Manhattan's district attorney has convened the grand jury that is expected to decide whether to indict former president Donald Trump, other executives at his company or the business itself, should prosecutors present the panel with criminal charges, according to two people familiar with the development.
The new grand jury is the latest sign of increasing momentum in the criminal investigation into the Republican ex-president and his company, the Trump Organization.
Former President Donald Trump's blog — a webpage where he shared statements after larger social media companies banned him from their platforms — has been permanently shut down, his spokesman said Wednesday.
The page "From the Desk of Donald J. Trump" has been scrubbed from Trump's website after going live less than a month earlier.
It "will not be returning," his senior aide Jason Miller told CNBC.
For those who haven't been following this closely, after being perma-banned from Twitter Trump announced he was going to launch his own "social media platform". What was eventually unveiled was . . . a blog. Now less than a month later it's been shut down for good. I'm guessing that having to write something every couple of days (or, more likely, having to skim something ghost-written for him every couple of days) was simply too much effort for someone who is at heart a profoundly lazy man.
For those who haven't been following this closely, after being perma-banned from Twitter Trump announced he was going to launch his own "social media platform". What was eventually unveiled was . . . a blog. Now less than a month later it's been shut down for good. I'm guessing that having to write something every couple of days (or, more likely, having to skim something ghost-written for him every couple of days) was simply too much effort for someone who is at heart a profoundly lazy man.
So sad! Very low energy.
My hope is that many of his followers are no longer following him, and he closed the platform from lack of interest.
Surely a blog is something for which you need permission from no-one. You need webspace or a server and a domain name. Then some software (open source is perfectly acceptable and free). Then if you're not one of those people who like getting technical (just a little bit of care and detail will do) you can pay someone to do that for you. Millions manage.
How did he get into a position where it could be shut down against his will? Did he get a free blog on some existing site with rules? What a numpty.
How did he get into a position where it could be shut down against his will? Did he get a free blog on some existing site with rules? What a numpty.
I think you're making an assumption there. His blog wasn't shut down against his will, the former guy just got bored and gave up after less than a month. (Another common phenomenon with blogs.)
Or as Eugene Scott put it (on Twitter, where he's allowed and the former guy isn't):
A Trump adviser told The Washington Post that the former president shut down his blog because he didn’t like that this platform was being mocked and had so few readers.
Thanks, anonymous "Trump advisor"! No one would have ever guessed Donald Trump is a thin-skinned attention whore if you hadn't told the folks at the Post.
The blog was also being cited by some of the judges as justification for denying bail to some of the insurgents because it showed they were taking their orders from him.
But it is another sign that he is getting less and less relevant for the majority of US Americans.
The blog was also being cited by some of the judges as justification for denying bail to some of the insurgents because it showed they were taking their orders from him.
But it is another sign that he is getting less and less relevant for the majority of US Americans.
I remember sad stories about Muhammad Ali being driven around in an open top car in his latter days, hoping to be recognised on the street. Know what I mean?
How did he get into a position where it could be shut down against his will? Did he get a free blog on some existing site with rules? What a numpty.
I think you're making an assumption there. His blog wasn't shut down against his will, the former guy just got bored and gave up after less than a month. (Another common phenomenon with blogs.)
Ah, I took the words "Donald Trump's blog ..... has been permanently shut down" to mean that it wasn't his choice but I can see it doesn't say that.
Trump is becoming 'less and less reevant for the majority of Americans'? But more and more relevant to the Republican party, it seems. Looks unlikely to an outsider.
I can't see how he can not be re-elected in 41 months. 1250 days.
But I’m sure you’d love to be wrong.
God knows I would. But what can I do now that Trump is His elect? That He's setting things Right with all the invisible voting fraud in plain sight in the states. Tangent but has it been noted his tactic for calling an opponent a horrible person? It's brilliant psychology as ever. How can he lose? Whatever you say is true and it can't be said or said back by civilized people.
Another piece of interesting news: of the 400 people formally arrested for participating in the insurrection, if convicted of a felony, they will lose the right to own or possess a firearm. Some of them may also be denied the right to vote in the future depending on which state they reside in. Too bad.
And trump would point to them as freedom fighters and strivers after democracy - regardless of the truth that they were aiming to overturn the verified result of the democratic vote of the people.
I can't see how he can not be re-elected in 41 months. 1250 days.
