There may be no better metaphor for why Democrats keep getting pantsed by Republicans than Whoopi Goldberg asking an audience to please be respectful to Ted Cruz.
Ted Cruz.
Not Jimmy Carter. Not Mister Rogers. Ted Cruz.
Cruz appeared on The View, and when the audience became disruptive, Goldberg admonished them, essentially insisting that he was a guest and deserved to be heard.
And there it was: the Democratic Party’s entire problem condensed into one exquisitely painful television moment.
The other side shows up with a flamethrower. Democrats ask everyone to please use their indoor voices.
To be clear, Cruz should be allowed on The View. Put him on. Ask him questions. Let him speak. Free speech isn’t the problem.
The problem is the bizarre insistence that someone who helped legitimize the effort to overturn the 2020 election must also be wrapped in the warm blanket of institutional respectability while doing it. My phone blew up with texts from friends/family who couldn’t believe what they were seeing.
Cruz objected to certification of Arizona’s electoral votes even after courts had repeatedly rejected claims of widespread fraud sufficient to change the election. He wasn’t some guy in a Facebook group forwarding blurry screenshots of voting machines. He was a United States senator. A Harvard Law graduate. Former solicitor general of Texas. He understood exactly how serious the moment was.
And yet somehow the people booing him are the ones who need a lecture about decorum.
This is why Democrats will never “get it.”
Republicans figured out years ago that politics is a knife fight being held inside a country club. Democrats are still worried someone might use the wrong salad fork.
The modern GOP has spent years attacking institutions, demonizing political opponents, calling elections rigged, treating compromise as weakness and turning politics into professional wrestling. Democrats respond by polishing the lectern and reminding everybody that, traditionally, we wait until the other person finishes speaking.
Wonderful.
Maybe democracy will put that on its tombstone.
HERE LIES THE AMERICAN EXPERIMENT.
IT LOST, BUT WAS EXTREMELY POLITE ABOUT IT.
This fetishization of civility is particularly maddening because it confuses manners with morality.
They are not the same thing.
You can behave impeccably while doing terrible things. History is filled with well-dressed people calmly explaining monstrous ideas. Take Joseph Mengele, the SS officer and physician dubbed the "Angel of Death." He gave out candy to the children who called him “Uncle Joseph,” before removing their spines. Conversely, an angry citizen yelling “BS” from the cheap seats may occasionally have a better grasp of the situation than the person sitting under studio lights explaining why we should all hear both sides.
There aren't always two equally respectable sides.
If somebody claims an election was stolen without evidence, the journalistic response shouldn't be, “Interesting. Let's explore that perspective.”
It should be, “Prove it.”
And when they can't, say so.
This is where Democrats and much of liberal television, not to mention the White House Press Corp., remain trapped in an obsolete fantasy: that if they demonstrate enough fairness, restraint and respect for norms, Republicans will eventually become embarrassed and reciprocate.
Any day now.
Perhaps immediately after infrastructure week.
The instinct isn't evil. In another political era, it might even have been admirable. Democratic institutions require disagreement. People with opposing political views have to coexist. Losing an election cannot mean deciding the winner is illegitimate.
Which is precisely why election denial is different.
The peaceful transfer of power is the mechanism that allows all the other disagreements to happen. Taxes, abortion, immigration, health care — we can scream about all of them because underneath the screaming is supposed to be one basic agreement: elections decide who governs.
Once politicians decide that elections only count when their team wins, we're no longer debating policy. We're arguing over whether the scoreboard itself exists.
And Democrats still seem terrified of appearing rude while pointing this out.
They worry about “norms” while their opponents discovered that norms are only enforceable when both sides care about them. They worry about hypocrisy while their opponents discovered hypocrisy has roughly the shelf life of yogurt left on a Phoenix sidewalk. They worry about being accused of partisanship by people who will accuse them of partisanship regardless.
Then, inevitably, somebody like Cruz walks onto a television set and liberals feel compelled to prove how much more civilized they are.
“Please be respectful.”
Why?
Be lawful. Don't threaten anyone. Don't assault anyone. Don't prevent someone from speaking indefinitely.
But respectful?
Respect is earned.
A functioning democracy doesn't require citizens to politely applaud politicians who tried to undermine confidence in an election. In fact, democracy depends on citizens being allowed to tell those politicians exactly what they think of them.
Loudly.
The irony is that Democrats constantly wonder why their voters aren't as energized as Republicans. Maybe it's because whenever Democratic voters actually become furious, somebody immediately appears with a rolled-up newspaper and tells them to get off the furniture.
Calm down.
Be reasonable.
Don't alienate anyone.
Respect the institution.
Meanwhile, Republicans have spent years discovering that anger is political rocket fuel.
Democrats don't need to become Republicans. They shouldn't lie more effectively, abandon democratic norms or turn every disagreement into mortal combat.
But they desperately need to learn the difference between defending norms and being imprisoned by them.
Democracy doesn't survive because everybody behaves nicely.
It survives because certain lines matter.
Trying to overturn a legitimate presidential election should be one of those lines.
Ted Cruz can appear on The View. He can speak. He can defend himself. He can even complain about the reception.
But nobody owes him applause.
Nobody owes him deference.
And Americans certainly don't need a celebrity moderator explaining that the important thing, after an attempted subversion of an election, is that we remember our manners.
That's the problem.
Republicans keep testing how far the guardrails can bend.
Democrats keep reminding everyone not to lean on them.
And then they wonder why they keep losing the argument. And for that, we say “Shame on you, Whoopi.”