Trump: How Much Longer?

So here we are, after another incredibly bad week in the incredibly bad presidency of Donald Trump, and the question really has become: How much longer will Trump be allowed to occupy the Oval Office?

To review this week that was: On Monday came word that Trump had revealed highly classified information to two Russian officials in the Oval Office. At first, White House officials seemed to deny Trump had done it — until, of course, the president tweeted that he had the “absolute right” to share that information.

Later Monday, the New York Times broke the news that fired FBI director James Comey had taken notes about his conversations with Trump — including one in which Trump appeared to ask Comey to drop the FBI’s investigation into fired National Security Advisor Michael Flynn.

On Wednesday, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein appointed former FBI Director Robert Mueller as special counsel to investigate possible collusion between the Russians and the Trump campaign during last year’s election.

On Thursday, Reuters reported that the Trump campaign team had at least 18 contacts with Russian “interests” that had not been previously disclosed.

On Friday, the Times reported that during that same White House meeting with the Russians in which Trump had revealed sensitive information, the president told the Russians that the fired Comey was a “nut job” and that he — Trump — “faced great pressure because of Russia. That’s taken off.”

Also on Friday, the Washington Post reported that the federal investigation into Russia included a focus on a current “senior White House official.”

And McClatchy Newspapers reported that Rosenstein has told members of Congress that the investigation into Russian meddling now includes a look at whether there’s been a cover-up.

All this comes after Trump fired Comey — and after White House spokes-people put out differing “facts” on why he did it — and after, finally, Trump undercut all those “facts” by telling NBC’s Lester Holt that he was going to fire Comey anyway because “I said to myself, you know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made-up story.”

After the president made that oh-so-elegant statement, he tweeted a threat to Comey, saying he’d “better hope that there are no ‘tapes’ of our conversations before he starts leaking to the press.”

White House spokes-people will not confirm or deny whether Trump is, indeed, recording conversations inside the White House.

So where does this mess-of-a-two-weeks leave us? With a true political crisis — every bit of it generated by Trump, who continues to undermine his very legitimacy with incredibly stupid claims, statements and tweets.

As the Wall Street Journal’s Peggy Noonan wrote today: The president “has produced a building crisis that is unprecedented in our history. The question, at bottom, is whether Donald Trump has demonstrated, in his first four months, that he is unfit for the presidency — wholly unsuited in terms of judgment, knowledge, mental capacity, personal stability.”

What Mueller and the ongoing congressional investigations must determine is whether Trump did, indeed, try to interfere in an ongoing FBI investigation, and whether his campaign colluded with the Russians.

Looking into all this could take months or even years. And while the investigations continue, a cloud hangs over Trump and the White House, and progress on important issues such as tax reform, health care and infrastructure grinds to a halt.

Republicans are  trying to run for cover on the issue of Trump’s alleged and proven indiscretions, and Democrats are going around either braying for impeachment or going on Facebook or Twitter with the most outlandish insults and attacks against Trump. Op-ed writers for the Post and the Times are showing a complete lack of self-control as they excoriate Trump and use him as a personal punching bag.

Let’s be clear: There’s no evidence yet — none at all — that warrants Trump’s impeachment. Screeching and writing about how Trump “must go” mean nothing. What must happen now is for the special counsel’s investigation to go forward — for Congressional inquires to continue — and for everyone else to somehow start acting like adults and wait to see what actually shows up in terms of evidence.

Comey apparently will soon testify to Congress — in public — about what Trump told him or demanded of him, It could be a seminal moment in this ongoing mess, and depending on what Comey says, Republicans in Congress may well have to decide whether to continue backing Trump — or go to him and say, “enough is enough.”

One thing is certain: Our country cannot continue to speed through crisis after crisis involving this president. No political system can prosper — or even survive — if it’s in constant chaos or if the chief executive continues to appear to be completely out of control.

How long will Trump remain in the White House? I have no idea — and neither do you — and neither does he. And that’s perhaps the most frightening aspect of this political dysfunction that threatens to tear our country apart.