Trump tries civility

(Click to see the full session)

"Americans can always be counted on to do the right thing…after they have exhausted all other possibilities."   Sir Winston Churchill

Today President Trump truly surprised their supporters and rivals with a new approach: civility. 

CNN cameras captured an almost one hour-long bipartisan meeting between POTUS and the Senate commitee leaders. As if to refute the recent revelations of Michael Wolff's book on the partisan dysfunctionality of the current White House, Trump conducted the meeting with... civility.  (Click to see the full session)

He asked questions, listened and responded courteously to the answers, cajoled, bargained and spoke against partisanship and Far Right-Far Left extremism with surprised Republican and Democrat senators.

Trump stakes on immigration are high, since his entire campaign and MAGA program was tied to his "build the wall" promise. 

Now "the wall" seems to be more reasonable and negotiable, and so is the promise of a "law of love" for the Dreamers.

In any case, the televised meeting might help the viewers understand first hand the ways Washington and a republic really work: by compromise and negotiation, with rules of civility.

That's the way Washington and the US government was designed by the Framers of our Constitution. The way Madison thought of making checks and balances control partisanship.

We will see if civility works better than civil war. That didn't work too well for the past year. Perhaps this session was a mirage, or a show put to quell the scandals unleashed by Bannon's last stand against moderates in the White House. 

But even if this meeting was a "Potemkin Village" -named after those fake towns erected to fool the Russian czars and Soviet Union visitors with nonexistent progress- it shows how civility looks in comparison with what we have had during the past year. 

And, last but not least, Trump has shown he's able to use it when he wants it.