Every con man knows he has to outrun reality because it will eventually catch up with the lies he tells. A good con man will make sure he’s in the next state before reality clashes with the lies he convinced his victims to believe. Sometimes, though, through hubris or miscalculation, he will stay too long, and circumstances will provide him … Read More

So it comes to this: Mitch McConnell refuses to permit the Senate to consider legislation passed by the House that would reopen the federal government in order to protect Donald Trump from either having to accept it and cave on the border wall or reject it and draw further blame for the shutdown. It’s been this way for weeks and … Read More

Why would Donald Trump find it preferable to shut down the government over congressional refusal to fund his border wall when there was an agreement in place to kick the issue down the road and avoid chaos over Christmas, into the new year, and beyond? Why would he take a position where he has no leverage and where opposition Democrats … Read More

As we entered 2018, I warned of a dangerous time ahead when congressional Republicans would let  Donald Trump get away with anything to stave off challengers during the long spring and summer primary season. Absent a legislative check and with political pressures at their height, I feared Trump’s efforts to consolidate power by delegitimizing every institution that stood in his … Read More

This post is about restoring faith in our institutions. In my previous post, I suggested that Democrats look to 2020 with a message of economic and social justice that, if delivered by a charismatic messenger, could mobilize the progressive base and appeal to swing voters. There is a third leg to this stool, and it is criminal justice or, if … Read More

There is opportunity in chaos. As Democrats contemplate the 2020 campaign, they should recognize that Donald Trump has shattered longstanding political alignments, giving them the chance to reassemble the pieces to form a lasting political majority. Doing this will require setting aside incremental thinking and embracing a platform of economic and social justice that would have been unthinkable in 2016. … Read More

Longtime readers of Wolves and Sheep know that I keep returning to the theme of partisan realignment, because I believe this moment of political instability shares characteristics with other realigning periods in American politics, most recently the transition between New Deal liberalism and Reagan conservatism. The potential for party realignment was a theme of my last two books on the … Read More

Previously, I wrote about how it will be difficult if not impossible for Donald Trump to adjust following a disastrous midterm and position himself for re-election. Today, I’m going to look in detail at what the midterms suggest about the challenges facing Trump in 2020. In my next post, I will consider the longterm implications of the 2018 results for … Read More

Every president has a base, and every president lets them down. They have no choice, because presidents have to govern broadly to survive politically. This lesson has escaped the current president, and until now you could be forgiven for believing that he had upended the laws of political gravity by governing expressly and exclusively for his core supporters. For the … Read More