Democrats: Withhold Consent and Do It Now
A former top aide to Harry Reid urges Democrats to use a rule of Congress to oppose Trump. (His op-ed in the Washington Post should be shared with your own representatives in case they haven't seen it, or think you haven't seen it.)
"Senate Democrats have a powerful tool at their disposal, if they choose to use it, for resisting a president who has no mandate and cannot claim to embody the popular will. That tool lies in the simple but fitting act of withholding consent. An organized effort to do so on the Senate floor can bring the body to its knees and block or severely slow down the agenda of a president who does not represent the majority of Americans."*
Dear Democrats in Congress,
Maybe you’ve been waiting for the new administration to show itself so the public would be outraged enough to support you rather than call your opposition outrageous (or hypocritical.)
But what happens once they’ve achieved critical mass? Once they have all the pieces in place and the machine begins to move? America would understand the danger then but it would be too late to avoid catastrophic damage to our system. Just as waiting till Germany controlled all of Europe made it impossible to prevent the Holocaust, not to mention the destruction of much of Europe.
(I realize Godwin’s Law rejects any Nazi analogies in the present day, but it is vital to see these parallels.)
Leaders of the western democracies thought they could “do business” with Hitler. Some stopped when they realized how evil he was. Some industrialists persisted because they profited.
Tech and other business leaders are arriving at the Trump White House and doing deals despite Trump’s bigotry and vulgarity and recklessness and delusional behavior and rejection of science and facts and his fascist tendencies and his apparent collusion with a foreign enemy.
I worry that the habit that controls the GOP and the profit-seeking habit of business leaders, the habit of not opposing evil as long as they can gain advantage by it, is now infecting Democrats too.
Let’s not make a deal.
Withhold Consent.
Do it now.
The elevation of Steve Bannon to the top national security group and the demotion of the Director of National Intelligence and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs ought to tell us something. Bannon wasn’t elected. He wasn’t appointed. He put himself there. This is a naked power grab. Should we start calling it a coup? Is this president leading an administration or a regime or a junta? Is he even in charge?
White supremacist Steve Bannon is now President of the United States. He has stated openly that his goal is to destroy our government, which means he wants to destroy democracy and our democratic institutions and all the systems and traditions that support it. They are a nuisance to him.
*Washington Post Op-Ed by Adam Jentleson
"Senate Democrats have a powerful tool at their disposal, if they choose to use it, for resisting a president who has no mandate and cannot claim to embody the popular will. That tool lies in the simple but fitting act of withholding consent. An organized effort to do so on the Senate floor can bring the body to its knees and block or severely slow down the agenda of a president who does not represent the majority of Americans."*
Dear Democrats in Congress,
Maybe you’ve been waiting for the new administration to show itself so the public would be outraged enough to support you rather than call your opposition outrageous (or hypocritical.)
But what happens once they’ve achieved critical mass? Once they have all the pieces in place and the machine begins to move? America would understand the danger then but it would be too late to avoid catastrophic damage to our system. Just as waiting till Germany controlled all of Europe made it impossible to prevent the Holocaust, not to mention the destruction of much of Europe.
(I realize Godwin’s Law rejects any Nazi analogies in the present day, but it is vital to see these parallels.)
Leaders of the western democracies thought they could “do business” with Hitler. Some stopped when they realized how evil he was. Some industrialists persisted because they profited.
Tech and other business leaders are arriving at the Trump White House and doing deals despite Trump’s bigotry and vulgarity and recklessness and delusional behavior and rejection of science and facts and his fascist tendencies and his apparent collusion with a foreign enemy.
I worry that the habit that controls the GOP and the profit-seeking habit of business leaders, the habit of not opposing evil as long as they can gain advantage by it, is now infecting Democrats too.
Let’s not make a deal.
Withhold Consent.
Do it now.
The elevation of Steve Bannon to the top national security group and the demotion of the Director of National Intelligence and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs ought to tell us something. Bannon wasn’t elected. He wasn’t appointed. He put himself there. This is a naked power grab. Should we start calling it a coup? Is this president leading an administration or a regime or a junta? Is he even in charge?
White supremacist Steve Bannon is now President of the United States. He has stated openly that his goal is to destroy our government, which means he wants to destroy democracy and our democratic institutions and all the systems and traditions that support it. They are a nuisance to him.
*Washington Post Op-Ed by Adam Jentleson
Labels: Donald Trump, fascism, Godwin's Law, Nazis, Senate, Steve Bannon, tyranny, Washington Post, white supremacist Steve Bannon, Withhold Consent, worse than Nixon
posted by pasquino at 8:29 AM
2 Comments:
Great idea, but you should credit the section of your proposed letter to its author, Adam Jentleson since you used a paragraph of his piece from the Washington Post word for word.
Good point. The use of italics was meant to indicate this. The link is given. But I should have, and am now adding, quotations also. I usually credit the publication rather than the author, especially when the author is not as widely known. I realize this is imperfect. Streamlining helps clarity of message but can be unfair to authors.I try to avoid clarifying clauses not because I dislike full information but because most readers' eyes glaze over when confronted with too much information.
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