Could Trump’s History Finally Combine With Current Events To Bring His Downfall?

By Donald A. Collins | 13 January 2025
Church and State

(Credit: YouTube / screengrab)

My, my, my! How poised Trump seems to be to mutilate US and even world governance. We all await with bated breath the inauguration and his actions promised shortly thereafter.

His no sentence conviction in NYC for his porn queen funding seems another example of his complete capacity to escape unscathed from any behavior.

Read here this latest escape.

Bill Kristol, a long-time neo-conservative who left the GOP in 2020 and became a serious critic of Trump, noted in a recant column that,

Donald Trump seems to be enjoying his time as president-elect. Why wouldn’t he? He’s a winner. He’s the center of all attention, and the recipient of all capitulation. He’s the biggest man on the biggest campus—and there are no classes yet, and no exams.

But there is one thing about being president-elect: You become president. And then you’re in charge. You’re responsible. You have to govern.

And there’s no reason to think Trump will be good at governing. He wasn’t the first time, and the second term will be worse. He won’t be constrained this time by some responsible people within the administration, or by elements of the Republican party not yet entirely cowed by him. And he’ll be backed and egged on by an authoritarian movement that is far stronger and more radical than it was at the beginning—or even at the end—of his first term.

Beginning January 20, it will be Trump’s show. From the most trivial things to the most weighty, the power will emanate from and the buck will stop at Trump’s Oval Office.

Malcolm Gladwell’s new book, “Revenge of The Tipping Point”, recalls that relatively small events can initiate massive changes in public attitudes and huge consequential reactions. Example, one unknown carrier, yet to be identified initiated the COVID crisis. He cites many others.

So Trump’s becoming the first President to enter office as a convicted felon won’t necessarily be that one small thing that triggers his demise. But it is just one more to add to his long list.

This past week beginning with massive fires in Los Angeles, a major 1/9/25 memorial service for Jimmy Carter and the sentencing in New York of Trump for his felony conviction suggests that these events might increasingly alert America to the impending horror of the Trump second term.

Also when will the Justice Department’s release Jack Smith’s report on Trump’s coup attempt or what happens when grocery and other prices don’t go down?

We also have watched the world‘s richest man Elon Musk aggressively courting the world’s most extreme right wing leaders to join him in honoring the power of the upcoming Trump administration to make changes which may not be good for many MAGAs who are among our less wealthy citizens.

Trump’s faithful MAGA group may not be believe in our planet’s dangerous climate change since that avatar continually claims it a hoax. Maybe they don’t care, but people in LA are not in doubt. My son and his wife in LA got one evacuation notice that was canceled but the fire remains nearby, and the outcome may be subject to which way the wind blows. They have packed bags and will be safe if forced to evacuate.

Read here the enormity of the LA fire story.

The 1/9/25 eulogizers noted President Carter’s integrity contributed a great deal to preserving our democracy. Trump sitting in the front row at his Memorial Service may not have reminded his TV viewers that those 2024 Presidential voters had approved sending a convicted felon, liar, and likely dictator to the White House.

Will that sharp contrasting comparison between Carter’s integrity and Trump’s prove a wakeup call for vast newly awakened voters? Maybe not but that could echo one of Malcolm Gladwell’s themes in his latest book which you can read about here.

One of several persuasive concepts Gladwell introduces is called an overstory which he defines beginning on page 51 as “the upper level of foliage in a forest and the size in density and height of the overstory after the behavior and development of every species far below on the forest floor. The over story is made of things way up in the air in many cases outside our awareness we tend to forget about the overstory because we’re so focused on the life going on in front of us and around us, but over stories turn out to be really really powerful”.

Gladwell cites many examples of overstories leading to vast consequences including the COVID epidemic, the emergence of gay marriage tolerance, or the acceptance of the meaning of what constitutes the definition of the word holocaust.

All these concepts, initially ignored or misunderstood, suddenly morphed into complete acknowledgment as true by a vast majority of everyone.

Did all who attended the Carter memorial service at the national Cathedral when leaving either touch the casket or put a hand on their hearts? I did not see Trump showing either of those gestures although he did apparently make a comment to Obama sitting next to him which caused Obama to express a small laugh.

The overstory here seems that while most voters understood what a flawed person is assuming a four-year Presidential term recent polls reflected that about 52% of Americans expected Trump’s term would be effective. In short OVERSTORY has yet to kick in.

Read on his current popularity story here.

Here’s hoping that not too much permanent Trump damage ensues, but I am not an optimist! But I think Trump will finally get his just punishment and strongly suggest you read this tightly reasoned, fully documented Malcolm Gladwell book as it shows many cases of anomalies tied to the overstories he describes.

The lead book review on Amazon argues

the title of this book could have been: “The Etiology of Change.” Etiology is a medical term meaning cause. And I use it here because he did in the first Tipping Point … (which) is the mass at which duality moves inevitably and often quickly in the other direction. ….Up is always accompanied by down. Left doesn’t exist without right.”

I am just a bit early perhaps in predicting that you won’t get away, Mr. Trump, from those collected change points you’ve sown without consequence over so many decades.

Former US Navy officer, banker and venture capitalist, Donald A. Collins, a free lance writer living in Washington, DC, has spent over 50 years working for women’s reproductive health as a board member and/or officer of numerous family planning organizations including Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Guttmacher Institute, Family Health International and Ipas. Yale under graduate, NYU MBA. He is the author of “From the Dissident Left: A Collection of Essays 2004-2013”, “Trump Becoming Macbeth: Will our democracy survive?”, “We Humans Overwhelm Our Earth: 11 or 2 Billion by 2100?”, “What Can Be Done Now to Save Habitable Life on Planet Earth?”, “Vote”, “Can Homo Sapiens Survive?”, “Will Choice and Democracy Win?”, “Can Our U.S. Survive 8 Plus Billion of Us”, “Economic Growth: A Cancer on all Earthly Life”, “On the Precipice of Political Disaster in 2024”, “Democracy at Red State Risk”, “Does Trump Go to Jail or to The Oval Office?” and “Trump: Pardon or Punish?: The Nixon Precedence Was Not A Trump Coup Denied!”.

‘Humiliation’: Trump’s now the first president-elect to be a convicted felon

Malcolm Gladwell Revisits “The Tipping Point” in New Book | Amanpour and Company

How the wildfires engulfed the Los Angeles area: Fire & Ash

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