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TreasonousBastard

(43,049 posts)
9. Read this in the Times last night...
Sat Oct 19, 2019, 07:10 PM
Oct 2019
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/18/opinion/trump-impeachment-republicans.html

?quality=90&auto=webp

At the Peace Monument near the United States Capitol, Grief weeps on the shoulder of History.
CreditCreditDamon Winter/The New York Times

In the summer of 1950, outraged by Joseph McCarthy’s anti-Communist inquisition, Margaret Chase Smith, a Republican senator from Maine, stood to warn her party that its own behavior was threatening the integrity of the American republic. “I don’t want to see the Republican Party ride to political victory on the four horsemen of calumny — fear, ignorance, bigotry and smear,” she said. “I doubt if the Republican Party could — simply because I don’t believe the American people will uphold any political party that puts political exploitation above national interest. Surely, we Republicans aren’t that desperate for victory.”

Senator Smith surely knew her “Declaration of Conscience” would not carry the day. Her appeal to the better angels of her party was not made in the expectation of an immediate change; sometimes the point is just to get people to look up. In the end, four more years passed before the bulk of the Republican Party looked up and turned on Senator McCarthy — four years of public show trials and thought policing that pushed the country so hard to the right that the effects lasted decades. The problem with politicians who abuse power isn’t that they don’t get results. It’s that the results come at a high cost to the Republic — and to the reputations of those who lack the courage or wisdom to resist.

The Republican Party is again confronting a crisis of conscience, one that has been gathering force ever since Donald Trump captured the party’s nomination in 2016. Afraid of his political influence, and delighted with his largely conservative agenda, party leaders have compromised again and again, swallowing their criticisms and tacitly if not openly endorsing presidential behavior they would have excoriated in a Democrat. Compromise by compromise, Donald Trump has hammered away at what Republicans once saw as foundational virtues: decency, honesty, responsibility. He has asked them to substitute loyalty to him for their patriotism itself.


(More at link.)

The original Times article this is based on was in 1964-- The more things change, the more they stay the same...

Recommendations

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2016 - 2019 and they are at it again in the open . . . Iliyah Oct 2019 #1
With Obama, it was them being "proud of their ignorance" DFW Oct 2019 #6
Sadly, this thought is largely dead, dormant, or otherwise mute. How far we have fallen back. Evolve Dammit Oct 2019 #2
I fear you are correct DFW Oct 2019 #4
Never thought anything like this was possible. But it has been unfolding since '16 and the fervor Evolve Dammit Oct 2019 #10
Actually it's been unfolding since Reagan mdbl Oct 2019 #12
I know it's been unfolding since Reagan; now it is culminating. Evolve Dammit Oct 2019 #15
Longer than that actually it's just cstanleytech Oct 2019 #29
I knew there was a catch. dchill Oct 2019 #3
Oh, yeah DFW Oct 2019 #5
Little known fact about Margaret Chase Smith avebury Oct 2019 #7
Wow. Thanks for this info. Duppers Oct 2019 #13
Oh my! Avebury, that is a great story and a wonderful memory for you! japple Oct 2019 #14
I saw her often for a while, but was working on the "other" side of the aisle. DFW Oct 2019 #22
Due to his job, my father had to work avebury Oct 2019 #24
Now there's a coincidence. Exactly the same story with my father! DFW Oct 2019 #28
She was my grandmother's high school basketball coach jpak Oct 2019 #26
I lived in Maine 2naSalit Oct 2019 #8
No wonder DFW Oct 2019 #30
Yup. 2naSalit Oct 2019 #31
My sister-in-law ran up against the same walls in her native country DFW Oct 2019 #33
Read this in the Times last night... TreasonousBastard Oct 2019 #9
"...- again confronting a crisis of conscience..." ??? calimary Oct 2019 #18
We're looking at you Susan Collins of Maine.... TeamPooka Oct 2019 #11
To have a crisis of conscience DFW Oct 2019 #23
She barely has enough braincells to keep a heartbeat RainCaster Oct 2019 #27
That's the truth! ...nt 2naSalit Oct 2019 #32
Smith was the commencement speaker at my college graduation. greatauntoftriplets Oct 2019 #16
this is now the party of limbaugh and when democrats figure that out this bunch won't have certainot Oct 2019 #17
That was then... Iggo Oct 2019 #19
There were giants in the earth in those days. soldierant Oct 2019 #20
They don't make Republicans like they used to IronLionZion Oct 2019 #21
K&R ck4829 Oct 2019 #25
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