Friday, May 7, 2021

The Counter-Reformation of the GOP


Comparing Trump to Hitler used to be an exercise in hyperbole that didn’t garner attention. He was bad, but he didn't kill six million Jews. It was just like calling Trump an asshole or a piece of shit. After all his daughter had, in fact, married a Jew. In addition, the Israelis liked him for putting the embassy back in Jerusalem. But now the orchestrated attacks on literally anyone in the party who opposes him give intimations of even more frightening things to come. If there seemed to be a short respite from Retrumplicanism, it turns out to have truly been the calm before the storm. Liz Cheney’s impending loss of her number three position is the coup de grace. In fact, Trump’s “big lie,” the issue she's fighting, itself exemplifies, in macrocosm what she has had to face on an individual basis. By attempting to delegitimize the Biden presidency, Trump has attacked the electoral process, and the social contract that makes democracy possible. Hitler didn’t attack constitutional government. He merely bypassed it.Trump has done something far worse which is to create a black hole of doubt which may forever tarnish the validity of American democracy. You may not agree with Liz Cheney’s ultra conservative positions, but she's courageous in standing up to a juggernaut of unquestioning fealty to one of the most imperious autocrats in history. One can only pray she succeeds in her quest to delegitimize Trump’s delegitimizing of the election thereby creating a successful counter-reformation in the GOP. 


Read "Trumpty Dumpty's Great Fall," by Francis Levy, The East Hampton Star

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