I think we're looking at the hamstringing of the Trump residency (at first that was a typo, but I like it and so I'm keepin' it) rather than its end stage. The end stage will be in 2020 when the country overwhelmingly votes that idiot manchild out of office, and the people who supported him will finally be forced to realize how much most of this country resents them for having foisted that idiot on us.
Trump will likely get impeached by then... but impeachment doesn't necessarily mean removal from office. Clinton was impeached but served out his term. Nixon resigned before he could be impeached; he'd likely have been removed from office, but, he took himself down, first. Trump will never resign, because Trump is unable to admit, even to himself, that he's crooked and incompetent. He's led a life in a money-bubble and has never been in a situation where he hasn't gotten away with the horrible stuff he does, because no one's ever held him accountable.
And, for the most part, the Republican party -- who have always been cult-minded conformists and are only getting worse as time goes on and their "news" outlets more aggressively brainwash their low-end-of-the-curve little minds -- have been enabling Trump, too. Because he's all they have. They don't like him, they made a bad choice picking him, but they
need him.
Look at their situation and it's not hard to understand, really: they're
embarrassed. In 2000 they elected an idiot who had to be installed by court order. Dubya was a moron who tanked the economy and made the world even more unstable by invading Iraq, a country that had nothin' to do with nothin'... one of America's biggest mistakes. He made America look not-all-that-bright. And to make it even more embarrassing, Dubya did this following a successful Democratic president. Bill Clinton, personally, is a sleazebag of the highest magnitude,
but he got the economy booming, built up America overseas, gave incredible speeches... overall he was great for the country, despite being an asshole personally. Dubya, in contrast, was a dumb guy who fouled everything up. He's a better husband than Bill, for sure, you could trust him around interns, no problem, but in every way that really matters, he was a disaster.
Then Obama came in, fixed all Dubya's messes, boomed the economy and jobs market, had no real scandals that some fucking FOX-washed morons didn't have to invent, and was a good husband on top of it. Republicans tried to demonize him because (A) it's what the little simpletons do, and (B) they
had to: a
Democrat, and a
black one on top of it, came in and showed them up in every possible way. The Republican base looked like the dumb voters who make bad decisions, the Republican president and congress looked like the stupid ones who make lousy choices and weren't good for the economy... it was
humiliating. They
needed the Democratic president to fail, too, and he didn't, despite their best efforts.
They were desperate not to have that happen again... especially from a Democratic
woman, and one named
Clinton, who they'd been Limbaugh-trained to hate like Satan-Satan-Satan. It's understandable, party-over-country-wise. But, unable to overcome the baser instincts of the basest base in the game, they crawled over a pile of not-good-but-far-better candidates (I'm
not looking at Ted Cruz there, but, almost everybody else) to elect the silliest, nastiest clown, because (A) he was on teevee and they like teevee, as long as it's dumb, silly, colorful, and makes loud noises, (B) he didn't make any secret of hating blacks and Mexicans and played to all their stereotypes about 'em, and (C) had that authoritarian thing that gets their nose open (probably daddy issues), and (D) came up with all kinds of fun nasty nicknames for the people they hate and since
he's doing it, they don't have to try any harder -- they can just cheer. Politics has become "team sports" now and Trump's good at making people feel good about hatin' the other team. Sarah Palin also tapped into that. It's become one of the core principles of the Republican party, and one of the few they actually keep -- they don't watch the budget, they don't shrink the government, they don't really give you more freedoms, that's all just lip service. What the party's mostly about now is
just hatin' Democrats. I can get that -- some of the SJW people are overbearing whiners. Not so much you should foul up the country just to spite them, but, I get the motivation. They're irritants, you want to scratch them.
Problem is, their dumb bright-shiny-object-chasin' base picked an
even worse loser than Dubya to follow an
even better president than Bill Clinton, and so now they're embarrassed all over again, even worse. It's become clear to anybody paying attention who the Stupid Person's Party is. Not that the Democrats are so great -- they really aren't, there's a lot that's annoying about 'em -- but, comparatively? Not even a contest. Unless you're eating paste, believing bearded ghosts in nightgowns battle pointy-tailed devils for control of the world, and are deathly afraid of anyone with melanin, there's really no reason to be a part of the G.O.P. at this point. But they're not gonna admit it 'cuz that'd mean
daddy was wrong! 
So, they're going to cling to Trump all the way down, they're going to say all the stuff he did is just "fake news," they're going to believe silly shit like "Uranium One" and repeat it like a catechism, they're going to hoover that FOX TV-teat no matter how wrongheaded it gets, because they're a cult now. If they believe horn-honkin'-clown-acts like "Pizzagate," then "the deep state's out to get our otherwise-wonderful president who everybody actually
loves!" is easy to sell themselves. The party of Reagan's now going to
side with the Russians just because the Democrats don't like 'em. Cult 45's going to sell the flag away, just out of reactionary spite.
And really, the only way out of this is voting. They've got to be shown that most of the country rejects them. It's gotta be hard, ugly, and overwhelming enough that they can't lie to themselves about where they stand anymore. It's gotta be such a vote-down that it can't be ignored, a grab-'em-by-the-scruff-of-their-neck-and-rub-their-nose-in-the-carpet moment. Impeachment-for-removal-from-office won't do that, because that'll just be put down as a "witch-hunt cabal" story. I
think Democrats know that, but maybe I give 'em too much credit. We'll see.
The best scenario is really that Trump stays in office making a fool out of himself and continuing to wreck his party, but congress keeps the country afloat and we just bide our time 'til the American people throw him out on his fat ugly face so hard it leaves an orange spray-tan skidmark all the way to the curb of Pennsylvania Avenue. Weaken him, lame-duck him, work around him, then show him the door without granting the party a second chance by giving 'em a replacement. And then, when the Democrats get back in, they have to do a good job again, like they did the last two times, hopefully even better.
I'm not just interested in getting rid of Trump. I want that Republican party's collective neck exposed so we can ear-to-ear that sumbitch and watch it bleed out. It's a lousy party, it's wrecked my state for decades, I've watched it wreck the country every time it's given a chance, and it needs to be finally done away with. It's had plenty of shots and it keeps failing. And the people who support it don't deserve a place at the table of ideas 'cuz they honestly aren't smart enough. They're easily tricked, they believe crazy shit, their ideas provably
do not work, and we can't afford to be nice about it anymore just 'cuz they don't want to feel dumb. I know I'm mean about that, but, sorry, I got that way by watching what they do, over and over again, and living amongst 'em and knowing what kind of people they are. They don't need to be making decisions that affect everyone else when I seldom run into any who haven't made a shambles of their own lives. The less influence they have, the better. If that's harsh, then it is.
The only good that Trump's really doing is wrecking their brand so people don't view them as a reasonable option anymore. Then we can work on improving what's left... which isn't so great, either. But you can't really do much effective landscaping until you clear out the dead wood. And, a lot of people's denial aside, Trump is making it clear where all of that is...
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