It's Not Nice, But--

I know. It isn't nice to get on the case of someone you've just discovered has cancer. But.

Having read the introductory galleys of the book "Original Sin", by Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson, I'm inclined to make generalized conclusions that really aren't anything new, as stricken as we are by 47's undermining of our system and revanche against his purported enemies.

Take a step back for a minute and I'll reintroduce you to a little history, history that has in fact been mentioned in this space but it doesn't hurt to repeat. It's something that nobody has brought up in the hubbub over Biden's obvious, sad and tragically devastating decline while in office.

I bring this back up because there's a good chance this has happened before, and not that long ago. The argument was never fully vetted, because an untrusted source got it right, but a trusted source responded with indignant shock and got it wrong.

I hosted a gathering in Washington, DC, when I lived there some 12 years ago. I was introduced to a gentleman, now deceased, who had been in the Reagan administration--in fact, had been in the Situation Room, as its called, the place where foreign and military policy is carried out and redefined during crises. His connection with the president wasn't close, but he got to know those that were.

And he told me, without prompting: He had it in good confidence that Reagan didn't have all his mental faculties for at least the last year and a half of his second term.

That comment didn't surprise me. The signs were obvious: Keeping him away from the press; minimizing his public appearances; quickly glossing over and getting him to back away from comments that indicated he couldn't remember one country from another (as in Beirut as opposed to Israel). There was no doubt that, at 77, he was slowing up. What nobody knew--in fact we still don't know and we may never know-- how much his decision-making was taken over by others as he became little more than a figurehead.

Or not. Bill O'Reilly's research led him to hidden places. He wrote the book "Killing Reagan" as part of his "Killing" series, and discovered that James Cannon, a White House aide, wrote a memo to Chief of Staff Howard Baker in 1987--just about when my acquaintance worked in the Situation Room--that suggested "the possibility that relieving the president of his duties (i.e. invoking the 25th Amendment) might be in order." But Cannon also recanted that memo, or so said Reagan's Attorney General, Edward Meese. Both are deceased now.

But what caused Cannon to recant? Was he honestly mistaken, incorrectly analyzing some obvious mistake Reagan made for senility? Or was he leaned on by less objective sources who wanted to protect Reagan's legacy? If so, who leaned on him? Could that source have been Reagan's wife, Nancy, who brooked no criticism of her husband, ever, and was one person who people never crossed if they could help it?

George Will, conservative columnist and one with far more credibility with the mainstream press, because he belonged to it and still does, writing occasionally for The Washington Post, spoke out against O'Reilly almost immediately after the latter's research became public. Will's wife, after all, was a member of the Reagan administration's communications team, so he took her support to heart, as husbands tend to do. If you add Will's stature, O'Reilly's findings were quickly quashed and we all went on with this nagging question being left in our minds. 

Of course O'Reilly objected to people who never wished to conduct further scrutiny: "It is preposterous that there wasn't an intense concern about the president's mental state shortly after the Iran-Contra scandal broke," he later said, about ten years ago. "That is a fact, and it is disturbing that Reagan loyalists have attacked us for pointing it out."

It's possible that it's both. Reagan died of Alzheimer's disease, that awful diminishment of the mind. Could it have begun while he was in the White House? Yes, indeed it could have. His moments of lucidity, though, might have outnumbered his moments of vacating memory, at least for that time; Alzheimer's doesn't attack all at once.

But it's clear, from O'Reilly's standpoint, that Iran-Contra brought Reagan's infirmity into clarity, or should have. I have little doubt that Cannon's memo was nothing less than a vetting of conversations that he either had been privy to or had had himself; White House memos are rarely justified by mere brainstorms. And O'Reilly found it, or discovered its existence. Such is what happens when someone wants someone else to remember something.

That, too, is a cover-up, one that continues. History is robbed by it. Someone should unearth it for the sake of clarity and future considerations.

