The Man Who Would Be King Has Needs

Kevin Necessary

Has it been only 100 days? Why, seems like only yesterday that we had a president who exhibited dignity and grace. Now we have some kind of weird hybrid with bad impulse control, poor judgment, and the emotional stability of a rich, spoiled brat.

Trump wants more power. He's talking about getting it via doing away with the Senate filibuster. There have been times when we've all hated the filibuster, but no one hates it more than Trump-the-Impulsive.

In Trump's interview with Fox News that aired Friday night, it was pretty clear what -- and who -- he's prepared to declare war on to consolidate and expand his own power:

“We don't have a lot of closers in politics, and I understand why: It's a very rough system. It's an archaic system.”

“You look at the rules of the Senate, even the rules of the House — but the rules of the Senate and some of the things you have to go through — it's really a bad thing for the country, in my opinion. They're archaic rules. And maybe at some point we're going to have to take those rules on, because, for the good of the nation, things are going to have to be different.”

“You can't go through a process like this. It's not fair. It forces you to make bad decisions. I mean, you're really forced into doing things that you would normally not do except for these archaic rules.”

Trump is hungry for more power, and the Senate -- the whole Congress, for that matter -- stands in his way. Back in February (you might remember), Trump implied that the judiciary doesn't -- or shouldn't -- have the power to question him as president. He has said that he admires Putin because he's a strong man who brooks no opposition, and he put in the famous call to President Erdogan of Turkey congratulating him for expanding and consolidating his power over the Turkish people. "Atta boy!"

True, many Republican senators are terrified of T Rex. Witness the craven waffling of Sen. Dick Burr who couldn't bring himself to take even preliminary steps to secure information about the Russian interference in our election and the collusion of the Trump campaign in that project. But others may not be so compliant, like McCain and Graham and even Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.

Trump is putting pressure on the Senate to do away with the filibuster so that a simple Republican majority can give him everything he wants. But there may not actually be anything like "a simple Republican majority" in the Senate currently, not with this imperialistic ego in the White House. Republican senators who value the historic role of that body, and the valuable "cooling down" of hurtful impulses that the filibuster provides, may not be so ready to release the Kraken.