Beyond Belief

Meet The Press has aired every Sunday since November 6, 1947. Each week it discusses vital current events with those possessing opinions and influence deemed relevant enough to justify their invitation to participate on the show. To be asked onto Meet The Press confirms one has established credentials worthy of enough respect to be taken seriously on the national and world scene, heady stuff. Through military conflicts, economic trauma, political and social upheaval, an invitation from the Sunday morning forum has always been seen as a feather in the career cap of most any public servant. Turning down the request for anything other than the most significant reason was rare indeed, until very recently.

Last Sunday, MTP moderator, Chuck Todd informed viewers the show had reached out to all 53 Senate Republicans with an invitation to be interviewed about their President’s unprecedented attempt to subvert the 2020 US Presidential election… nobody accepted. Not a single GOP Senator was prepared to go on the record regarding Trump’s claims the contest he lost by a relatively robust 73 electoral votes, not to mention more than 6 million overall ballots, was rigged against him, sans any evidence of course.

Now, in their defense, some were clearly busy with very important projects. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, for example, made clear on Twitter her mind share was on public health in her home state. “As Chairman of the Senate Interior-Environment Appropriations Subcommittee, one of my top priorities is ensuring healthier communities across Alaska.” Forget that, at 79.3 Covid cases per 100,000, Alaska is failing miserably at containing the pandemic’s spread just when the long arctic winter night forces everyone inside to aggravate matters, Murkowski’s attention and schedule are fixed. American democracy will have to wait. As will, apparently, any GOP pressure on the current administration to cooperate in a transition that experts say will be vital to the incoming team’s ability to save lives.

Murkowski wasn’t alone, either. Rob Portman of Ohio was still awash in the glow of his state giving its electoral votes to Trump, even as he appeared far less certain of who actually won the election. Ohio did its part. Buckeye voters, Portman tweeted, knew Trump “has the right policies.” Susan Collins, granted yet another chance by Maine voters to redeem her tarnished reputation for independence and integrity, was more interested in lobsters. Though only capable of a feeble shout out that the process she is certain legitimately granted her a fifth term, only provided Joe Biden an “apparent victory,” and with US democracy pushed to the brink, Collins was more focused on the $36 million “awarded to Maine lobstermen & women to date to help offset the financial harm they have experienced due to China’s retaliatory tariffs.” She was intent to make sure the twitterverse knew about the “funding I helped secure… through USDA’s Seafood Trade Relief Program.“ Perhaps she figured Chuck Todd wouldn’t be interested enough in such a parochial accomplishment.

Lamar Alexander, Mr. reasonable institutionalist, had nothing to say about Trump’s rabid, fact-free claims of multi-state voter fraud. His silence comes despite pending retirement, which is supposed to free him from the clutches of MAGA servility. Fat chance. Maybe he figures it’s simply no use. Either way, the soon-to-be senior Senator from Tennessee, Marsha Blackburn, possesses more than enough fascist fascination for the two of them as she dutifully makes the Fox/AM rounds, Herr Bunker Fuhrer’s Eva-on-the-spot. And on and on. Nothing to see here. The process will play out. Always has.

Trump doing his worst is the least surprising thing of this election. That his keystone despot routine now reflects more than anything else a metric for GOP despicability, sadly, comes in a photo-finish second in that same “no duh” department. It also confirms the damage one term of Fox/AM governance can, not only inflict, but fully normalize. In fact, anything else would have probably seemed too good to be true, a head fake to warily ponder while awaiting the other shoe to drop. What in the last four years provided any credence courage and honorable good faith would be displayed by more than a precious few outliers?

This is where America now dwells, within the firm expectation one of our two major political parties, AT BEST, will remain silent as its leader openly subverts the crux of our national identity. Of course, many Republicans are doing far worse than that in service to their constituents thirst for totalitarian sedition, a fact that should keep us sleepless through the 2022 mid-terms. Kevin McCarthy as the Speaker of the House should fill us all with dread. The anemic Democratic down-ballot performance this cycle inspired no confidence in any firewall Nancy Pelosi claims exists. A GOP House will do more than ensure policy gridlock, it will codify seditious disinformation as the basis for US governance, Biden’s White House will immediately become a wounded lion encircled by hyenas, the Fox/AM narrative gnashing away at truth and substance.

One week later, Chuck Todd scraped the barrel’s bottom and finally found one Republican Senator, Kevin Kramer of North Dakota, to come on and address Trump’s sedition. Unfortunately, in addition to being just about the chamber’s least qualified member, with little more than one year of service, Kramer is distinguished for his involvement with graft involving the award of a southern border wall construction contract to a donor who fully circumvented federal procurement guidelines, instead relying solely on the President’s own “approval process.” Moreover, Kramer being about as servile a Trumpie eunuch as exists in the Senate, offers no meaningful insight as to what calling out his dangerous disgrace might look like.

Alas, Todd shamed his program’s tradition of tough inquiry and fidelity to facts by providing Kramer eight minutes of nearly uninterrupted platform to polish Trump’s dangerous guff, repackaging Rudy Guiliani’s outrageous freak show last week as something “the President has every right to.” Kramer, free from any challenge by the complacent moderator, claimed Trump’s circus has merely thus far lacked an “evidentiary” setting to present a smoking gun that will justify why millions of voters in half a dozen states should be fully disenfranchised. In response Todd was only capable of citing Pennsylvania Republican Pat Toomey’s tepid tweet, which did finally express impatience that Trump’s legal filings have all been baseless and recognized Biden as President-elect. Otherwise, Todd merely shrugged off Kramer’s fiction, appeared pressed for time and moved on. Tim Russert, Lawrence Spivak or even David Gregory, Todd is not, nor ever will be.

The incredible spectacle of a soundly defeated American President overtly subverting our electoral process with baseless claims he thinks up in between rounds of golf continues apace. In the midst of the gravest health crisis in US history – a catastrophe he alone is responsible for – which stands to kill up to half a million people by its one-year anniversary, Trump spends all of his time either plotting how to overthrow his duly elected opponent, or sabotage Biden’s coming term in office. Very few take issue with that synopsis.

Republicans in the House and Senate are now divided into three groups: one that either unapologetically cheers on or more circumspectly roots for Trump’s treason; another lesser number that wishes he would go away, but have no intention of inviting his tweet storms or the unhinged walking dead hordes they unleash; and Mitt Romney, who has merely lived up to the obligations of the oath he took, which within this soulless band of criminals and cowardly mediocrities makes him what passes for a hero. That’s it. Nothing could capsulize our ruin more clearly. We are right now a sick and corrupted nation with nothing to offer the world but a cautionary tale. BC