My Arts Editor and I have been watching the old sci-fi series Babylon 5, and we’ve noted that some of its insights into the moral corruption of those seeking power on Earth have had chilling parallels to the activities we see in today’s American government and, particularly, the tactics of such organizations such as the Night Watch and its emphasis on loyalty to the government (vs Earth), compared to that of the GOP’s first loyalty to its President, rather than to the United States. Another facet has been the disregard for the truth, the willingness to say anything to get and keep power.
I agree with Steve Benen when he says,
Republicans who want to wait for additional information have taken a somewhat defensible posture. I’m not sure what more they want to know, but “we’ll just have to wait and see” isn’t crazy.
But willful apathy about allegations that the sitting president is a criminal is awfully difficult to defend.
But I think it’s explainable. Trump and his ilk are, almost by definition, emerging from the same social matrix as the GOP Senators and Representatives, and to a great extent he’s using the same tactics and intellectual practices that they have used, with the key difference that he’s never recognized limitations. Where they’ve stretched truths, he’s indulged in brazen lies; where they’ve dog-whistled very carefully, he stuck his entire hand in his mouth to summon the repugnant white supremacists and their various cousins.
If they choose to reject Trump, they also reject themselves. Instinctively, they won’t go there quietly. Some are asking for more information, which is a delaying tactic which may turn into a hand grenade for those using it, but it’s a reasonable response. Newsweek reports, however, that retiring Senator Hatch (R-UT) has decided to respond with the classic end justifies the means excuse:
CNN reporter Manu Raju revealed in a series of tweets on Monday that Hatch—a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee and retiring Utah Republican—said “President Trump before he became president is another world. Since he’s become president this economy has charged ahead… And I think we ought to judge him on that basis.”
It’s evident that Senator Hatch has entered his dotage and hit utterances shouldn’t be accorded any further respect. However, I don’t doubt that the morally downfallen GOP is all set to line up behind that excuse. What will happen, however, if we were to then enter a recession?
One of the repetitious lessons of history is that the “how” we get somewhere is at least as important as that “somewhere” is itself. The GOP seems to be desperately ignoring that dictum, but I suspect this is going to be seen by historians as simply throwing gasoline on the flames that eventually will burn the GOP to the ground.
