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Republicans Hate the Constitution


TexasTiger

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Trump’s call for suspending the Constitution is too dangerous to ignore

December 4, 2022
 

There was a time, in the naive spring and summer of 2015, when I deemed Donald Trump beneath my notice and refused to write about him: Why soil myself, I thought, and also: Surely he will fade away.

I finally caved, in July 2015, with this prescient sentence: “Do not worry about Donald Trump becoming president.

There was a time, in the increasingly appalling months and years that followed, that I deemed Trump too dangerous to disregard and I could not stop calling out his never-ending, ever-escalating outrages against American democracy. Mexican judges. Enemies of the state. Fake news. Muslim bans.

Even a columnist gets tired of repeating herself. And so, during his final stretch in office, and in the years since, I mostly averted my gaze. I called out Trump last August, when he warned darkly of “riots in the streets” after the Justice Department’s search of his Mar-a-Lago residence and before that, in December 2020, when he released a 46-minute video rant assailing the election.

But I mostly thought: Why bother? Shaming targets and convincing readers are the columnist’s goals. With Trump, no minds will be changed, and neither will his behavior.

And yet, there are times when attention must be paid — if only to lay down a marker, if only (grandiose as this may sound) so historians will understand: This went too far. This cannot be allowed to stand without being denounced.

I might have made this choice in the aftermath of Trump’s dinner with antisemites and Nazi sympathizers Ye (formerly known as Kanye West) and Nick Fuentes. Who could have imagined, in the time before Trump, that a former president of the United States and declared candidate for president would so sully himself and the office?

But I am moved, now, to write about Trump’s latest post, on his Truth Social network, because it is at least equally dangerous and even more insidious.

“So, with the revelation of MASSIVE & WIDESPREAD FRAUD & DECEPTION in working closely with Big Tech Companies, the DNC & the Democrat Party, do you throw the Presidential election results of 2020 OUT and declare the Rightful Winner, or do you have a new election,” Trump posted. “A massive Fraud of this type and magnitude allows for the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution. Our great Founders did not want, and would not condone, False & Fraudulent Elections!”

And, he followed up, “UNPRECEDENTED FRAUD REQUIRES UNPRECEDENTED CURE!”

Pause to take this in. The former and would-be future president has suggested suspending the Constitution in support of his deranged belief that he won the election and that its results are subject to change. A man who took an oath to “preserve, protect and defend” the Constitution now has hijacked “our great Founders” in the service of his megalomania.

No.

This is insurrectionism by social media. Nothing — and certainly not imaginary “Fraud,” capitalized or not — “allows for the termination” of constitutional guarantees. Trump is laying the groundwork for a coup.

We can dismiss the post as just the latest Trumpian bluster, something he will never be capable of implementing. Yet the mere willingness to entertain and encourage extra-constitutional action is alarming coming from a man who is seeking to return to office.

Which is why Trump’s words must be highlighted — and called out. I’m past expecting Republican leaders to speak out. We know that, for most, their spines have collapsed and their courage reduced to a shrunken kernel.

Trump “says a lot of things, but that doesn’t mean that it’s ever going to happen,” was the most that Rep. David Joyce (Ohio), chair of the Republican Governance Group, could choke out in response to questions by ABC’s George Stephanopoulos.

The White House was right to rebuke Trump. “Attacking the Constitution and all it stands for is anathema to the soul of our nation and should be universally condemned,” spokesman Andrew Bates said in a statement. If anything, the words should have been issued in the name of the president himself.

Others made more puzzling choices. For a full day, the New York Times, so far as I can find, made no mention of Trump’s post. I assume this was not an oversight but a deliberate decision not to let Trump hijack its product for his unpatriotic purposes.

I get it, but I’m glad the Times relented with a news report Sunday afternoon. The episode embodies the paradox of dealing with Donald Trump. We do not want to give him oxygen, yet there are times we dare not ignore him. This is one. It should be neither excused nor forgotten.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/12/04/ruth-marcus-donald-trump-latest-outrage-is-too-dangerous-ignore/

 

 

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Orange man is a maniac. 

 

I bet DeSantis isn't for suspending the Constitution, so the title of this thread is misleading. LOL 

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9 minutes ago, autigeremt said:

Orange man is a maniac. 

