SUPER CHARGED?

As the impeachment investigation in the House of Representatives continues, the guiltiness of Donald Trump's behavior is becoming more and more obvious.  Right now,  Gordon Sondland, US ambassador to the European Union, is giving testimony to the fact that Trump's attempts to get the country of Ukraine to dig up dirt on Joe Biden's son consisted of a lot more than a phone call from the president to the leader of the Ukraine.  “I know that members of this Committee have frequently framed these complicated issues in the form of a simple question: Was there a ‘quid pro quo?’” Sondland said. “The answer is yes.”
This overwhelming evidence should mean that, if this were a just and honest world, Trump's own party would turn on him and he would be bounced out of office and possibly into a jail cell where he belongs.  But, alas, the country we are now living in is not just and honest.
The Republican party is now the party of the Trump cult and nothing else.  No matter what happens, the registered voters of the party still support him, so the congressional Republicans must do the same.  Which means that the Republican votes needed in the Senate to oust Trump will be almost impossible to get.  Why would  they turn on him now, when they supported his campaign as he lied, bragged and insulted his way into office?  They supported him after he called Mexican immigrants rapists and drug dealers, refused to put his businesses in  a blind trust or  release his taxes. Not even  the release of the infamous Access Hollywood tape could stop them from sticking with him. Which means that once again, the man who has spent his whole life doing terrible things and never paying any consequence will once again skate away unscathed.

As if that isn't horrible enough, the sad fact of the matter is that Trump's almost inevitable vindication in the Senate may super charge him.  Instead of seeing himself as weakened by being impeached by one house of congress, Trump may very well see himself as being invulnerable.  Because he truly does seem to believe that he has done nothing wrong in this scandal (or indeed, that he never done anything wrong in his entire life!), the senate vote may unleash him to be even more corrupt and deranged in the upcoming election.  It is entirely possible that during the campaign Trump will openly start asking for aid from foreign countries.  In his speeches, in his tweets, in financial dealings, he will just make the same demands that he made with Ukraine: help me win reelection and I will help you, if you don't help me  I will use the might of the largest economy in the world to strike back at you.   Even worse, it's easy to predict how the two parties will react to this: elected Republicans will shrug and say that they don't agree with his methods but still support him, and Democrats will be left screaming into a void, unable to sell the idea of impeaching him all over again.
This is the rock and a hard place that the Democrats have been stuck in ever since the impeachment proceedings began.  While I certainly think that it was the right thing to bring these charges against Trump in the face of such obvious corruption, it may actually wind up helping him win reelection by embolding him to openly seek aid from Russia and other countries.  And as long as the feckless Republican party do nothing to stop him, America will become more and more of the  complete disgrace it became since he took office.

AFFLUENZA

Definition of affluenza

: the unhealthy and unwelcome psychological and social effects of affluence regarded especially as a widespread societal problem: such as 

feelings of guilt, lack of motivation, and social isolation experienced by wealthy people

Affluenza is a expression that had been kicking around for years before it became well known in 2013 after a teenager was arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol and valium and killing four people.  At his trial, his family's high priced lawyer used the term to make the claim that the boy shouldn't be sent to prison because his wealthy parents had indulged him all his life, setting no boundaries and never teaching him right from wrong.  Amazingly, this absurd argument worked, and he was given ten years of probation, a pathetic display of everything wrong with our legal system.  It also placed the word firmly into the public's consciousness ( the above definition came from the Webster's website).  Personally, I think the time has come to use the term to describe our president and his often crazed response to the current impeachment process.
Since the beginning of the Ukraine scandal that has led to the impeachment proceedings going on right now in the House of Representatives, one thing has stood out: President Donald Trump has never admitted the tiniest bit of regret about his phone call with the Ukraine leader in which he openly asked for "a favor" regarding investigating his potential presidential opponent Joe Biden's son.  Not only has the president expressed no regrets about the possibility (now an almost certitude)   that he used the with holding of financial aid to a country, spending which had been  voted on and passed by congress, as a means to help him win reelection, but he has continually said that he has done nothing wrong, calling his phone conversation "beautiful" and "perfect."
This kind of deranged behavior in the face of what surely should be  impeachable  is just the latest example of Trump living a life in which he got to do whatever he wanted whenever he wanted without ever facing any real consequence.  I think that the president is clearly a sociopath, which is an inborn trait, but I also think that his extremely privileged upbringing  has enabled and focused his sociopathic tendencies to the point where he thinks everything he has ever done is perfect.  There are numerous examples of  his believing this, like when, during the campaign, while discussing religion,  he was asked if he ever sought forgiveness from God and, he said “I like to be good. I don’t like to have to ask for forgiveness. And I am good."  Amazingly, this rejection of the Christian virtues of forgiveness and humility didn't hurt him a bit with the Christian Evangelical vote.
This utter belief in his own rightness has lead to some horrible actions in Trump;s life: it would be seem to be apparent that in the past, if we are to believe multiple allegations and his own words on the Access Hollywood tape, Trump's way of expressing an attraction towards a woman is to get her alone in a room and shove her up against a wall while kissing and groping her.  Given the number of women over the years who have accused him of such behavior, it's safe to say that the he has been acting this way, (and more importantly, getting away with it) for years.  He has also gotten away with not releasing his tax returns,  multiple bankruptcies, and paying out twenty million dollars in a class action lawsuit over Trump University.  So of course he thinks that he did nothing wrong in his phone call and in his administration pressuring a foreign country to help him politically; it's just the latest in a long line of things he's never had to account for in his entire life. Putting it simply, Trump will never admit to any kind of mistake because he has never had to pay for one; his family's wealth and power have always bailed him out, so why shouldn't he continue to get away with everything?  While he never drinks alcohol or takes drugs, Trump clearly is a man addicted to his own bloated self worth and ego.  And sadly, the Republican party in the Senate appears poised to bail him out and enable him once again, allowing a man who never should have gotten near The White House to claim absolution for an obviously impeachable offense.  As America continues to sink into divided chaos...