Since Friday I’ve been hearing a great deal about how the Mueller Report and/or the Barr Letter have eased, if not out right eliminated, any threat the Russian interference with the 2016 elections has for Trump or the GOP. I would beg to differ.
First let’s assume that the Mueller Report does clear the Trump Presidential campaign of any knowing cooperation with the Russians. Next lets also assume it show that no one in the campaign did anything that can be said to be obstruction of justice (this is a big assumption as some of the people involved in the campaign actually did do things publicly). This still doe not mean that the Report does not contain anything damaging to Pres. Trump, his family, his associates, or the GOP in general. What I’d like to suggest is that the Mueller Report contains evidence proving that some, if not all, of the GOP or the Trump group were and are “useful idiots”. (See https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Useful_idiot )
Being seen as a Useful Idiot is a bigger danger to both the Trump Presidency and to the GOP than showing a few people in the Trump Campaign and/or Presidency knowingly cooperated with the Russian effort for a. Very simple reason. If they had, they could be ostracized as “bad” people who are not like everyone else in the party or administration. But being show to be Useful Idiots can and will taint both the Administration and the GOP as a whole.
Just consider this little ‘though Experiment ‘:
Cabinet member puts forth a ‘new’ and radical idea, say like defunding the Special Olympics. If the Mueller Report has show that a fair number of the Trump administration were co-opted as “Useful Idiots” by the Russians how can said Cabinet member defend themselves from the charge that they are still being used as “Useful Idiots” now?
Also, both administrations and political parties can survive and recover from corruption and/or criminal charges, even ones that have been proven true. What they can not survive is being shown to be both stupid and a laughingstock. If you don’t think the GOP isn’t worried about this just look at some of the hysteria going on in the Houes of Repressives right now. Look at what the Administration is doing now, like the No-plan plan to replace the ACA once the courts remove it. Or look at just what the Administration is doing about the massive flooding in the mid-west.
It is like one of my professors said “politicians can weather almost anything but being shown to being stupid”. I have said for many years that “In politics, stupidity is the only capital crime.”