Listen to the leaders of the Democratic Party, and it seems America is in some of its most dire straits in its history. In an interview with NPR regarding President Trump's assertion that he can break any law he wants, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said: "We do not have a dictatorship. The Founding Fathers did not want a king." Sounds bad!
And he's not wrong. Even if Trump doesn't break the Constitution, his administration is going backwards on climate change — the most important problem facing America and the world — at a critical hinge point in the trajectory of world carbon dioxide emissions. He's got to go as soon as possible, and Democrats are the only ones who can make it happen.
But despite what he says, Schumer is neither treating Trump as the enormous crisis he in fact is, nor mounting a remotely effective opposition. He is just not up to the task history demands of him.
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Probably Schumer's worst characteristic is that he is consistently using President Trump and Republican control of Congress as a handy opportunity to allow through a bunch of things rank-and-file Democrats hate.
As a fanatical Israel partisan, he has long disliked the Iran deal. He voted against it in 2015 despite the fact that it was widely popular among Democrats (and has only become more so) — oh, and also was President Obama's greatest foreign policy accomplishment. Schumer mustered limp at best opposition to Trump's decision to renege on the deal, arguing mainly that it hurt the ability to attack Iran for other actions (read: things Israel doesn't like). Schumer similarly advocated for and celebrated the decision to move the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, a wildly provocative move that was opposed by most of the Democratic Party.
