Democrats are totally blowing it

Since then, the party has returned to its accustomed role as a group of simpering, pragmatic dealmakers. Dozens of House Democrats voted for a $1.3 trillion spending bill in March, only to see Republicans get to work on stabbing them in the back by trimming billions through an obscure process called “rescission.” Then, in a truly bewildering display of stupidity, 17 Senate Democrats also voted to roll back key provisions of the Obama-era Dodd-Frank law, which placed restrictions on large banks and sought to prevent another 2008 unraveling of the financial sector. Instead of humiliating the GOP’s robber barons, a group of Democrats including, mysteriously, Mark Warner (Virginia), Tim Kaine (Virginia), Jeanne Shaheen (New Hampshire) and Maggie Hassan (New Hampshire), joined their GOP colleagues in handing the president one of his coveted “wins” in return for a giant pile of rocks. This betrayal was flabbergasting — not only did Democrats not win any policy concessions on this or any other issue in return for their votes, they now will jointly own any future mayhem that stems from loosening critical financial oversight policies.

But it’s not just that institutional Democrats seem to have lost their 2017 fighting spirit this year — the president is also benefiting from normalcy. Despite the ugly, bewildering spectacle of rage, incoherence, and abuse staged by the president on his Twitter machine every day, the world is still spinning. And that’s because despite all the president’s bluster, the policy status quo from 2016 remains almost completely untouched.