The question is the title of a post on the website of Revote2017, the group with a Writ of Mandamus action waiting for a response from the Supreme Court on Friday. This intrepid pro se group is trying to make the argument that the Guarantee clause of Article IV, Section 4 of the Constitution requires our government to protect us from “foreign invasion,” even the cyberwar kind. Since it is clear that Russians interfered with the election—as 17 Intelligence Agencies have actually confirmed—they want the Supreme Court to assign a Special Master to determine that invasion as fact, which then could enable the Supreme Court to require the Government to remedy this failing by holding a revote. Experts claim there is little precedent for the court to do this but don’t put their chances at zero. At any rate, they find out what happens on Friday.
Meanwhile, as "normal” Americans, they manage to cast a rather bright spotlight on the rather absurdist new “normal” that is on display for a posse of Trump Administration appointees and insiders, so many of which just coincidentally have some Russian connection or other. The post offers a “handy reference chart" of those leaders who seem genuinely disturbed by the now statistically-impossible-to-be-explained-by-mere-coincidence phenomena of so many people in the Trump camp being connected to Russia and those who are trying hard to act like it’s perfectly normal to, say, hang out with Ambassador Kislyak or have a bank account at the Bank of Cyprus. They write:
We are compiling a handy reference chart of members of the Trump Administration and Congress who have, through their various actions, appear to be gleefully embracing a new degree of Russian influence, interference and deconstruction in the U.S. and those who clearly are not. So far, we have about 17, more than enough to field a baseball team for Russia. We, however, are "normal" Americans and, as such, we are extremely upset about Russia's intrusions into our electoral process and government. We are not "okay" with any of our leaders being complicit with Russian "cyberwar aide" to the Trump campaign so they can take-over U.S. Government for the purposes of increasing Russian oil profits, decreasing American regulations (that protect the public), diluting our influence abroad or any other reason. We think if these leaders are not opposing this clear and obvious Russian take-over with everything they have, then they are likely complicit with this treason.
This chart assigns people in the Trump Administration either to Team USA or Team Russia, giving readers a pretty clear picture of the situation at hand, which is a rather large rats' nest of Russian influence, actors and suspected espionage.
Among the names they include on Team USA are General H.R. McMaster, Senators McCain, Cardin, Feinstein and Leahy and Representatives Pelosi and Issa.
On Team Russia are Trump, Bannon, Sessions, Flynn, Ross, Tillerson, Manafort, Donald Trump Jr., Ivanka Trump, Jared Kusher, Kellyanne Conway, Roger Stone, Carter Page, and JD Gordon, along with Senate Majority Leader McConnell, House Speaker Ryan and House Oversight Committee Chair Jason Chaffetz.
Those still yet to be assigned to a team (lack of Russian connections and also lack of alarmed response) includes Vice President Pence, Betsy DeVos, Richard Burr, and Devin Nunes.
We know there are now numerous investigations going on, but in this moment before the shit really hits the fan for Trump and his comrades—in the absence of an explanatory story line that explains what most everyone instinctively already knows may well be the most bizarre and brazen but ultimately fumbling episode of treason in the history of of the United States—it is helpful to have this reference chart to see the amazing scope of the scandal. Nothing like seeing that long line-up of players to get one to really appreciate the amount of work that investigators must be doing to try to amass the amount of evidence that must be preserved so as to prosecute so many high level people at one time.
There’s certainly reason to want those investigators to do a really thorough job, yet with each passing day it is impossible not to share this sentiment expressed by the Revote folks:
Frankly, we are looking to see which leader will be the first one willing to call all this blatant treason "treason!"
It is possible to wonder whether the impatience that most of us feel to stop these bad actors in their tracks might be shared a tiny bit by members of the Supreme Court, who by merely approving the plaintiffs’ Motion for a Special Master, could put the Trump Administration on notice that all is not kosher and that the judicial branch is actually going to make its own assessment, free from the binds that are clearly holding back most Republicans in Congress. Happily, whether or not they do, Revote’s call to top leaders to begin calling treason "treason" is no longer even that quixotic—the whole country seems to realize that it is really just a matter of time.