 

I bet DeSantis isn't for suspending the Constitution, so the title of this thread is misleading. LOL 

Yet, most Republicans won’t say they won’t support the guy who is for it if he gets the nomination, so it’s not misleading at all.

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8 minutes ago, TexasTiger said:

Yet, most Republicans won’t say they won’t support the guy who is for it if he gets the nomination, so it’s not misleading at all.


Ok........

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Just now, TexasTiger said:

That’s a low bar, isn’t? Would you support any nominee who says they want to suspend the Constitution?

No but there's a big difference between "most", and all. There's also nothing scientific about your title. You can't back it up unless you use a very wide brush. 

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......In a healthy democracy with two sane, stable and pro-democratic parties, it never would have come to this. In such a world, Republicans never would have nominated and elected in 2016 an openly racist character who fanned birtherism; Republicans never would have renominated him and never would have acquitted him twice in impeachment hearings. Republicans in our parallel universe would have disowned him after Jan. 6, 2021. repudiated him when he issued antisemitic insults and continued to lie about 2020. They would have disowned him when he renounced fidelity to the Constitution.

It would hardly come as a surprise that a parade of spineless Republicans appearing on the Sunday shows refused to declare him unfit to be president. Rep. Michael R. Turner (R-Ohio), ready to claim the chairmanship of the House Intelligence Committee, said that he “vehemently disagree[d]” with the remark and managed to acknowledge that Trump’s repudiation of the Constitution was “not consistent with the oath that we all take.” Though he finally agreed that he would condemn Trump’s comments, he insisted there was a “political process” to play out to determine the party’s 2024 nominee. In refusing to rule out Trump as the nominee, he personifies the moral cowardice of today’s GOP.

Likewise, Rep.-elect Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.) would merely say he didn’t “endorse” the threat to overturn the Constitution. (That’s a relief!) And Rep. David Joyce (R-Ohio), who chairs something called the Republican Governance Group, offered only that Trump “says a lot of things.” Worse, he explicitly declared that he would “support whoever the Republican nominee is,” without ruling out Trump. (At least Marc Short, former chief of staff to Vice President Mike Pence, acknowledged, “The president’s remarks, the company he’s keeping, I think is way beyond the fold.”)

This is precisely how we got to this shameful state of affairs: Republicans lack the spine, decency and loyalty to the Constitution to denounce Trump by name and declare him unfit to seek the presidency. In 1992, the Republican Party denounced former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke when he attempted to run for president. Don’t expect it to have any such standards now.

Republicans continue to cower in fear of the radicalized base (which they helped rile up by standing by the “big lie” that the 2020 race was stolen). They fret that Trump might run as an independent or instruct his base to stay home if they turn on him. (Spoiler: He’ll do that anyway unless they hand him the nomination.)

We await a contender for the GOP presidential nomination in 2024 (aside from Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming) to declare he or she will not support him if he is the party’s nominee. Their silence amounts to complicity in the repudiation of our democracy. They are implicitly telling us that someone who rejects the Constitution is a valid contender for the presidential nomination.'

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/12/05/rubin-trump-constitution-threat-gop/

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6 minutes ago, homersapien said:

 

......In a healthy democracy with two sane, stable and pro-democratic parties, it never would have come to this. In such a world, Republicans never would have nominated and elected in 2016 an openly racist character who fanned birtherism; Republicans never would have renominated him and never would have acquitted him twice in impeachment hearings. Republicans in our parallel universe would have disowned him after Jan. 6, 2021. repudiated him when he issued antisemitic insults and continued to lie about 2020. They would have disowned him when he renounced fidelity to the Constitution.

It would hardly come as a surprise that a parade of spineless Republicans appearing on the Sunday shows refused to declare him unfit to be president. Rep. Michael R. Turner (R-Ohio), ready to claim the chairmanship of the House Intelligence Committee, said that he “vehemently disagree[d]” with the remark and managed to acknowledge that Trump’s repudiation of the Constitution was “not consistent with the oath that we all take.” Though he finally agreed that he would condemn Trump’s comments, he insisted there was a “political process” to play out to determine the party’s 2024 nominee. In refusing to rule out Trump as the nominee, he personifies the moral cowardice of today’s GOP.