Which is a very long time in presidential electoral politics. Way too much can happen between now and then to lay any money on how the 2024 election will turn out.
Trump is becoming 'less and less reevant for the majority of Americans'? But more and more relevant to the Republican party, it seems. Looks unlikely to an outsider.
Why would that be unlikely? Almost all Democrats don't care what Trump has to say, and if you throw in the good number of independents who probably don't care either, that takes you to a a majority.
Meanwhile, within the Republican party itself, he's becoming incresingly popular, but this popularity isn't bleeding over into independents or Democrats.
I think it's important to keep in mind that Trump isn't one of those leaders who garners a lot of respect outside of his ideological niche, like eg. the way people who never voted for Harold MacMillan might still have thought he was a good sort whose post-premiership comments on political life were worth listening to. Think more Margaret Thatcher, ie. beloved by her hardcore camp followers, while disliked or ignored by everyone else.
And just to clarify, I know that Thatcher's policies initiated a paradigm shift(for lack of a better word) that influenced Labour governments as well. But very few people outside of the Conservative Party were consciously valorizing her.
Meanwhile, within the Republican party itself, he's becoming incresingly popular, but this popularity isn't bleeding over into independents or Democrats.
I’m not sure it’s quite accurate to say he’s “increasingly popular” among Republicans. He may be increasingly popular to some, but I think there’s a lot of self-interest at play, too. Trump remains extremely popular with his base, and most Republicans know they can’t win without his base, so they’ll do whatever they need to to ingratiate themselves to that base, which has become the base of the Republican Party.
Meanwhile, within the Republican party itself, he's becoming incresingly popular, but this popularity isn't bleeding over into independents or Democrats.
I’m not sure it’s quite accurate to say he’s “increasingly popular” among Republicans. He may be increasingly popular to some, but I think there’s a lot of self-interest at play, too. Trump remains extremely popular with his base, and most Republicans know they can’t win without his base, so they’ll do whatever they need to to ingratiate themselves to that base, which has become the base of the Republican Party.
Fair enough. The point remains that whatever popularity of whatever sort Trump enjoys within the GOP, it isn't necessarily going to be reflected in the electorate at large.
(And if Trump is only truly popular with a minority faction of Republicans, that makes it even less likely that the rest of the country would be following suit.)
Meanwhile, within the Republican party itself, he's becoming incresingly popular, but this popularity isn't bleeding over into independents or Democrats.
I’m not sure it’s quite accurate to say he’s “increasingly popular” among Republicans. He may be increasingly popular to some, but I think there’s a lot of self-interest at play, too. Trump remains extremely popular with his base, and most Republicans know they can’t win without his base, so they’ll do whatever they need to to ingratiate themselves to that base, which has become the base of the Republican Party.
Fair enough. The point remains that whatever popularity of whatever sort Trump enjoys within the GOP, it isn't necessarily going to be reflected in the electorate at large.
My assumption is that his popularity runs in reverse as Nick says. He's still popular amongst a good percentage of the Republican base, and so can play king maker of sorts among the party - hence his popularity comes from the electorate at large, and the party will go along with that.
Meanwhile, within the Republican party itself, he's becoming incresingly popular, but this popularity isn't bleeding over into independents or Democrats.
I’m not sure it’s quite accurate to say he’s “increasingly popular” among Republicans. He may be increasingly popular to some, but I think there’s a lot of self-interest at play, too. Trump remains extremely popular with his base, and most Republicans know they can’t win without his base, so they’ll do whatever they need to to ingratiate themselves to that base, which has become the base of the Republican Party.
Fair enough. The point remains that whatever popularity of whatever sort Trump enjoys within the GOP, it isn't necessarily going to be reflected in the electorate at large.
My assumption is that his popularity runs in reverse as Nick says. He's still popular amongst a good percentage of the Republican base, and so can play king maker of sorts among the party - hence his popularity comes from the electorate at large, and the party will go along with that.
I'm not sure I understand. Trump is popular with the base, and can be a kingmaker within the GOP, hence we can assume he's popular with the electorate at large? How does that follow?
How many voted for him in 2020? How many fewer votes did he get than steady, old, unexciting Joe Biden? If with the advantages of Presidential /White House power and the ability to put pressure on election officials (eg Georgia?) to return fiddled results he lost by a good margin (yes, I know it's the distribution of votes, esp. swing states, not plain numbers) how can he do better when he's even older, more clearly corrupt and his influence can't plausibly increase when out of power but can only decline?