We are left with the malady that afflicts White House insiders under these circumstances: that if you try hard enough, you can fool yourself into thinking that your boss still has all his marbles, or at least enough to continue in the job without attacks on that basis. There's an enormous difference, though, between Reagan's situation and that of Joe Biden: Reagan was well into his second term. I'm sure those that knew about his mental faculties had an unspoken--maybe spoken but maybe not recorded anywhere; an assumption with a wink and a nod--agreement to take him in for what's called a 'soft landing', where no great national crisis takes place and other people take over decisions for him.

Joe Biden, on the other hand, wanted desperately to defeat 47 and continue his policies--who wouldn't--so his aides were in a far more impossible position: try to fake his lucidity through the grinding of another nationwide campaign and on through another four years. But the debate tore the curtain back from that Wizard of Oz; there was nowhere else to hide, no spinning that would suffice.

Who was his most ferocious defender? Once again--Jill, his wife, who people didn't want to cross. As you might figure. Biden did, finally, accede to logic and polling, and stepped aside. But it's now clear that the smoothing over and covering up of his infirmities began far before last July. It's just that, as the public and its media keep doing, as wishful thinking drives us to accept, we refused to confirm what our eyes clearly saw--the halting stride, the garbled speaking, the forgetting of details.

Could we have been saved from this present effort to erode democracy? Maybe. We'll never know because Democrats, in their shared desire to smooth over challenges, because no one wanted to be the first to cry wolf. They took Biden's endorsement, didn't outwardly question the mentality behind it, and nominated Kamala Harris, who became one of the great disappointments in presidential campaign history, right up there with Michael Dukakis, who also somehow snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. And now we (again) have a corrupt, terrible president who is not only amoral, but may in fact be also losing his marbles, little by little, and who will certainly resist any future soothsayer who suggests that he should step down.

Granted, the 25th Amendment is there for such a situation. But as has been noted in this space, a president's Cabinet isn't likely to be the first to acknowledge such a potentially damaging dilemma; it's likely to be the last. So we need another Constitutional amendment putting a ceiling on, perhaps, the age at which someone can be elected president--allowing for someone to cross that line if already in office. We have a basement age, 35, already in the Constitution; why not a ceiling? Let's call it 70, so if someone happens to begin his first term at 69, he won't be older than 77 when he leaves office.

It would have take Joe Biden out of the running in 2020, true. But look what happened. Look where we are. Look where we could be. He could have also won, for one thing, and now he's been diagnosed with metastasizing, prostate cancer. But someone else could have won, too, someone who would have inspired more confidence than a decent but failing leader.  It's worth more than a passing thought.

Be well. Be careful. With some luck, I'll see you down the road.

Mister Mark

A Third Term? The Loopholes Are All There

Everybody is scared to death of a lot of things now, but especially of 47 being president for the rest of his life.

I wish I could tell you not to worry. But worry. Worry a lot, talk a lot about it, and stay in touch with political things, even though heaven knows that's the last thing many of us want to do.

Because I see no reason why it couldn't happen, at least as far as the Constitution is concerned. The loopholes are all there, because of course nobody expected someone like this to ever be president--someone who destroys all the guardrails in a relentless, ugly pursuit of absolute power which he abuses every day. Not to mention getting elected twice. Not to mention getting re-elected with a plurality of votes once.

Steve Bannon, culture wrecker extraordinaire, hinted strongly at this possibility on Bill Maher's show a couple of weeks ago: He said, "(47) will be president of the United States on the afternoon of January 20, 2029. We're studying it now."

It really doesn't take a lot of study. I looked and yes, it is possible. Yes, if everyone has their price and can be bought off. Yes, especially if a Republican is elected president in 2028, and yes, within constitutional means. Then, it's highly probable. I'm not sure that it can happen as quickly as Bannon suggests, but within a month or two of that presidential term, the ducks can all be in line. A true coup d'etat can take place, with the pretense of legitimacy cloaking devastating shenanigans.

It comes down to this: First, figure out who would make absurdly loyal stooges to serve as stand-ins for the next Republican ticket.

