For awhile during the year things looked pretty bleak. The Biden Administration’s efforts to pass legislation to advance the Democratic domestic agenda were going nowhere. The Supreme Court’s conservative majority threw its weight around to scuttle Roe v. Wade’s constitutional right to abortion thereby upsetting millions of women and a significant majority of all Americans. The Russian Army was rolling across Ukraine intending to drag that unwilling country back into the Russian controlled orbit. Inflation was rearing its ugly head in the U.S. causing the Federal Reserve to initiate huge hikes in the interest rate in an effort to control the inflation. And new strains of Covid were causing increased infections threatening the relaxation of Covid control policies.

Adding to the somewhat unhappy outlook for the year were the impending mid-term elections. The out of office political party (the Republicans) typically picks up a sizeable number of both Congressional and Senatorial seats in off-year elections and the Republicans were on the march. Their ads were everywhere, condemning everything the Biden Administration had done as both useless, destroying the economy and creating the inflation which was eating away at everyone’s pocketbook. The polls and periodic interviews with “real” Americans seemed to support the idea that America was unhappy with the economy and the Biden Administration and that a red wave was the likely result of the impending election. Conservatives everywhere were going to be swept into federal, state and local offices, including Trump supporting election deniers who would take over the election supervising offices in key states to ensure that Trump and other “true” conservatives never lost another election (because it only happened as a result of massive fraud by the socialist Democrats). The Democrats would lose control of both houses of Congress, the Biden Administration’s plans would be thrown into the wastebasket, and a new wave of retributive Congressional investigations would begin into Democratic “criminal” activity. Even the Democrats seemed to be resigned to this scenario.

But to America’s great credit, the ship of state righted itself. Voters proved smarter than pollsters and political talking-heads; Ukraine and its army proved they were not about to be forced back into a Russian controlled orbit; new vaccines and built-up immunity controlled new strains of Covid allowing the American economy, schools and everyday life to open back up and flourish again, and various states began enacting protections for abortions.

The voters showed, again and again, including in the red state of Kansas, they supported abortion rights despite the Supreme Court’s opinion overturning Roe v. Wade. The voters also showed, again and again, by supporting rational moderates and rejecting right wing extremists for state officials controlling elections, that they care about democracy and believe our electoral system is sound. The voters also showed that while they were unhappy with some aspects of governmental policies and some elected officials, they weren’t unhappy enough to just ”throw the rascals out”. The election was basically a split decision which is a pretty decent outcome for the Biden Administration and the Democrats.

The Republicans elected enough additional Congressmen to take over the House but by a very small margin, and they failed to elect any additional Senators leaving the Democrats in charge of that body. Trump anointed “crazies” were largely defeated for all offices from Senator and Governor down through local election officials. The Democrats, and apparently the country at large breathed a large sigh of relief. Maybe the election – denying, conspiracy theory loving, autocratic leaning, white Christian nationalist fever had broken and the country could return to normal political bickering.

Don’t hold your breath – it ain’t going to be that easy. Many new Trump chosen candidates may have lost, but many of his old supporters won, including extremists like Marjorie Taylor Green, House and Senate members who voted against certifying the 2020 Presidential election results, and, of course, Kevin McCarthy, the newly elected Speaker of the House, who is now owned completely by the wingnuts. Trump’s loyal and vocal, radical populist supporters still form the solid core of the Republican Party’s base (despite their possible preference now for strongly reelected Florida Governor Ron DeSantis). They demonstrated both their power and their direction in preventing McCarthy from winning the Speakership until he bowed to their will after 14 unsuccessful ballots. Consequently, we can expect the House to engage in tit for tat investigations of Biden Administrative officials, the FBI, Justice Department, and Intelligence community as well as Hunter Biden and the President himself. The House conservatives also give every indication of intending to undermine any ongoing or intended investigation or prosecution of Trump or any other significant conservative figure or organization. We can also expect the House to stymie all Democratic initiatives as well as proposing radical Republican initiatives such as Senator Scott’s idea of sunsetting Social Security and Medicare every 5 years.

Adding to these reasons why we haven’t really turned any political corner yet are the facts that: I) the Evangelicals and white Christian nationalists haven’t gone away or changed their stripes; 2) the conservative Supreme Court hasn’t changed ( notwithstanding new Justice Jackson) and can be expected to continue ripping apart progressive laws and court decisions since the Eisenhower Administration; 3) the Fox News rabble rousers and the liars and conspiracy theorists are still with us; and 4) radical progressives in the Democratic Party keep giving all of the above lots of reasons to remain angry and alienated.

But wait, the year is likely to prove even more contentious than the above suggests. We haven’t even mentioned the report of the January 6 Committee which is smoldering over at the Justice Department ready to light a new Trump directed legal conflagration. On top of that are the other on-going Trump investigations, including the Special Counsel looking into Trump’s handling of classified documents at Mar-A-Lago (more on that below), the Georgia District Attorney’s investigation of his attempted interference with the Georgia presidential vote count, and the New York investigations into his business and tax practices.

On the other side of the political ledger sheet will be investigations by House committees into Hunter Biden’s business affairs and any questionable involvement therein of Joe Biden while Vice-President or President; and now, thanks to Joe Biden’s inexcusably negligent handling of classified information, a Special Counsel investigation into that. Ordinarily, one could assume because there are investigations into both Presidents’ handling of classified information, political expediency would lead them both to be resolved without charges being filed. But since they are both being handled by Special Counsels, political expediency may not be a factor.

Finally, there is the ongoing war in Ukraine which shows no signs of settlement and every possibility of growing larger. Despite growing disagreement in conservative Republican ranks with our ever-growing funding of the Ukraine war effort, it seems evident that the U.S. along with NATO allies will not only keep supporting Ukraine but will also, somewhat reluctantly, start sending more modern weapons systems, including tanks, to Ukraine to counter any Russian effort to turn the war in its favor. More importantly, during this year, the West will have to take a closer look at whether this isn’t the best opportunity to really hand Putin a defeat and force him out of office. At the same time, they will probably have to face down harsher nuclear saber rattling from Putin, who knows his army can’t win against a Ukraine armed with modern western weapons. This, not the Trump litigations or the machinations of the Republican radicals in charge of the House, may well be the most important issue of this year, both for the President and for the country.

THT

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