Republican U.S. Senator John Thune of South Dakota leaped out to endorse Donald Trump the other day. There was no reason for the timing of this endorsement -- except that he wants to lead Senate Republicans when Kentucky Senator Mitch McConnell steps back.
Meanwhile, McConnell is fully expected to endorse Trump immanently -- endorse a man who called the Senate leader a "loser" and threw racist insults at McConnell's Chinese American wife.
For many years, journalist Dan Froomkin wrote the White House Watch column at the Washington Post; he took no prisoners, exposing politicians' stupidity and malfeasance. When his employers found him too hot to handle, he was fired and went on to the Intercept and then his own website, PressWatch.
Froomkin has nothing good to say about Republican pols who've seen Trump try once to overthrow our democracy and are flocking to him now. He's disgusted with the Trump endorsements by formerly serious figures. And he's disgusted by political media which treat the coming presidential election as just one more normal contest.
... the powerful people who knew better — who are bending the knee to Trump only now — are hypocritical, craven opportunists going through a very public and newsworthy moral collapse.
That is how the media should be covering them. These people are forsaking the principles they had previously proclaimed — and why? Because they want something (mostly power and money) more than they care about those principles.
Every time that happens ought to be a major news story. Another person has sacrificed their self-respect to become an enabler of tyranny and chaos.
But I’m not seeing that.
I’m seeing reporters writing without any sense of shock or alarm about members of Congress, titans of industry, and others bending the knee as if it’s just a normal part of a normal presidential race.
It is, however, not remotely normal that a major-party nominee for president is an irrational impulsive lying rapist racist crime lord and would-be dictator.
Bending the knee to Trump is a break with core human values like empathy and decency – and democracy. It’s an expression of approval for lying, cheating, stealing, and attempted insurrection.
... Every single new public figure who endorses Trump should be asked by reporters to explain how that squares with their moral beliefs.Do they consider Trump trustworthy? Reliable? Do they agree that the government should root out certain people like vermin? Do they condone his contempt for pluralism? Do they share his willingness to turn over parts of Europe to Vladimir Putin? Do they support setting up camps for the mass deportation of long-time U.S. residents who lack documentation?
And if not, why are they so willing to abandon their principles? What exactly do they think makes that worth it?
These are not just normal times.
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