How many voted for him in 2020? How many fewer votes did he get than steady, old, unexciting Joe Biden? If with the advantages of Presidential /White House power and the ability to put pressure on election officials (eg Georgia?) to return fiddled results he lost by a good margin (yes, I know it's the distribution of votes, esp. swing states, not plain numbers) how can he do better when he's even older, more clearly corrupt and his influence can't plausibly increase when out of power but can only decline?
I can see only two possibilities for a Trump comeback...
1. Biden effs up SO badly that there will be enough Americans willing to vote for ANYONE to get rid of him, to give Trump a majority in the EC.
2. The current Republican efforts at voter-suppression all come to fruition and have their desired effect.
The 2020 popular vote was about 81.3 million for Biden and 74.2 million for Trump. But the Republicans largely dominate state governments and have busied themselves with weakening the election systems that withstood Trump's assaults in 2020. In Georgia, for example, a recently passed bill "gives state-level officials the authority to usurp the powers of county election boards — allowing the Republican-dominated state government to potentially disqualify voters in Democratic-leaning areas. It criminalizes the provision of food and water to voters waiting in line, in a state where lines are notoriously long in heavily nonwhite precincts. It requires ID for absentee ballots and limits the placement of ballot drop boxes."
The concern isn't that Trump will be able to win more votes in a fair election in 2024, it's that the Republican party may ensure that he doesn't have to.
Another piece of interesting news: of the 400 people formally arrested for participating in the insurrection, if convicted of a felony, they will lose the right to own or possess a firearm. Some of them may also be denied the right to vote in the future depending on which state they reside in. Too bad.
Does that mean some people could be denied the right to vote forever, or just for a limited period of time?
I guess given some of the groups involved that losing the right to possess a firearm would hit them even harder.
The concern isn't that Trump will be able to win more votes in a fair election in 2024, it's that the Republican party may ensure that he doesn't have to.
Exactly. If the Democrats don't get off their asses and fight off the Republican voter suppression, we may have seen the last free and fair election in the US. Republicans know minority rule is their only path to power.
The problem is that moving to the 'centre'* is not a path to power in the short term because their base is so far to the right** that any serious move to the centre would split the party (or at least their base) and thus guarantee Democratic victories.
AFZ
*what passes for 'centre' in the US is considered Right Wing in the civilised world***
**after three decades of cultivating this move rightwards, the GOP has only themselves to blame
***I don't count England as part of the civilised world. The UK Overton Window does goes much more left than the US but we also have far-Right zealots pretending to be centrists.
How many voted for him in 2020? How many fewer votes did he get than steady, old, unexciting Joe Biden? If with the advantages of Presidential /White House power and the ability to put pressure on election officials (eg Georgia?) to return fiddled results he lost by a good margin (yes, I know it's the distribution of votes, esp. swing states, not plain numbers) how can he do better when he's even older, more clearly corrupt and his influence can't plausibly increase when out of power but can only decline?
I can see only two possibilities for a Trump comeback...
1. Biden effs up SO badly that there will be enough Americans willing to vote for ANYONE to get rid of him, to give Trump a majority in the EC.
2. The current Republican efforts at voter-suppression all come to fruition and have their desired effect.
The concern isn't that Trump will be able to win more votes in a fair election in 2024, it's that the Republican party may ensure that he doesn't have to.
Exactly. If the Democrats don't get off their asses and fight off the Republican voter suppression, we may have seen the last free and fair election in the US. Republicans know minority rule is their only path to power.
How can states Democrats possibly stop voter suppression?
Meanwhile, within the Republican party itself, he's becoming incresingly popular, but this popularity isn't bleeding over into independents or Democrats.
I’m not sure it’s quite accurate to say he’s “increasingly popular” among Republicans. He may be increasingly popular to some, but I think there’s a lot of self-interest at play, too. Trump remains extremely popular with his base, and most Republicans know they can’t win without his base, so they’ll do whatever they need to to ingratiate themselves to that base, which has become the base of the Republican Party.
Fair enough. The point remains that whatever popularity of whatever sort Trump enjoys within the GOP, it isn't necessarily going to be reflected in the electorate at large.
My assumption is that his popularity runs in reverse as Nick says. He's still popular amongst a good percentage of the Republican base, and so can play king maker of sorts among the party - hence his popularity comes from the electorate at large, and the party will go along with that.