Second, make an attractive deal that promises them positions they would crave.

Third, persuade Congress (it doesn't matter who's running it; see below) to go along with the deal.

Fourth, get 47 appointed president by proscribed constitutional means.

The 22nd Amendment was put there because the Republicans didn't want a president like Franklin D. Roosevelt, a Democrat who had been elected four times, to keep being president more than two terms. That much power has to have limits, the thinking went. They obviously no longer think so. But within what looks like an ironclad firewall there is a loophole provided by another amendment, the 25th--one that nobody thought about, I'm quite sure.

It's time to start thinking about it, instead of avoiding difficult, uncomfortable conversations about what's "unthinkable." Because this clown has made nothing "unthinkable" anymore. People are still trying to get used to that. They'd better hurry up. 

Because the longer it's not faced, the stronger the possibility is that 47 can become, well, technically 48, but probably 50: The more possible momentum can be established and the public caught unaware.

The 22nd Amendment says that no one can be elected president more than twice. 47 can still be president, though, because the way a person can be vice-president was updated by the 25th Amendment. That provides more than one way for 47 to sneak in the back door, so to speak and to make it as legal as crossing the street on a crosswalk.

The 25th Amendment was passed in 1967 because upon Kennedy's assassination, the normal, legal succession to the presidency revealed potentially, at least, a real problem: the next man after vice-president Lyndon Johnson was the Speaker of the House, John McCormick, who was already 73 (my age, by the way). The next person up, the president pro-tem of the Senate, a mainly ceremonial position, was Carl Hayden, who was already 86. That fragile succession chain set off shivers on Capitol Hill. The solution is contained in that amendment, but because of the unwieldy methodology the Constitution proscribes, it still took four years to get it accomplished.

So we now have a process that says that the moment a sitting president fails to still be president, be it by death, removal, or resignation, the vice-president becomes president, even without the swearing-in ceremony. In today's far more dangerous world, that provides the security of instantaneous succession and no arguments made.

All well and good. But within that new process is room for plenty of mischief.

Let's say for a minute that 47, with disingenuous pompousness, says that he won't run for a third term. That can, first of all, hide his true intention, because he doesn't have to remain president to regain power as president. No, he doesn't.

And let's say that a Republican, say J.D. Vance, gets elected in his stead. Vance gets a running mate, say Majorie Taylor Greene, the ridiculous, blaring, incredibly stupid congresswoman from Georgia, as slavishly devoted to 47 as anyone has ever been. That's part of the plan.

And they are secretly persuaded--each one--to become president for a number of days, even to plan appointing (or keeping) a new or old Cabinet, to make sure of a rubber stamp. Then the process begins.

47 keeps denying that he'll have anything to do with the White House anymore, just like he denied having anything to do with the Project 2025 Heritage Foundation plan, which has clearly been his blueprint all along. But continuously lying is his watchword, not that anybody would ever call him on it.

The election takes place. The restrictions on voting are tightened signficantly, and once again, bushels upon bushels of money are brought for ads in swing states like Wisconsin to intimidate and brainwash average voters into believing that Republicans have any thought of prioritizing their needs (which, clearly, they have already proven not to). It works just like it did last time, since the Democrats are afraid of alienating any of the minority groups which make up their coalition; last time it was those who supported trans- rights, this time events will bring some other fringe group forward for attention. So the Electoral College, backwards and obsolete, left there because our method of changing the Constitution is clumsy and obsolete as well, elects Vance and Greene president and vice-president through a now-often used irregularity. Or not, if things go as they did in 2024. 

Now the deal is struck: In the so-called lame duck time, Vance elicits a promise from 47 to become, say, Secretary of State, replacing whomever is there in what will be a token position for four years; take the recent displacement of Marco Rubio. And Greene will be promised something else just as juicy, say Attorney General, Treasury Secretary, or Homeland Security Secretary, since she's been mouthing off about those pesky foreigners endlessly. Their loyalties have already been tested and secured, so that shouldn't be a problem for 47, since he's appointed endlessly incompetent stand-ins so far anyhow.

