What's Trump's Shutdown Strategy?

A point I've been making about Trump, especially in his second term, is that he isn't the implulsive, ego-driven guy the legacy media wants to make him, although I haven't seen even any alt media making a serious effort to portray him as an astute strategist. But clearly a bull-in-the-china-shop disrupter couldn't have worked out this past week's Gaza deal -- and let's recognize that he's also been eager to share credit for that with Secretary Rubio and his personal emissaries. This isn't a comic-book narcissist.

But if there's method to the madness, what's his strategy for the shutdown? He seems over the past several weeks to have been concentrating on foreign policy; after the Gaza deal, he seems to have been renewing focus on Ukraine, while raising the level of harassment against Maduro in Venezuela. Over the same period, he's had little to say about the shutdown, other than consistently calling the Democrats "deranged" every few days since before it began. He seems happy enough to let Speaker Johnson make most of the public comment. As of yesterday, he added slightly more:

In clips that aired Friday from Trump's interview with Fox Business's Maria Bartiromo, President Trump was asked about the ongoing closure of the government by the Democrats and if he thought that this weekend's "No Kings" rally planned by leftists in Washington, D.C., and across the country was the reason Democrats had refused to reopen the government.

Trump shook his head no and explained that the shutdown was happening because Schumer is trying to hang on to his failing political career.

"Chuck is at the end of the line," Trump said. "He's being beaten by everybody that they poll against him. And you know what he did is he did the right thing a couple of years ago on something like this. And he got hurt by his party. "

"I don't think it matters to him," he added. "He's just so dead that he will do anything. I think they could just stay out forever, to be honest with you."

On one hand, Trump doesn't seem particularly perturbed at the idea of the shutdown lasting "forever", although I suspect it's because he's confident it won't. His move to use unspent funds to pay the miitary on October 15 relieved a pressure point on the administration, but a new one now looms if other federal workers, including air traffic controllers and TSA, go unpaid through Thanksgiving.

“As TSA agents and air traffic controllers show up without pay, Democrats brag they won’t budge until planes fall out of the sky,” said Rep. Lisa McClain (R-Mich.), the GOP conference chair. “Really? Seriously?”

. . . “Airports will be flooded with flight cancellations and delays amid the busiest time to travel all year, and the list goes on and on,” House Majority Whip Tom Emmer said alongside Speaker Mike Johnson at a news conference Tuesday, calling on Democrats to “reopen our government.”'

The polls appear to be moving:

Just last week, the blame gap stood at 11 points, with 39% of Americans pointing fingers at President Trump and Republicans, while 33% blamed Democrats. Now that gap has shrunk to just 6 points, with Democrats holding steady at 33% but losing ground as fewer voters are willing to split the blame equally between both parties. That number dropped from 23% to 20% in a single week.

Via Axios:

In his first term, President Trump was highly sensitive to being blamed for a shutdown, and there has been an undercurrent of bipartisan belief that he will try to get a deal from Democrats this time.

But so far, Trump has displayed none of the concerns or worry he had in 2018-2019, during the longest shutdown of 35 days.

This seems to be borne out by his seeming imperturbability at the prospect of the shutdown lasting "forever". As he appears to see it, Schumer isn't thinking strategically, he's just fighting a losing battle to prolong his career. Axios contiinues,

44% in the internal White House polling blame the shutdown on President Trump and the GOP-led Congress. 38% blame Democrats.

But public opinion has shifted a net of seven percentage points against Democrats. Two weeks ago, Democrats had a 13-point advantage on who was to blame. Now that lead has been cut by more than half.

The trend line of the White House's polling numbers are consistent with YouGov/Economist surveys that showed Democrats taking more blame as the shutdown grinds on.

Yesterday's headline at The Daily Beast: How Trump Broke Congress in Just Nine Months. The subhead: The government shutdown is just the tip of the iceberg of the dysfunction in Washington, DC.

As for a president so keen to tout his peacemaking skills overseas, he has not lifted a finger to facilitate an end to the standoff, and in many instances, eagerly stoked the political battle raging just down the road on Capitol Hill as his top officials look at ways to consolidate his power in Washington, DC, further.

I asked Chrome AI mode, "Is The Daily Beast left-wing?" and it replied,

Based on analyses by media watchdogs and other observers, The Daily Beast is generally considered left-leaning or liberal, particularly in its commentary and opinion content. While the outlet describes its news reporting as "non-partisan but not neutral," its liberal bias is a widely noted characteristic.

In other words, the left is starting to worry that Trump is going to win this. Because, of course, he's impulsive and ego-driven.