I was talking to friends:
* It appears that although there is a shrill not insubstantial minority of Democrats who want to go down fighting against Donald Trump, Trump is consolidating his position and even a majority of Democrats want him to succeed. Today Elon Musk is meeting with Bannon and Miller who are Trump’s top policy guys. Since most of Musk’s ongoing business (Tesla, Space and Solar) have substantial subsidies from the Federal government, I would imagine that Musk is taking the position that he is helping America lead the way in innovative technology and that the government should continue its favorable policies toward Musk’s enterprises for the prestige involved.
* Some observers (Paul Craig Roberts for example) believe that the actions since the election against Trump are designed not just to discredit Trump and to undermine his legitimacy, but as a precursor to a coup. Certainly the leaks from the intelligence community about Russian involvement in the election are designed to imply (a) that but for the hacking of Podesta’s emails (which are conflated to “hacking the election” which has led a majority of Democrats to believe the Russians actually interfered tabulating the votes cast so as to insure Trump’s victory) Trump would have lost the election and (b) that Trump is a traitor because (i) he may have cooperated with or had knowledge of what the Russians were doing and (ii) he has cast doubt on the both the motives and conclusions of the intelligence agencies. There is a great deal of information out there that suggests that the emails were not hacked by the Russians, that the leaks are politically motivated and that the timing of the blame cast on Russia is designed to cause Trump problem by splitting him off from the zealous anti Russian wing of the Republican party exemplified by Lindsay Graham and John McCain. In any event, one has to wonder how such a coup could take place. The easiest way to engineer a coup would be for Trump to be killed. Perhaps this is the reason that Trump has retained his private security services in addition to the Secret Service protection he gets.
Certainly Mike Pence is not someone who shares many policy positions with Trump and would govern in a markedly different way, probably along the lines of how he has governed in Indiana, in other words what now passes for traditionally conservative in the Republican party, a mix of Koch Brothers anti regulatory libertarianism, Paul Ryan budget cutting of entitlements and tax cuts for the wealthy, and the chamber of commerce positions on immigration and TPP. However, if sufficient “evidence” surfaces that Trump is in fact a traitor, it would not be that much of a stretch for Obama to invoke his powers as commander in chief, to put the country under martial law to prevent Trump from succeeding him. To that extent Trump has helped himself by respected Generals to top positions, notably Mattis as secretary of defense. Trump did get huge cheers when he attended the army navy game and he is much more popular than Obama among the troops. Obama has purged many generals and put in generals who are more aligned with him politically, but I cannot see them falling into line on something as serious as martial law whose purpose is to prevent Trump from becoming president.
* It is pretty funny watching the news media oppose and attempt to diminish everything Trump has done. When American companies have decided to expand here and bring foreign operations home, and foreign companies have decided to invest here, Trump’s influence in those decisions is played down. Trump is also criticized for interfering in the free market. These are not positions the press would ever take with a Democrat. When the Republicans pulled their bill to gut the independent ethics watchdog only after Trump tweeted against it, his involvement was played down as made only after Congress decide to withdraw the bill (false) and only after public opinion forced his hand. Again, the press would not take this position had the party been the Democrats
