At Long Last, Do They Care?

My next newspaper column:

It’s time for the Republican Party and its members who continue to support Trump to decide if they believe in America. Seriously. That’s the question, right now, as Trump, Barr, and Congressional Republicans are declaring the Constitution of The United States of America inoperative, a meaningless piece of parchment. Is there any Trumpist who can look in the mirror and claim the person smirking back at them would make excuses, were it Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton? 

That venerable document explicitly gives to Congress the authority, the duty, to oversee the Executive Branch. In a country founded by people who fled tyrannical monarchy, this is easily understood; a concept to be defended at all costs, lest we find ourselves back in the Seventeenth Century, with no way home.  

Donald Trump, a duplicitous egoist who’s bullied, cheated, and ignored the law throughout his career and who’s demonstrated not an ounce of patriotism beyond that which enriches him, is, without resistance from his party, claiming he’s above the law. He’s demanding his hired help do the same. And he’s getting away with it.  

The thing about the rule of law is that, alone, it doesn't exist. Citizens need to buy into the concept, see it as worth defending, even if doing so might lessen their personal power. Even if it requires sacrificing part of the present to protect all of the future. If it ever did, the Republican Party no longer accepts that premise. We see now how the system fails if people, particularly our elected officials, don’t respect it. 

When a “president” refuses to comply with constitutionally mandated congressional oversight requests, when his Attorney General unreservedly lies to Congress, while making farcical excuses for Trump’s lawlessness (“It wasn’t obstruction because he considered the investigation unfair”), how will subpoenas or contempt orders issued by Congress be enforced? Absent belief in the most basic American premises, namely separation of powers, and checks and balances; absent willingness to accede to its requirements, it breaks down. Rules become unenforceable. Which is what, precisely, is happening. 

We love seeing him stick it to liberals, say Trumpists. Forget the Constitution! Long as it’s our guy, take the rule of law, the lifeblood of our republic, everything that has, till now, preserved and protected our form of government, and shove it. We. Don’t. Care.  

When the Republican Party was producing decent people, like Dan Evans, Mark Hatfield, Margaret Chase Smith, Barry Goldwater, Everett Dirksen, Dwight Eisenhower, this would have been impossible. Even in recent memory, before whatever got to them got to them, Lapdog Graham considered Trump a “race-baiting, xenophobic bigot; Trump’s now-Chief-of-Staff called him “a horrible human being,” Rick Perry called him “a cancer on conservatism.” What happened? Power, and money, happened. Cowardice happened. Fox "news" happened.  

Trump calls a Constitutionally authorized inquiry into certain of his activities an “attempted coup,” and, predictable as acidifying oceans, his blind followers buy it, repeat the phrase like quoting the Bible. Write outraged letters to the editor. The potential end of democracy doesn’t occur to them. The history of our founding doesn’t, either.  

We’ve known for a while that today’s Republicans have discarded, like used tissues, the idea of fair elections, the importance to democracy of public education and a vigilant, inquisitive press. Have they now decided that, as long as he’s theirs, an unrestrained, autocratic “president” is okay, too? What do they think has, until now, made America great? Are those brilliantly rendered, permanently embedded checks and balances merely empty words, disposable on a whim? 

If you don’t see Trump’s dictatorial stonewalling of Congress as a danger, you neither understand nor accept the essence of America. You’re a false patriot. You reject the very concept of “a nation of laws.” This, of all things, shouldn’t be defined by party allegience.  

Bill Clinton embarrassed himself and his supporters. I found Lindsey Graham’s self-righteous, lip-quivering outrage, back then, phony (where is it now?); but I never thought Congress hadn’t the right to impeach. It’s codified. It deodorizes the stink of corruption. Do Trump supporters love America for its uniquely brilliant and successful constitutional governance, or not? If so, will they vote Trump and his Congressional co-dependents out of office, to restore the Republic? Given Republican Congressional dereliction, they’re our last hope. 

Nope. Not likely. It’d take acts of actual, selfless patriotism, not easy declarations. That ship has sunk.