Likewise, Rep.-elect Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.) would merely say he didn’t “endorse” the threat to overturn the Constitution. (That’s a relief!) And Rep. David Joyce (R-Ohio), who chairs something called the Republican Governance Group, offered only that Trump “says a lot of things.” Worse, he explicitly declared that he would “support whoever the Republican nominee is,” without ruling out Trump. (At least Marc Short, former chief of staff to Vice President Mike Pence, acknowledged, “The president’s remarks, the company he’s keeping, I think is way beyond the fold.”)

This is precisely how we got to this shameful state of affairs: Republicans lack the spine, decency and loyalty to the Constitution to denounce Trump by name and declare him unfit to seek the presidency. In 1992, the Republican Party denounced former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke when he attempted to run for president. Don’t expect it to have any such standards now.

Republicans continue to cower in fear of the radicalized base (which they helped rile up by standing by the “big lie” that the 2020 race was stolen). They fret that Trump might run as an independent or instruct his base to stay home if they turn on him. (Spoiler: He’ll do that anyway unless they hand him the nomination.)

We await a contender for the GOP presidential nomination in 2024 (aside from Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming) to declare he or she will not support him if he is the party’s nominee. Their silence amounts to complicity in the repudiation of our democracy. They are implicitly telling us that someone who rejects the Constitution is a valid contender for the presidential nomination.'

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/12/05/rubin-trump-constitution-threat-gop/

My guess is they're trying to placate Trump so he doesn't split off and run 3rd party, then hoping he doesn't win the Republican nomination. I think it's probably futile - if he doesn't get the nomination I think he'll run 3rd party, anyway - but they're desperate.

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Real patriotism dictates:

You hate half of your fellow Americans.

You defecate in the capitol while someone holds your Trump (or confederate) flag.

You suspend the constitution when it's not working for you.

 

Impeach Joe Biden.  Restore the Trump presidency.

 

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1 hour ago, icanthearyou said:

Real patriotism dictates:

You hate half of your fellow Americans.

You defecate in the capitol while someone holds your Trump (or confederate) flag.

You suspend the constitution when it's not working for you.

 

Impeach Joe Biden.  Restore the Trump presidency.

 

Sounds like Democrats during orange man 

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1 hour ago, autigeremt said:

No but there's a big difference between "most", and all. There's also nothing scientific about your title. You can't back it up unless you use a very wide brush. 

Thus the Smack forum. It ain’t purporting to be science. But most Republicans still refuse to call out the most egregious crap from this guy. Don’t blame me. I’d love for this post to have no bearing at all.

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Just now, TexasTiger said:

Thus the Smack forum. It ain’t purporting to be science. But most Republicans still refuse to call out the most egregious crap from this guy. Don’t blame me. I’d love for this post to have no bearing at all.

Ok 👌🏻 

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Just now, icanthearyou said:

No, it does not.

Do you contend that Trump was good?  Is he the leader you want?

I hate the mfer. Stop! Obviously you ignore a lot of posts that don’t feed your ego. Lol 😂 

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3 minutes ago, autigeremt said:

I hate the mfer. Stop! Obviously you ignore a lot of posts that don’t feed your ego. Lol 😂 

I wish you would think without emotion. 

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2 minutes ago, icanthearyou said:

I wish you would think without emotion. 

I wish you would stop being a self perpetuating judge. But hey, it’s all good. 

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Just now, icanthearyou said:

Just trying to help.

In your own mind. 😜

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Just now, icanthearyou said:

I apologize for offending you.

No you don’t. Ha! 

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21 hours ago, autigeremt said:

I hate the mfer. Stop! Obviously you ignore a lot of posts that don’t feed your ego. Lol 😂 

Yeah, but the topic is about the ongoing Republican support he has.

 

 

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23 hours ago, TexasTiger said:

Yet, most Republicans won’t say they won’t support the guy who is for it if he gets the nomination, so it’s not misleading at all.

Well, let's count the number of Republican Representatives and Senators who have said they won't support him. After all, most of us have at least 10 fingers - or will 5 do? 

Edited by homersapien
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