Jay Kuten: Republicans claim big wins

Senator Al Franken: Pawn sacrificed to checkmate a king? Photo/AP

NORMALLY I'm put off by conspiracy theories, because they rest on the improbable to explain phenomena that have straightforward explanations or are simply inexplicable — like UFOs.

Except that we're not living in normal times. We're in improbable times when a thoroughly disreputable individual who brags of assaulting women is in the White House. Where politics are concerned, one man's conspiracy theory is simply another's political dirty tactics.

For all the talk in the media of internecine warfare in the White House and of the Republican Party's disarray, they seem to be winning. They're passing tax measures that enrich their donor class — the rich — and emburden the middle class.

President Donald Trump, himself, is eliminating protections for the integrity of the financial system, and the safety of the US environment and that of the planet.

Democrats, meanwhile, are absenting themselves from the messy business of legislating and seeking instead "the moral high ground", while shooting themselves in the foot.
In minority they are flailing about and have, until now, had no strategy to thwart Republican intentions nor one to marshall their several constituencies for the fight to retake Congress in 2018 or the presidency in 2020.

In a similar spot in 2008, Republicans succeeded in obstructing Obama at nearly every turn.
In search of a strategy, Democrats seem to have found one in the issue of sexual harassment. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand and her supporters believe that their absolutism on sexual harassment — even if it ignores due process — is a winning one to bring about the downfall of Donald Trump.

Removing Senator Al Franken has been likened to a classic chess move of sacrificing a pawn to checkmate the king.

But what if Franken's status were more like that of a bishop, or rook, not simply a pawn?
An interesting speculative theory has emerged from the affiliations of several of Franken's accusers with Fox News, a Republican outlet.

Senator Franken is almost single-handedly responsible for the present state of the investigation into possible collusion between Trump and the Russians.

During the confirmation hearings on Jeff Sessions' appointment as Attorney General, Franken vigorously questioned the nominee, asking repeatedly whether he, Sessions, had met with the Russians during the campaign. Sessions denied it only to have proof of such meetings emerge.

Rather than face perjury charges, Sessions subsequently recused himself from any future inquiry into possible collusion. That recusal, which infuriated Trump to the point of calling Sessions names and threatening his job, was what led to the appointment of former FBI chief Robert Mueller, a man with impeccable credentials for integrity and persistence to head the investigation.

The claims against Franken, according to this theory, were organised by Trump's minions as a hit job in payment for the Sessions debacle. In this scenario, Senator Gillibrand was weaponised to bring down Franken in a political scheme to have the Democrats eliminate their own effective senator.

The attempt to also bring down Trump by the same charges is wishful thinking. Republicans voted for him despite knowledge of his behavior. Republicans are playing chess while the Democrats play checkers.

From the standpoint of political effectiveness, score this one a big round for Trump et al.
With the assistance of Gillibrand and the 30 Democrats in her posse, they've just removed one of the most likely successful presidential contenders for 2020.

The Democratic party is rife with division between the Clinton and Sanders wings, between the so-called centrists and the genuine populists. Franken was one of the few whose institutional support and hard-working wonk style and legislative effort on behalf of the disadvantaged, women and minorities, allowed him to bridge the gap.

With Franken gone, Democrats will have to look hard for another candidate who can appeal to both constituencies. For now, the Democrats have done the Republicans' dirty work for them in eliminating a credible compromise candidate, compromising their chances for 2020 in the process.

Jay Kuten

■ Jay Kuten is an American-trained forensic psychiatrist who emigrated to New Zealand for the fly fishing. He spent 40 years comforting the afflicted and intends to spend the rest afflicting the comfortable.