The world is losing its mind. It's irritating as hell. First we had this free-for-all in Charlottesville followed by the President abdicating any moral leadership he ever had and now we're very busy tearing down statues. It's madness.
As for the Trump thing, it matters that he equivocated. There are no "very fine people" in a neo-nazi rally. They don't exist. Hold, on, I can hear you now "well what about Antifa?" Antifa used violence as well. That's bad too but we cannot tolerate nazi-ism or White Supremacists in our country for we know where that leads. The President needed to say that nazis are bad. That doesn't seem complicated or difficult to me. Honestly, a politician in 2017 doesn't get points for being able to articulate such a position. However, that second statement where he finally indicated that this was all bad didn't contain what Trump has in his heart. We saw that at that free for all press conference. I'm disappointed in him.
The wreckage that followed has been substantial. His two big business councils have evaporated – that really shocked me. Big time CEO's don't walk away from a power center like that easily. Bannon is gone and the President's inner circle is as constricted as ever. His Presidency is in serious jeopardy of just not mattering anymore. Honestly, he needs to man up, forget about Twitter and do what the people elected him to do. He's behaving like a 5 year old and whether you like the guy or not having a failed presidency isn't helpful.
What's followed is a rush to pull down statues, etc. celebrating / recognizing civil war era Confederate generals. In my view, there's way more heat than light around this issue. The Federal government doesn't need to be passing laws or any sort of judgment as to the appropriateness of these actions. Frankly, neither do the states but states, and southern states in particular, despite their "freedom loving" majorities tend to be overwhelmingly paternalistic. Virginia is no different so the state is involved in the debate. Honestly, this is a question for the localities to answer. I'd like to see a more public process than what happened in Baltimore but at the end of the day if the folks in Baltimore or Manassas or Richmond don't want those statues, it isn't anyone else's business. Ideally there would be public hearings or maybe even a body to study the issue but any methodology that involves the public before the Council / Board of Supervisors makes a decision would be good. If the folks in those towns don't like the decision they should find new representatives. This is the way that most big decisions need to be made and when they aren't (like the police station project here in Manassas – zero input) then the citizens don't respond well. It's an intensely local issue and it should stay that way.
What's going to happen next? Well, the republicans have a hellish September in front of them. They have to pass a deficit cap increase and a budget. The leadership keeps talking about tax reform but I'm pretty skeptical. If they get with the Democrats and figure out something that can pass with support from both parties then maybe. Otherwise, we'll have more of the same….nothingburger drama from our leadership.