I'm not sure I understand. Trump is popular with the base, and can be a kingmaker within the GOP, hence we can assume he's popular with the electorate at large? How does that follow?
Sorry, part of my reply got eaten up before I posted it; my point was that Trump appears to be popular enough among the base that it isn't as if the average never-Trump Republican Candidate can appeal 'over the heads' of the base and to the electorate more generally (whatever that would look like). It's the same dynamic that we saw with the Tea Party, but stronger, anyone who doesn't make accommodating noises will be primaried out
Brainwashing in this scale, supported by self-serving media and politicians, will take some time to be sufficiently cleansed from the collective awareness. I’m just not sure how long it will take.
Brainwashing in this scale, supported by self-serving media and politicians, will take some time to be sufficiently cleansed from the collective awareness. I’m just not sure how long it will take.
Who is incentivised to do it though? Both the media and politicians concerned (as well as their big financial backers) are generally getting what they want.
But do what, exactly? It's not as if there aren't any conservative politicians and journalists who have tried to stand up to Trumpism - nearly all of them have been abandoned or attacked by the base and consigned to irrelevance.
How many voted for him in 2020? How many fewer votes did he get than steady, old, unexciting Joe Biden? If with the advantages of Presidential /White House power and the ability to put pressure on election officials (eg Georgia?) to return fiddled results he lost by a good margin (yes, I know it's the distribution of votes, esp. swing states, not plain numbers) how can he do better when he's even older, more clearly corrupt and his influence can't plausibly increase when out of power but can only decline?
I can see only two possibilities for a Trump comeback...
1. Biden effs up SO badly that there will be enough Americans willing to vote for ANYONE to get rid of him, to give Trump a majority in the EC.
2. The current Republican efforts at voter-suppression all come to fruition and have their desired effect.
But do what, exactly? It's not as if there aren't any conservative politicians and journalists who have tried to stand up to Trumpism - nearly all of them have been abandoned or attacked by the base and consigned to irrelevance.
"Gradual cult disillusionment?" was what @Barnabas62 was talking about, and I agree, there's absolutely no payoff for anyone to even attempt this, and every reason why they'll just go along with the dominant feeling within the Republican base.
Regards the possible loss of voting rights if convicted of participating in the insurrection. This depends on the state of residence. Some states have no restrictions, other states expect you to complete your sentences and pay your fines. Still, other states ban voting for the rest of your life.
On the other hand, the loss of possession of a firearm is a federal penalty, again, if convicted.
The concern isn't that Trump will be able to win more votes in a fair election in 2024, it's that the Republican party may ensure that he doesn't have to.
Exactly. If the Democrats don't get off their asses and fight off the Republican voter suppression, we may have seen the last free and fair election in the US. Republicans know minority rule is their only path to power.
How can states Democrats possibly stop voter suppression?
Elections are run at the state level, and rules about voting are made at the state level. The Democrats in the Texas statehouse walked out prior to the vote on a voter suppression bill this past weekend, depriving the legislature of a quorum, and the bill died. When it is reintroduced, they should do it again.
Can you explain that please Ruth? I'd have thought that if a group of people of like mind choose not to be present to vote, it would be carried by those present.
ETA I see you sayit's about quorum but isn't that a minimum number present to make the vote valid?
The concern isn't that Trump will be able to win more votes in a fair election in 2024, it's that the Republican party may ensure that he doesn't have to.
Exactly. If the Democrats don't get off their asses and fight off the Republican voter suppression, we may have seen the last free and fair election in the US. Republicans know minority rule is their only path to power.
How can states Democrats possibly stop voter suppression?
Elections are run at the state level, and rules about voting are made at the state level. The Democrats in the Texas statehouse walked out prior to the vote on a voter suppression bill this past weekend, depriving the legislature of a quorum, and the bill died. When it is reintroduced, they should do it again.
The concern isn't that Trump will be able to win more votes in a fair election in 2024, it's that the Republican party may ensure that he doesn't have to.
Exactly. If the Democrats don't get off their asses and fight off the Republican voter suppression, we may have seen the last free and fair election in the US. Republicans know minority rule is their only path to power.
How can states Democrats possibly stop voter suppression?
Elections are run at the state level, and rules about voting are made at the state level. The Democrats in the Texas statehouse walked out prior to the vote on a voter suppression bill this past weekend, depriving the legislature of a quorum, and the bill died. When it is reintroduced, they should do it again.