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Publish Or Perish

Saturday's newspaper column:

As of this writing, we still don’t know what’s in the rumored four-hundred-page Mueller report (not counting tables and appendices), other than William Barr’s cagey four-page letter to Congress, which he first characterized as, then claimed wasn’t, a summary. Nevertheless, reactions from Trump and his apologists have been fierce, and, despite knowing nothing, signal shocking disregard for our Constitution. Were it not so dangerous, it’d just be bizarre.  

Say what you will about liberals and their desire to make American capitalism work for everyone; they’re not, unlike Trump and his adulators in Congress, trashing the Constitution, confident their flock will swallow it. 

To repeat: we don’t know what’s in the report. We do know, though, that Barr explicitly stated it did NOT exonerate Trump. He also intimated Mueller found suggestions of collusion with Russia; just not enough for him, as opposed to Congress, to level charges. This we learned from words. Written by Mr. Barr. To Congress. In English. A language we understand. Except Trump, et ilk. Doesn’t exonerate. Is what it said. Exoneration: didn’t happen.  

Trump claimed complete and total exoneration. 

He added that those who’d dared to investigate him had committed treason. Announced desire for retribution. Demanded resignations, imprisonment. Because we have this peculiar piece of parchment called the Constitution, which, quaintly, created separation of powers and the jejune concept of “checks and balances,” you’d think members of Congress, regardless of political party, would rise, united, to affirm their Constitutional role and its obligations.  

You’d be wrong.  

Instead, intelligence-impaired Republicans taking up space on the House Intelligence Committee unanimously called on Democratic Chairman Adam Schiff to resign. Bad move. Have you seen his response?  

Trump oinked his intention to see “this never happens again.” By “this” he meant Constitutionally bestowed oversight, by Congress, of the Executive Branch. Countries in which “this never happens” are called dictatorships. Countries against which the US has occasionally stood, particularly when not receiving their electoral help. Republicans in Congress, all but waving banners saying “The Constitution is un-American” and “The Founders Were Pinkos,” are on board. People who investigated one Clinton for years, impeached another, now proclaim -- and Trump’s rally-attending apostles, switching to “Lock THEM up,” agree -- investigations of possible malfeasance by the Executive Branch are treasonous except when it’s their party investigating the other. 

All it took was Trump’s lie about Barr’s memo to convince Republicans that Mueller’s investigation, vested by a Republican Congress, was ipso-facto, retro-acto, seditious. Having first professed he wanted the full report released, Trump now says those calling for it are “a disgrace.” Surprised? 

By contrast, Republicans released every word of Starr’s report. And Watergate.  

It’s perfectly proper to debate what circumstances should trigger what level of Congressional oversight. Javakna’s use of private servers and unsecured communications, for example, might be more investigation-worthy than Hillary’s. If one, why not the other? Fair question. But to contend there’s no rationale for Mueller’s investigation or the ones gearing up in the House of Representatives is to be blissfully uninformed or cosmically hypocritical. 

That Russia interfered with our election on Trump’s behalf is undeniable. That there are legitimate grounds for probing possible collusion and obstruction is, too. Chairman Schiff’s response to that failed Republican coup covers them well. 

Imaginative fourth-grade-level wit that he is, Trump began calling Mr. Schiff “pencil-neck.” Unembarrassed to expose their well-cultivated ignorance, delighted deplorables are selling T-shirts so imprinted. Choosing Foxic ridicule over honest reflection, theirs is American exceptionalism, Trump style. 

Like those that came before, Trump’s latest provocations are pernicious. Anyone who abides them rejects the essential principles on which our republic stands, confessing preference for autocracy. For if Congress hasn’t the duty to oversee the conduct of a “president,” there’s no wall between us and tyranny. No believer in America should countenance this, even when it’s “their” president. But Republicans do. In Congress and at Trump’s deranged rallies, dropping prior pretense of being the “law-and-order” party, they display their disturbing, anti-constitutional inclinations.  

If no criminality is found, fine. (We've just learned, though, that there's more in the report than has met our eyes.) But vilifying those seeking answers undermines America. Whether or not Trump did, vilifiers are providing aid and comfort to our enemies. In 2020, it’s imperative that they’re outvoted and voted out. America now stands, without question, at a crossroads. 

Meanwhile, Director Mueller’s report remains hidden, the conditions of its release subject to the will of an Attorney General hired explicitly to protect Trump. 

