterday, there is no Republican platform \u2013 just Trump\u2019s vision for America.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He has hijacked the Republican party and where the party once espoused clear \u2018conservative\u2019 principles, it is now the party of \u2018Trumpism.\u2019\u00a0 Not only has he hijacked the Republican Party, he has hijacked and politicized the Department of Justice, the State Department and, most recently, the United States Post Office.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is no doubt that Trump would like to add the Department of Defense to his trophy room but so far Mark Esper, the Secretary of Defense, has resisted attempts to politicize the military. He has stated that the Dept. of Defense will not deploy troops domestically to be used against US citizens. \u00a0As a result of that position, rumors abound that the friction between Esper and Trump is growing so if Trump is reelected, I would suspect Mark Esper will be shown the door and be replaced by a Trump loyalist.\u00a0 It\u2019s bad enough to have some joker like Trump loyalist, Louis DeJoy, now in charge of the Post Office \u2013 just imagine if he were in charge of the Department of Defense.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m sure there are those who will say, \u201cWhy the heck is Rep. Castro wasting time and money launching an investigation into Mike Pompeo giving a speech at the Republican Nation Convention?\u00a0 What\u2019s the big deal?\u201d \u201cWhat\u2019s the big deal about Kelly Ann Conway and Invanka Trump and the Hatch Act?\u00a0 What\u2019s the big deal about Trump putting people he likes in Cabinet positions and politicizing government agencies that heretofore were deemed to be independent?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here\u2019s the big deal.\u00a0 As I have stated in previous posts, the road to authoritarianism often starts with someone winning an election and then, once they are in power, they begin to slowly and and sometimes subtly chip away at the same democracy that brought them to power.\u00a0 Trump has been doing this since the first day he took office (actually before he was sworn in if you count the illegal calls Mike Flynn made to the Russian Ambassador, Sergey Kislyak).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thus far, Trump has not been held to account for anything.\u00a0 He continues to chip away at American democracy, the Constitution and any vestige of presidential norms.\u00a0 If he is reelected, you can fully expect that he will stop chipping and start smashing.\u00a0\u00a0 I am sure some of his current supporters and enablers will wake up one day and ask, \u201cI didn\u2019t think he would do that. How did that happen?\u201d\u00a0 The simple answer is \u2013 you let it happen.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"