Excellent Ruth. Sounds too good to be true for all and for the duration.
Can you explain that please Ruth? I'd have thought that if a group of people of like mind choose not to be present to vote, it would be carried by those present.
ETA I see you sayit's about quorum but isn't that a minimum number present to make the vote valid?
A quorum is the minimum number necessary for the body to act. When the Dems walked out, there were not enough Republicans present to constitute a quorum, so the House could not take any action other than adjournment.
the loss of possession of a firearm is a federal penalty, again, if convicted.
"If convicted" is the catchphrase. Preceded by "if caught". I don't think any little thing like a federal law will stop these yahoos from doing what they want.
How can states Democrats possibly stop voter suppression?
Elections are run at the state level, and rules about voting are made at the state level.
Mostly. The federal government has some powers over elections, mostly derived from the Fifteenth Amendment. (Americans often underestimate the degree to which the Reconstruction Amendments radically altered the American constitutional system, and the federalization of certain aspects of elections are one of them.) The big problem here is John Roberts' gutting of the Voting Rights Act which would have prevented these kinds of shenanigans if the law were still intact. This is a problem Congress could theoretically* correct if it had the will to do so.
*John Roberts' opinion in Shelby County v. Holder somewhat notoriously didn't say which part of the Constitution the VRA violated, so there's a distinct possibility that any future efforts by Congress would fall victim to Constitutional Calvinball as long as Roberts remains on the bench and has four other votes to back him up.
But do what, exactly? It's not as if there aren't any conservative politicians and journalists who have tried to stand up to Trumpism - nearly all of them have been abandoned or attacked by the base and consigned to irrelevance.
"Gradual cult disillusionment?" was what @Barnabas62 was talking about, and I agree, there's absolutely no payoff for anyone to even attempt this, and every reason why they'll just go along with the dominant feeling within the Republican base.
I guess I don't see "gradual cult disillusionment" as describing an action that anyone could attempt to perform. It's something many people (including some prominent conservatives) would like to see happen but I haven't heard of any obvious action likely to succeed that Mitt Romney (e.g.) has been neglecting.
Comments
For those who haven't been following this closely, after being perma-banned from Twitter Trump announced he was going to launch his own "social media platform". What was eventually unveiled was . . . a blog. Now less than a month later it's been shut down for good. I'm guessing that having to write something every couple of days (or, more likely, having to skim something ghost-written for him every couple of days) was simply too much effort for someone who is at heart a profoundly lazy man.
So sad! Very low energy.
My hope is that many of his followers are no longer following him, and he closed the platform from lack of interest.
Tidied up quoting code. BroJames, Purgatory Host
How did he get into a position where it could be shut down against his will? Did he get a free blog on some existing site with rules? What a numpty.
I think you're making an assumption there. His blog wasn't shut down against his will, the former guy just got bored and gave up after less than a month. (Another common phenomenon with blogs.)
Thanks, anonymous "Trump advisor"! No one would have ever guessed Donald Trump is a thin-skinned attention whore if you hadn't told the folks at the Post.
But it is another sign that he is getting less and less relevant for the majority of US Americans.
Hallelujah
Ah, I took the words "Donald Trump's blog ..... has been permanently shut down" to mean that it wasn't his choice but I can see it doesn't say that.
But I’m sure you’d love to be wrong.
God knows I would. But what can I do now that Trump is His elect? That He's setting things Right with all the invisible voting fraud in plain sight in the states. Tangent but has it been noted his tactic for calling an opponent a horrible person? It's brilliant psychology as ever. How can he lose? Whatever you say is true and it can't be said or said back by civilized people.
Why would that be unlikely? Almost all Democrats don't care what Trump has to say, and if you throw in the good number of independents who probably don't care either, that takes you to a a majority.
Meanwhile, within the Republican party itself, he's becoming incresingly popular, but this popularity isn't bleeding over into independents or Democrats.
I think it's important to keep in mind that Trump isn't one of those leaders who garners a lot of respect outside of his ideological niche, like eg. the way people who never voted for Harold MacMillan might still have thought he was a good sort whose post-premiership comments on political life were worth listening to. Think more Margaret Thatcher, ie. beloved by her hardcore camp followers, while disliked or ignored by everyone else.
Fair enough. The point remains that whatever popularity of whatever sort Trump enjoys within the GOP, it isn't necessarily going to be reflected in the electorate at large.
