Wearing the Orange Letter
Should Trump voters be held accountable?
Jeffrey Denny
74 million Americans did not invade the Capitol. Several hundred rioters did. And 74 million Americans did not engineer the campaign of disinformation and rage that provoked it. One person did.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s statement condemning former President Donald Trump after his acquittal was a powerful indictment.
Yes, it defied logic, but here we are — Trump is overwhelmingly guilty as charged, but free to be reelected and commit future high crimes and misdemeanors, the kind of recidivism the liberals are accused of indulging.
If only McConnell had made his case before the vote about Trump’s “disgraceful dereliction of duty,” and how he’s “practically and morally responsible for provoking” his rioters.
And if only McConnell and his Senators had the conscience and cohones to convict rather than quibble about the Constitution.
I have my own quibble:
The 74 million Americans who voted to reelect Trump are not innocent bystanders.
We all saw Trump whipping up his mob going into the election. We all could predict a bad end coming a mile away.
Doesn’t that make every voter who still picked Trump at least somewhat culpable?
The fault lies not only with Trump’s poor ride-or-die base he suckers. The coastal elite Republicans who leverage MAGAs for regulation and tax break$ also gave aid and comfort to the Trump insurrection.
As Trump plots his return from exile in Mar-a-Elba, his voters continue to threaten our Republic.
Trump voters inspired the Sedition Caucus to shame themselves and continue to stand up for Trumpism.
Trump voters control the Republican Party, giving them powerful sway in Congress to block President Biden from doing his job and then jeer he’s ineffective.
Trump voters control Republican state parties that censure lawmakers that dare speak truth about Trump or fail to seig heil him.
Trump voters still buy the lie. A conservative poll found only 15 percent of Republicans blame Trump for the Capitol attack. Half blame Antifa and 66 percent say Biden’s win was illegit.
And it was Trump voters that frightened Senate Republicans into discarding their hearts, minds, self-respect and souls to exonerate Trump.
Pity these poor cowering Senators.
If they had indicted Trump, his voters would go ballistic on them. Literally.
Not just by defeating them with crazy right-wing extremist primary opponents. Not just by spewing online venom and death threats with the patriotic courage of anonymity. And not just by accosting them shouting “traitor! traitor! traitor!” in public or outside their homes.
Trump voters have the guns. They amass arsenals. They preen with guns in public. They arrive at peaceful protests in tactical gear with military-grade weapons. And they’re enraged with hate for traitor RINOs who fail to support Trump.
If I were a decent Republican Senator, I’d be afraid of Trump voters too.
Yet Trump voters somehow get a free pass from the media, pundits and politicos.
Naturally, the Trump media won’t hold them accountable as it makes $billions fueling their fears of an AOC Socialist Antifa Democrat under every bed burning down our cities.
But oddly, the fact-based, professional mainstream media tiptoes gingerly around the source of Trump’s destructive power as if to avoid hurting their fragile feelings.
The kid-glove treatment of Trump voters relieves them of personal responsibility, pats them on the heads and croons, “There, there, poor dears, bless your hearts, it’s not your fault you chose to reelect a horrifying, inept, despicable despot.”
It’s condescending to excuse people for their deliberate wrongs.
In America, the people govern.
With great power comes great responsibility, per the Peter Parker Principle.
And with great responsibility comes great accountability.
So let’s stop coddling Trump voters and start speaking truth to their power.
Let’s call out our fellow Americans who are responsible for Trump, Trumpism and Trump’s continuing hateful hold on our country.
Let’s hold accountable the Trump fellow travelers, sympathizers and collaborators, from his red-hat rally mobs, Facebook posters and internet underworld, to the GOP gentry laughing all the way to the bank.
History offers precedence:
We all recall the McCarthy Red Scare and post-9/11 “see something, say something” Muslim scare.
Republicans, whose love for America is nonpareil, demanded if you’re a patriot you’ll happily rat out family, friends, colleagues and neighbors if you merely suspect them of giving aid and comfort to enemies of America, foreign or domestic.
Republicans ruined Americans who they declared a threat to our democracy.
Granted, back then Republicans were stronger.
Today they tremble over the triggering words of a Millennial Bronx congresswoman and her “squad.”
They swoon with the fantods over unarmed BLM protestors and lurch for their guns and smelling salts.
They weep like endangered Nile crocodiles on national media over being “canceled” simply for expressing their First Amendment right to insult, incite, and insurrect without being held responsible for their words.
They gnash teeth and rend garments over creeping Socialism, although not the Socialism they protect such as federal oil subsidies.
And they wake at 3 a.m. in a cold sweat from a nightmare of losing their Congress jobs to a certifiably sociopathic whack-job QAnon extremist like Marjorie Taylor Greene, in spite of their GOP gerrymandered “safe” seat.
All because of Trump voters.
In journalism, you follow the money.
In fighting deadly global pandemics, you follow the science.
In the stock market, whatever the short-term madness, you follow the “Oracle of Omaha,” Warren Buffet.
In love, you follow your heart.
In a democracy, we follow the people.
In “The Scarlet Letter,” when Hester Prynne birthed a baby from an undisclosed father, she was publicly shamed and forced to wear a bright red “A”.
I shan’t suggest we shame the 74 million Americans who tried to birth more Trump and pin them with a flaming orange “T”.
Just please, please, never vote for Trump or anyone like him again.
Jeffrey Denny is a Washington writer.
