Opinion

We've got a fair number of repentant former Republicans roaming loose on the political landscape these days. They like to tell us that the onetime Party of Lincoln must be thoroughly defeated and destroyed before it can be rebuilt as a respectable, mainstream center-right organization. That's an encouraging team-building exercise, I guess — if we set aside everything about observable reality and play an extended game of Let's Pretend We're Grownups, like a bunch of eight-year-olds trying on Mom and Dad's Clinton-era wardrobe.

Even looking past the question of whether the reconstructed GOP 2.0 these folks imagine would be remotely viable (as to which: ha!), we still have the question of who's going to defeat the exceptionally nasty current version of the Republican Party, and how. These GOP apostates, it's worth noting, were totally OK with cutting taxes for the rich and running up massive deficits on endless, pointless, destructive overseas wars. They find themselves deeply shocked, however, by the party's swerve into overt racism, know-nothingism and borderline fascism, elements of the Republican coalition they believed could be kept in the basement indefinitely.

By now, you've read about John Eastman's secret memo outlining six points by which he believed the vice president could overturn the results of the 2020 election on January 6. I defer to legal scholars to explain the memo's legal absurdities. I defer to political scientists to explain why the memo represents forces threatening our republic.

What I want to suggest is so plain I'm surprised that no one else has asked: isn't this evidence of a conspiracy to commit a high crime?

One of the most important lessons of the 2020 election is just how easy it would be for someone with a little bit more savvy to upend the constitution and prevent the peaceful transfer of power in the future. Democracies don't always crumble as a result of violent revolution. It's often done by manipulating the law and using intimidation to ensure compliance.

The most famous example is the German Enabling Act of 1933, also known as The Law to Remedy the Distress of the People and the Reich. That law allowed Adolph Hitler to enact other laws, including ones that violated the Weimar Constitution, without the approval of either parliament or Reich President Paul von Hindenburg, effectively making Hitler a dictator. Through some adroit maneuvering and the detention of certain members of the Parliament, he was able to gain the two-thirds majority required and the courts all went along with it. The rest, as they say, is history.

One of the most important lessons of the 2020 election is just how easy it would be for someone with a little bit more savvy to upend the constitution and prevent the peaceful transfer of power in the future. Democracies don't always crumble as a result of violent revolution. It's often done by manipulating the law and using intimidation to ensure compliance.

The most famous example is the German Enabling Act of 1933, also known as The Law to Remedy the Distress of the People and the Reich. That law allowed Adolph Hitler to enact other laws, including ones that violated the Weimar Constitution, without the approval of either parliament or Reich President Paul von Hindenburg, effectively making Hitler a dictator. Through some adroit maneuvering and the detention of certain members of the Parliament, he was able to gain the two-thirds majority required and the courts all went along with it. The rest, as they say, is history.

The stock market is falling today, in part a reaction to GOP threats to shut down the government: it's all part of their plan.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen last week warned us that the GOP is about to use Jude Wanniski's "Two Santa Clauses" fraud again to damage Biden's economy and our standing in the world. And, sure enough, Mitch McConnell verified it when he said last week there would be "zero" Republican votes to raise the debt ceiling.

At times during the last five or so years, some of us have been living in the future. Sometimes just a day or two, but at other times it has felt like a week or perhaps even a month. During rare moments of immense clarity, it's like being in a time warp, a year or two ahead of the rest of the world.

I'm talking about those of us, both with and without prominent public platforms, who have consistently sounded the alarm about Trumpism, American neofascism and the escalating crises to come. We were mostly ignored, and sometimes mocked and derided. The truth, one suspects, was too painful to accept for those Americans who for reasons of self-interest, cowardice, willful ignorance or indifference found it convenient to ignore our warnings.

Last Saturday, a much-anticipated Washington rally organized by a no-name TrumpWorld character was a complete bust, with only 50 attendees showing up to voice their support for Jan. 6 Capitol rioters, who were characterized at the event as "political prisoners."

Yet given that this event fell flat, does that mean that right-wing extremism in the post-Jan, 6 era is still a problem? Researchers who monitor online forums and track in-person far-right gatherings say the answer is simple: Yes.

Last week, Special Counsel John Durham secured an indictment against an obscure cyber-lawyer and Democratic insider named Michael Sussmann for allegedly lying to the FBI about who his clients were when he relayed a tip about possible digital communication between the Trump Organization and Russia. Durham was appointed by Donald Trump to delve into the origins of the Trump/Russia investigation. Sussmann's indictment appears to be the culmination of that probe, which has already dragged on for more than two years.

A grand jury only hears the prosecution's side of the story. Hence the truism that a grand jury will indict a ham sandwich. With the five-year statute of limitations running out, Durham sought to indict while the indicting was good. At least now he can say he got a Clinton lawyer. This means a lot to the QAnon base, but it won't mean much to a jury.

If there was ever a time to hit the panic button in the Biden era, Monday was that day.

Monday marked one week before so-called moderates in the House of Representatives attempt to force a vote on the bipartisan infrastructure package passed at the center of President Biden's Build Back Better agenda. With his approval ratings stalling due to the double hits of a lackluster response to the delta variant and continued vaccine hesitancy holding down economic recovery, along with a messy withdrawal from Afghanistan that included the fatal drone bombing of 10 civilians, mostly children, Biden is now facing threats of sabotage from the very people with whom he made a political bed for decades in D.C.

At times during the last five or so years, some of us have been living in the future. Sometimes just a day or two, but at other times it has felt like a week or perhaps even a month. During rare moments of immense clarity, it's like being in a time warp, a year or two ahead of the rest of the world.

This article first appeared in Salon.

President Joe Biden promised during his first joint address to the United States Congress earlier in the year to tackle systemic racism. America and the world was listening, including Haitians.

Some might have thought that beyond the need of the United States to eradicate the scourge of racism evident in many areas of society within its own borders, a radical plan might be implemented to tackle discrimination regarding the heavily criticized border policies.

After a trio of moderate House Democrats, led by Rep. Scott Peters, D-Calif, blocked a provision in President Joe Biden's landmark infrastructure package allowing health officials to negotiate excessively high drug prices with large pharmaceutical giants last week, Arizona's senior Democratic Sen. Krysten Sinema has reportedly joined her centrist collegagues in expressing opposition to the White House's proposed prescription drug pricing reforms.

Throwing a wrench in the Democrats' agenda to make life-saving drugs more affordable for millions of Americans, Politico reports that Sinema has told the White House she does not support a provision of the reconciliation bill currently being debated in the House of Representatives that would allow Medicare to negotiate prices for prescription drugs. While running for office in 2018, however, Sinema expressed clear support for lowering prescription drug prices.

When most people think about "bias" in news coverage, they usually think of some kind of ideological bent, as if the Post, say, is trying to advance some kind of political agenda with its journalism. While this does apply to right-wing outlets, like the Washington Examiner, most of the rest of the press corps isn't ideological as we would normally understand that word.

This doesn't mean there isn't bias, though.