So Vance is inaugurated, enters the Oval Office on the afternoon of January 20, 2029 as the 48th president, and writes a letter of resignation, making the redoubtable Marjorie Taylor Greene the first woman president of the United States, number 49, for exactly as long as it takes for her to appoint 47 the vice-president and sit out the process proscribed by the 25th Amendment. Now comes the hard part: both houses of Congress must approve that appointment by majority vote. That's controlled by us, but so what? Would a new Democratic Congress actually let Greene sit in the White House instead of 47? Talk about the lesser of two evils....Then, upon approval, she resigns herself and yields the bully pulpit right back to him.

What happens if she reneges on her promise to step aside? 47 could nudge the Cabinet, filled with his appointees, remember, to bring to a vote her ability to run the country, as the 25th Amendment allows. With threats galore and their positions on the line, they would naturally comply. Congress would have to decide within 21 days, and it would have the same choice--the devil or the deep blue sea. A bit more challenging, but possible.

Can that happen? You bet it can. 47 will not have been elected president again. He can't, and he won't. But he doesn't need to. He will have been appointed president. There's nothing in the Constitution that says that a former president, even Barack Obama or George W. Bush, both of whom won two terms as well, cannot be vice-president: Nothing. And thus be appointed through the president's resignation. So he can, and you can bet your last dollar that he would.

It's a transaction, assuming that Vance and Greene, or any other combination of two Republicans, would accept deals. And as intimidated and awed as they apparently are, based on their public comments, that seems a simple enough exchange. There would be no bribery, no money exchanging hands. For Republicans, the trick would be to get two people who would be inclined to go along with it. Maybe it wouldn't be Vance and Greene. That would take some risky vetting, but what's that compared to a grab for ultimate power?

Has such a corrupt bargain taken place before? Well, if you believe what the Democrats accused John Quincy Adams of in 1828, there has. Adams, Andrew Jackson, Henry Clay, and one other candidate ran for president that year: Adams, the incumbent president; Jackson, the hero of the Battle of New Orleans, who had the most electoral votes of the four; and Clay, the Speaker of the House, who was a distant third. The three stood for election in the House of Representatives, still the method the Constitution requires upon such a circumstance, where each state delegation gets one vote. Some House Speakers are more or less placeholders, the way Mike Johnson is now, something of a 47 sycophant; others are highly influential. Clay fit the latter description, so although Jackson had won the most electoral votes, Adams came from behind to beat him in the House. Then, in what caused Jackson supporters endless howling, Adams made Clay his Secretary of State. In fact, they called it the "corrupt bargain," even though Adams denied that such a deal had been struck.

If everyone does as promised, though, this deal would be done, and nobody could sue successfully (You really think this Supreme Court would get in the way?) to stop it. If necessary, the same thing could happen in 2033, even if 47, now president number 50, would be 86 by then. Yes, he will eventually die, but what's to keep him from doing the same thing with his sons, or maybe one son, then the next? We would have a constitutional monarchy, sure as the air you breathe; truly a banana republic. America, as we know it, would be destroyed within a fetid fog of legitimacy.

There are no roadblocks available. No changes in the Constitution could take place because the methodology asks for us to leap too high a bar; don't even think about it. The only thing we could do is elect a Democratic president. That has proven, amazingly, to be too much of a challenge to overcome so far. But the Democratic Party has to do some honest-to-goodness soul searching to keep its shaky coalition together and yet elect a good person to the position.

It's the only way out now, even if 47 would make what would be his usual stink about an election being "stolen." We would have to endure that, but that's been done before. It's the only way our democracy, as tattered as it is, can last. It's breathtaking that it has come to this, but it has, where one political party can, and would, strangle our way of life in a mindless grab for absolute power. The planning for it is happening now, I'm sorry to say. It must be stopped.

Be well. Be careful. With some luck, I'll see you down the road.

Mister Mark