"Now Pelosi is in her element, ready for the fight of her life with Trump... Pelosi keeps moving forward, a shark with a permagrin... If combating an inhumane Trump requires a superhuman effort, Pelosi may be just the woman to do it."
But Dowd does not say how this will be done. She supports the hope with an anecdote about Pelosi carrying on bravely at an Irish political event just after having her right hand smashed in a car door. This shows grit, to be sure. But it was only for one night, and the struggle with Trump has more than a year to go.
Reflecting the traditional political timidity of mainline Democrats, Pelosi has taken potshots at fellow Democrats in the House like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, mocking the Green New Deal, or Ilhan Omar, reinforcing the right wing's anti-Semitic canard. Pelosi has demonstrated that, in a pinch, she does not have their backs or Rashida Tlaib's or Ayanna Pressley's. Pelosi again denigrated all four women of color to Dowd. This is ugly, gratuitous infighting, not principled leadership. Little wonder, perhaps, that Corbin Trent, an aide to Ocasio-Cortez, told reporter Ryan Grim that the Democratic leadership is "driven by fear. They seem to be unable to lead."
"The greatest threat to mankind," according to Trent, a co-founder of Justice Democrats, "is the cowardice of the Democratic Party."
The Democrats Pelosi denigrates are all agents of change. Pelosi talks about defeating Trump, but she doesn't embrace much change of any other sort. She cavils at the more ambitious proposals of Democratic presidential candidates. Why has the House pushed so little legislation that challenges the status quo? Is there anything Pelosi truly believes in besides herself? Dowd characterizes her as the most powerful woman in the country (with Trump the most powerful man). She seems to have made the calculation that she'd rather preserve her speaker-ship than take any serious risk. Are the ambitions of a 79-year-old multimillionaire really more important than the good of the country?
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