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Memo Demo

My next newspaper column: 

By ignorance or premeditation, Donald Trump, who, as did Stalin, defines treason as failing to applaud him, damages the United States and its institutions beyond Soviet Cold War dreams. Khrushchev said they needn’t invade America, they’d take us down from within. With aid and comfort of today’s Republican party, as they attempt to derail investigations into potential sabotage, it’s happening. “When you don’t have facts, sow doubt.” That’s a Russian thing, too. (So is Trump ordering a military parade for himself.)  

The FBI, CIA, and DOJ have hardly been exemplary throughout history. FISA resulted from the Church committee’s investigations of their excesses, requiring specific justifications for surveilling American citizens. Warrants aren’t handed out like sausage samples at Costco; they are, in fact, extensively prepared and subjected to critical judicial review. 

Around the same time as FISA’s creation, rules were written to prevent federal law enforcement agencies from becoming instruments of presidential imperium. (Ironically, given Republican claims, current FBI recruits are required to visit the Holocaust Museum, to see what follows when they do.) Trump, unchecked by capitulating Congressional Republicans, looks to undo them. That should frighten everyone, especially what’s left of conservatives in what’s left of that party. This, not Nunes, shows where the conspiracy is, and reveals the motives behind the “memo” and those defending it. Spoiler alert: it’s about abrogating Constitutional checks on unbridled power.  

For years, Carter Page, self-described “Kremlin adviser,” had been suspected of being a witting or unwitting Russian agent. And maybe – who knows? – Trump himself, considering his dodgy dealings with Moscow’s wealthy kleptocrats. One assumes former KGB interrogator Putin knows how to weaponize patsies. 

Having previously given the White House info from his intelligence committee and lied about it, Devin Nunes admitted to Fox “news” that he hadn’t read the FISA application to which his deceptive memo refers, relying instead on summaries provided by Trey “Benghazi” Gowdy, who, interestingly, admits the memo “in no way” discredits Mueller’s investigation. In fact, with its footnotes and final point, it negates itself.  

Democrats on Nunes’ “intelligence” committee requested all documents related to the application. Republicans refused. If they’re truth-tellers, why not allow examination of the supposedly deep-state-plot-revealing records? Answer: Nunes, et al, have a narrative they want the public to swallow and messengers eager to spoon it out, counting on the power of Foxification to obscure the dangerous implications. 

Republicans’ defense of Trump’s authoritarianism amounts to explicit rejection of Constitutionally established system of checks and balances. Support for the mechanisms for America to repel dictatorship or subversion by a hostile foreign power ought to be universal and bipartisan. That it’s not raises serious questions about what’s happened to the Republican Party, and what, or who, is behind it. Questions Trumpists doggedly want neither asked nor answered. 

Mere months ago, Republicans agreed Vladimir Putin was a mortal enemy, toward whom President Obama was dangerously weak. Then came Trump (whose lawyers fear he can’t testify without lying), heaping praise on the man and hiring people with deep ties to him. If there’s no “there” there, why the desperation to defame the investigation and the people and institutions carrying it out? 

Consider who benefits from causing Americans to distrust agencies dedicated to preventing illegal foreign influences. Why are those who claim to love America more than people like me rallying around attempts to be rid of Robert Mueller? Why not let him report? If it reveals threats to America, shouldn’t all Americans want to know? If he finds nothing, wouldn’t that be a good thing for everyone, including Trump? If it’s full of falsehood, won’t our fair-minded right-wing media be able to tear it apart with Hannitoid verisimilitude? 

It’s self-evident how TrumPutin benefits from silencing Mueller and the FBI. What side deals Nunes, Ryan, Hannity, ad prevaricatum, have made, and with whom, remains a vital unknown. Whatever their motivation, they’d have us believe the FBI investigating possible treason is “politicization,” when what it is, is doing their job.  

The “worse than Watergate” crowd are right: this obstruction of justice from both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue makes Richard Nixon look like Eliot Ness. Devin Nunes’ cynical stunt and Trump’s lies about it lay bare their contempt for established rules of law, while Trumpists and the Republican Party remain slavishly indifferent or actively complicit. 

Meanwhile, Rex Tillerson says we’re as vulnerable to Russian treachery as we were in 2016. 

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