Editor’s note: This commentary by retired ABC News diplomatic correspondent Barrie Dunsmore first appeared in the Barre-Montpelier Times Argus and Rutland Herald Sunday edition. All his columns can be found on his website.
[I] watch cable news a great deal – more, I’m sure, than is good for one’s mental health. But it does give me some credibility when I offer my choice of the most authentic and credible critic of President Donald Trump – veteran Republican strategist Steven Schmidt, who these days appears mainly on MSNBC.
The name may not instantly ring a bell for you. He was a mid-upper level staff member in President George W. Bush’s White House, and later became Sen. John McCain’s senior adviser during the 2008 presidential campaign.
If you saw the HBO film “Game Change,” which covers this period, Schmidt is played by Woody Harrelson. He is shown to have initially pushed for Sarah Palin as McCain’s vice presidential running mate but soon realizes Palin’s major intellectual and basic knowledge limitations. On election night he prevents her from making her own concession speech, which he believes she wants to use to elevate her own political future. Schmidt says the film “tells the truth of the campaign.”
Especially in the past few months, when Schmidt talks of President Donald Trump’s latest outrage it is often with barely controlled anger. And Schmidt continues to be highly critical of the Republican Party, its members of Congress and their role as Trump’s enablers.
Last week, Schmidt has said that the current political crisis we are living through is ultimately going to have to be resolved by the voters. For this reason he says, the November 2018 elections are going to be a “referendum on Trump.” If the Democrats can pick up about 25 seats in the House, (the post-war average loss for the party in power is 24) then many things will be possible. Implicit in this is that if Special Counsel Robert Mueller establishes that the Trump administration engaged in a conspiracy with the Russians during the 2016 presidential election; and/or also engaged in obstruction of justice, then a Democratic House would be able to pass articles of impeachment. In the subsequent trial by the Senate, a two-thirds majority would then be required to find him guilty and have him removed.
Schmidt has come to this conclusion because he doesn’t think the current Republican House majority will ever impeach Trump, regardless of what the special counsel determines. His profound disappointment with his own party is the backdrop for his increasingly, estranged commentary.
The latest egregious example of the Republican Party’s capitulation to Trump will become evident with the voting next week to elect a new Alabama senator. A couple of weeks ago the Washington Post revealed credible allegations that Republican candidate Roy Moore had sexually molested a 14-year-old girl when he was 32. Other girls who were teenagers at the time also claimed he had sexually harassed them.
Republicans, including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, claimed they believed the girls and called for Moore to step down. The Republican National Committee withdrew its support for Moore. But what a difference a week or two can make in politics.
Moore steadfastly denied the allegations and President Trump, who has mastered the art of denial of sexual improprieties, began to defend him. Last week Trump openly endorsed Moore and the RNC has resumed its financial support. The Republicans evidently have concluded they would rather have a child molester as a senator than a Democrat.
The old axiom is that if you’re stuck in a hole, the first thing to do is stop digging. But Trump rejects such quaint notions of perceived wisdom. So in the midst of serious political challenges abroad and potential legal difficulties at home, he has decided to stir up the pot in the Middle East by recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. Moving the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv will take several years, but that’s the intention.
Since President Harry Truman recognized the state of Israel in 1948, it has been American policy to have its embassy in Tel Aviv. No one disputes that West Jerusalem is Israel’s capital. But the full political status of the entire city of Jerusalem has been very much the center of the Arab-Israeli dispute since ‘48, and especially since 1967 when Israel captured East Jerusalem during the Six Day War. Palestinians see East Jerusalem as their capital of any future Palestinian state.
Thus virtually every country in the world has kept its embassy in Tel Aviv, on the grounds that Jerusalem’s final status should be established through Arab-Israeli negotiations as part of a broader, final peace agreement.
Trump is not the first American president to promise moving the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, but the benefits of such a move have always been subordinated by the potentially violent explosion it has been likely to ignite.
Jerusalem is no ordinary city. It has direct historical connections going back millennia, to three of the world’s great religions — Judaism, Christianity and Islam – where each religion has its holiest of holy places. For the United States, to unilaterally recognize Israel’s claim to the city, in the absence of any new political agreement, would eliminate the slightest chance that America could ever again play the mediator in this dispute.
Cynics suggest that as there is still no peace after seven decades, what does it matter? As someone who spent years of his life reporting from that region and traveling in and out with six secretaries of state from Henry Kissinger to Warren Christopher, I am convinced that without their tireless efforts, there would have been even more war and less peace. I am also certain that such a move will make America and its citizens less safe. To what end?
- So that Trump can brag about doing something no previous American president would do?
- So that super Trump donor casino owner Sheldon Adelson, who gave Trump tens of millions in campaign funds, will be assuaged?
- Or is this part of a new entente with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that includes a future U.S.-Israeli war with Iran?
It could be all of the above. But I can say with conviction, nothing good will come of this.