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It's Past Time for Republicans to Join America in Rejecting Trump — Taking Liberties
BY JOEL MCNALLY
Winning is always supposed to be better than losing in politics. But the narrow Republican majority that barely won House control in the party’s disastrous midterms could easily turn into an even worse nightmare for Republicans.
Forget all those Republican plans to make the next two years hell on earth for President Biden and Democrats. That was before voters reduced their confident predictions of a surging red tidal wave to a trickle.
Here’s the understatement of the century why 2023 could be an even worse year for Republicans unless they change directions. Kevin McCarthy is no Nancy Pelosi. Pelosi’s brilliant leadership made passing major legislation with a slender majority look easy. The only woman elected to that position may have been the most effective House Speaker in American history.
McCarthy will never be. Neither will any other Trump-approved House Republican. McCarthy’s been frantically making deals for weeks with the craziest Republicans in captivity including Marjorie Taylor Greene to become Speaker. At this writing, he still hasn’t secured the 218 votes to win the job on Jan. 3.
GOP SELF-DESTRUCTION
That’s right. There are even crazier House members than Greene with demands to be satisfied. At this point, it doesn’t really matter whether McCarthy or somebody even more extreme wins.
That’s because Republicans are caught in a self-destructive perfect storm. Republicans have now lost three straight national elections by following a false god. They lost the midterms because they nominated terrible candidates spewing Trump’s lies and contempt for democracy.
The only reason they squeaked out a House victory was Republican states corruptly gerrymandered elections to assure themselves of winning a majority of House seats even when they lose statewide elections.
The other dreadful result of gerrymandering is electing far more extreme Republicans in the House. When a record number of mainstream Republicans who couldn’t stomach life under Trump retired or were driven from the party after the violent insurrection, they were immediately replaced by more extreme members.
What happens next will embarrass Republicans nationally by creating chaos going into the next presidential election. It's a bad time to be caught on the wrong side of American history. Since Trump’s defeat, he’s continued to incite his supporters against federal law enforcement to try to escape punishment for the deadly violence that ended his presidency.
Trump forged links with the lawless armed militias of the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys long before they responded to his call to Washington to lead the insurrection to overthrow President Biden’s election. A jury has now convicted the Oath Keepers of seditious conspiracy for attempting to violently overthrow the lawful transition of power. The Proud Boys are facing similar charges.
Trump is now explicitly advocating the destruction of American democracy—calling for the termination of the Constitution to return him to power. It’s long past time for Republicans to join America in rejecting Trump. They’ll just be another lunatic fringe party until they do.
The successful midterms will allow Biden and the Democratic Senate to block the most reprehensible legislation coming out of the House. Republicans won’t have anything left to do but conduct fraudulent investigations into nonexistent administration scandals. Their political targets are, to correctly use the term, fake news. Americans face serious problems if they want elected officials to address rebuilding the economy. Hunter Biden isn’t one of them. He’s never held any political office. Many families can identify with the heartbreak of the Bidens as they struggled to save a son they loved very much from drugs. With Hunter in recovery, all anyone else should care about is his continued success.
PROSECUTION MOVING FORWARD
Surely, House threats to impeach Atty. Gen. Merrick Garland and investigate the FBI for raiding Mar-a-Lago are over now. Federal prosecutors are moving full speed ahead with criminal investigations into Trump’s actions before and during the January 6 insurrection and his possible theft of hundreds of secret government documents when he left the presidency.
Legal experts once thought charging Trump might be a difficult decision for Garland. No president has ever before been criminally prosecuted for his actions in office. But after riveting testimony from Republican White House witnesses before the bipartisan House January 6 Committee, it would be more surprising if Trump were not criminally charged.
Throughout his presidency, Trump used to boast almost daily of his imaginary historic achievements. Now Trump could finally achieve his fantasy of making history. The highest official ever tried for his role in an armed insurrection was President Jefferson’s former vice president Aaron Burr in 1807. Burr was acquitted because there were no eyewitnesses to his planning of an armed rebellion against Jefferson.
Americans in those days didn’t have the technology we do to watch our violent insurrections on live television. It’s getting late, but there’s still time for Republicans to distance themselves from Trump. Relax and enjoy the trial. Remember, Americans are supposed to be on democracy’s side.
Joel McNally was a critic and columnist for the Milwaukee Journal for 27 years. He has written the weekly Taking Liberties column for the Shepherd Express since 1996.