(And if Trump is only truly popular with a minority faction of Republicans, that makes it even less likely that the rest of the country would be following suit.)
My assumption is that his popularity runs in reverse as Nick says. He's still popular amongst a good percentage of the Republican base, and so can play king maker of sorts among the party - hence his popularity comes from the electorate at large, and the party will go along with that.
I'm not sure I understand. Trump is popular with the base, and can be a kingmaker within the GOP, hence we can assume he's popular with the electorate at large? How does that follow?
By "the electorate at large", I mean all the voters taken together, Republican, Democratic, independent, whatever.
I can see only two possibilities for a Trump comeback...
1. Biden effs up SO badly that there will be enough Americans willing to vote for ANYONE to get rid of him, to give Trump a majority in the EC.
2. The current Republican efforts at voter-suppression all come to fruition and have their desired effect.
Or maybe a combination of the two.
The concern isn't that Trump will be able to win more votes in a fair election in 2024, it's that the Republican party may ensure that he doesn't have to.
Does that mean some people could be denied the right to vote forever, or just for a limited period of time?
I guess given some of the groups involved that losing the right to possess a firearm would hit them even harder.
Exactly. If the Democrats don't get off their asses and fight off the Republican voter suppression, we may have seen the last free and fair election in the US. Republicans know minority rule is their only path to power.
The problem is that moving to the 'centre'* is not a path to power in the short term because their base is so far to the right** that any serious move to the centre would split the party (or at least their base) and thus guarantee Democratic victories.
AFZ
*what passes for 'centre' in the US is considered Right Wing in the civilised world***
**after three decades of cultivating this move rightwards, the GOP has only themselves to blame
***I don't count England as part of the civilised world. The UK Overton Window does goes much more left than the US but we also have far-Right zealots pretending to be centrists.
Definitely both. And both are already happening. 'Ordinary hard working American families' in quotes as a political cliché beloved of the centre on right, invoked by the GOP now, are already 'shouldering the burden' of Biden's infrastructure bail out including his unsustainable renewables only energy policy.
Again, what can possibly stop Trump in 1249 days?
How can states Democrats possibly stop voter suppression?
Sorry, part of my reply got eaten up before I posted it; my point was that Trump appears to be popular enough among the base that it isn't as if the average never-Trump Republican Candidate can appeal 'over the heads' of the base and to the electorate more generally (whatever that would look like). It's the same dynamic that we saw with the Tea Party, but stronger, anyone who doesn't make accommodating noises will be primaried out
Brainwashing in this scale, supported by self-serving media and politicians, will take some time to be sufficiently cleansed from the collective awareness. I’m just not sure how long it will take.
Who is incentivised to do it though? Both the media and politicians concerned (as well as their big financial backers) are generally getting what they want.
"Gradual cult disillusionment?" was what @Barnabas62 was talking about, and I agree, there's absolutely no payoff for anyone to even attempt this, and every reason why they'll just go along with the dominant feeling within the Republican base.
On the other hand, the loss of possession of a firearm is a federal penalty, again, if convicted.
Elections are run at the state level, and rules about voting are made at the state level. The Democrats in the Texas statehouse walked out prior to the vote on a voter suppression bill this past weekend, depriving the legislature of a quorum, and the bill died. When it is reintroduced, they should do it again.
ETA I see you sayit's about quorum but isn't that a minimum number present to make the vote valid?
Excellent Ruth. Sounds too good to be true for all and for the duration.
Mostly. The federal government has some powers over elections, mostly derived from the Fifteenth Amendment. (Americans often underestimate the degree to which the Reconstruction Amendments radically altered the American constitutional system, and the federalization of certain aspects of elections are one of them.) The big problem here is John Roberts' gutting of the Voting Rights Act which would have prevented these kinds of shenanigans if the law were still intact. This is a problem Congress could theoretically* correct if it had the will to do so.
*John Roberts' opinion in Shelby County v. Holder somewhat notoriously didn't say which part of the Constitution the VRA violated, so there's a distinct possibility that any future efforts by Congress would fall victim to Constitutional Calvinball as long as Roberts remains on the bench and has four other votes to back him up.
I guess I don't see "gradual cult disillusionment" as describing an action that anyone could attempt to perform. It's something many people (including some prominent conservatives) would like to see happen but I haven't heard of any obvious action likely to succeed that Mitt Romney (e.g.) has been neglecting.