I’m so tired of politics. So tired and yet I can’t turn away from the disgraceful drama playing out in this presidential lame duck interregnum. This duck is not merely lame. He is like a frightened, wounded boar emerging from the dense undergrowth now and then to snort in unintelligible bursts. And yet …
Nearly all Republican leaders stand by their man, despite the emperor’s lack of clothes.
The political explanation for being blind to his naked tirades is simple and sad: Cross the raging bully and experience death by tweet — 280 characters and a career is over, or so the conventional wisdom goes. A few keystrokes and Fox, OANN, Breitbart, The New York Post, Parler ( I wonder if they just misspelled “parlor”?) and other scribes devoted to the lunatic right will unleash legions of MAGA hat wearin’, gun-totin’ political assassins to find a QAnon candidate to oust the offender in the next primary.
And so the spineless senators and representatives dissemble, equivocate and mutter, “We have to wait and see.”
Their fear extends beyond inauguration day. Kowtowing to the dethroned sociopath will remain a prerequisite for GOP candidates. It is a real bind. Success requires either actually being conspiracy-addled or pretending to be conspiracy-addled. Heads you lose. Tails you lose. It is not a good time to be a Republican, although attaching that once-honorable label to the current crop of sycophants is a semantic felony.
Perhaps my characterization is unduly harsh. I’m quite serious when quipping that some of my best friends are Republicans. A cogent, intelligent conservative voice is a crucial component of the balancing act called democracy. But that voice has been lost in the cacophony of obsequiousness, obstructionism, pandering and, gosh, just lying. I know that many Republicans, including some in Congress, are embarrassed and feel helpless unless, like Mitt Romney, they are in a safe political district, are very rich — or both.
Conservative women and men of conscience cannot identify with a party that embraces the false grievances, tawdry tactics and far-fetched tales of the lunatic right. What to do, what to do?
Here’s a novel suggestion: Try leadership. Instead of allowing utter nonsense to pass by unchallenged, speak the truth.
I have more faith in conservative voters than they do. Most GOP supporters don’t vote for people like Donald Trump because they like him. They vote for people like Trump because they don’t like people like me! I’m fine with that. Whether in Weld County, Colo., or Grosse Pointe, Mich., most conservative/Republican Americans are decent folks and don’t want to be represented by either a Democrat or a crazy person. They’d be thrilled to have a rational, trustworthy candidate. But Republicans have soiled their own bed by failing to confront the sickness that has infected their party.
They need to tell constituents that Joe Biden won the election and that the Rudy Giuliani clown car is a sideshow. They need to be very well-prepared and go on Fox to correct the false record spun by Sean Hannity, Tucker Carlson, et al. Remember when John McCain corrected a woman who questioned Obama’s religion and citizenship at a rally? Do you think it lost him any votes?
The GOP cannot be held hostage by a fringe group of conspiracy theorists and white nationalists. That has given the darkest forces in America far too much power. Republican silence in response to this lunacy creates the appearance of agreement and complicity. And it is really bad for the country.
While many pundits predict that Trump will wield great power beyond his term, I disagree. Much of his ill-gotten war chest of some $200 million will be rapidly squandered on lawyers defending his civil and criminal violations in and out of office. Many millions will be wasted on ego-gratifying red hat rallies, where he will posture, preen and proclaim endlessly that the election was rigged. Over time even the most faithful will get tired of the act and the crowds won’t fill a high school auditorium.
As Winston Churchill said in 1947, “democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried.” In our country it requires the creative tension of a two-party system. And the two parties can’t be the Democratic Party and the Anti-Democratic Party.
Republicans have some work to do and I wish them well. Telling and acknowledging the truth would be a good start.
Steve Nelson lives in Boulder, Colo., and Sharon. He can be reached at stevehutnelson@gmail.com.