It's time to stop arguing about the Trump-inspired minutia of the moment, and think about the end game: Our republic.
Donald Trump has already attacked our republic in a million ways big and small. He started by demonizing certain people—immigrants, to be specific, the lifeblood of our country. He moved to undermining our institutions—judges and the independent judiciary. And then he started destroying our foundational principles—the separation of powers and a free press that can serve as a check on his power.
Ultimately, he is like some rancid acid eating away at our trust in everything—in our neighbors, our politicians, our justice system, our media, our fellow countrymen. He has turned everyone and everything into our enemy because everyone and everything is his enemy unless and until one's fealty to him is declared and proven.
Trump has not done this alone. These were divisions in the making and Russian President Vladimir Putin rightfully saw and capitalized on an opportunity to exploit them from abroad. Whether Trump colluded with Putin to steal the election is a question for another day. Regardless of the answer, Putin's fingerprints are all over crisis we now find ourselves in. Over the last several weeks, his Russian bots have been vigorously pushing the #ReleaseTheMemo meme on twitter. If there’s an opportunity to stoke discord in our union, Putin will find it.
A solid 35 percent of voters have also joined Trump in his austere "You're either with me or against me" mentality—it’s no longer “us,” it’s “me.” They will neither falter nor be deterred by facts. Trump is their North Star.
And Republican lawmakers have traded in their oath to the Constitution for a loyalty pledge to the party. Some of those GOP lawmakers are just wackadoodle enough to be fully politically aligned with Trump, while others have made a Faustian Bargain to tolerate his existence on the way to other goals. But whatever the case, they have ceded their responsibility to serve as a check on the executive branch at great detriment to the future of our country.
For congressional Republicans, there is no insult too personal, no rhetoric too incendiary, no viewpoint too repulsive, no action too destructive. Trump can do all and Republicans will do nothing.
In fact, the Republican party succeeded this week in eroding the very practices that were developed post-Watergate to protect the nation against another Richard Nixon abusing the power of the presidency solely for his or her political ends. The trust that once allowed our intelligence agencies to share information with congressional oversight committees without fearing that information would be disclosed or otherwise used for political gain dissolved with the publication of a four-page memo fully intended to weaponize classified information in support of the president.
That memo was a dud in so many ways. Far from being the bombshell GOP lawmakers had billed it as, it proved that the FBI's Russia investigation wasn't triggered by the Steele dossier but rather by information surrounding former Trump campaign aide, George Papadopoulos, who has since pleaded guilty to lying about his Russian contacts and become a cooperating witness in the probe. It also showed that three separate FISA court judges found enough probable cause that former Trump campaign aide Carter Page was working as a foreign agent to approve FBI surveillance of him.
But arguing the merits of the memo is useless. Regardless of what the facts show, Trump's 35 percent will take it as gospel while Republican lawmakers fall in line, goose stepping toward Trump's ultimate target—thwarting special counsel Robert Mueller and the Russia investigation. By Saturday morning, Trump was already on twitter declaring total vindication from the “Russian Witch Hunt.”
There is no mystery to Trump's desire. And this week has once and for all put to rest any intrigue about whether the Republican party would finally step in once it became clear that Trump posed a mortal threat to the sanctity of our democracy. Paul Ryan is a complete and utter disgrace—full stop. As the Washington Post editorial board wrote:
Mr. Ryan bears full responsibility for the deterioration of congressional oversight of intelligence operations. Once a bipartisan responsibility that lawmakers treated soberly — as they still do in the Senate — oversight under Mr. Nunes has become another front in Mr. Trump’s assault on the law enforcement institutions investigating the president and his associates.
It was arguably treasonous for Ryan to allow Rep. Devin Nunes to manipulate and then publicly release classified intelligence in service of insulating the commander in chief from a legitimate criminal inquiry being conducted by an independently appointed prosecutor.
But what we now know that may not have been crystal clear until this week is that congressional Republicans are going to sanction absolutely anything Trump does on the path to decimating the Russia probe and exonerating himself.
The trail of ousted Justice Department and FBI officials named in the Nunes memo as having signed off on FISA warrants for surveillance of Carter Page is frightening. All credit to MSNBC, which compiled this simple graphic of them.
Looking at that graphic Friday afternoon brought the gravity of our situation home to me. Just because this is a slow rolling Saturday Night Massacre doesn't mean it isn't happening. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein is clearly on the chopping block next but only as a pretext to reaching Robert Mueller.
And in the midst of a crisis that is shredding the fabric of our country, we are arguing about a memo. Mark my words: Even if we dodge a bullet in this one instance, it will not make one lick of difference. Donald Trump with his singular obsession over the Russia probe will find another way. In fact on Friday, Nunes was already hinting at a new investigation into the Obama State Department’s role in the Russian probe just as the Justice Department’s inspector general finalizes another report about the FBI’s handling of the inquiry into Hillary Clinton.
So here we are. Absent the protection of our institutions, any honorable GOP lawmakers, and our system of checks and balances, what we are left with is us: We the people.
As MSNBC commentator Donny Deutsch declared Friday, "Our democracy is under siege. People need to start taking to the streets. This is a dictator!"
If Trump finally succeeds in removing Rosenstein or Mueller, we must stand ready to fight. We cannot afford for there to be a moment of hesitation that results in a collective national shrug. We must flood the streets with a citizen outcry equaling that of the original Muslim ban.
Get your boots and signs ready, folks. Tell your friends and neighbors to prepare. Sign up for action pages that are prepping for just such an eventuality, like this one at MoveOn.org which is currently focused on Mueller’s ousting. (Feel free to share other resources below.) As the MoveOn sign on page says:
Our response in the minutes and hours following a power grab will dictate what happens next, and whether Congress—the only body with the constitutional power and obligation to rein Trump in from his rampage—will do anything to stand up to him.
Republican lawmakers are now living inside Trump’s 35 percent bubble and a massive outcry from the streets is perhaps the only thing that can pierce it. If facts don’t matter, people still do. Washington will need to hear a muscular and unequivocal response from our citizenry if GOP lawmakers are to understand the magnitude of the line they are crossing. I invite everyone to prepare for that moment now so our collective response to such an event is both swift and meaningful. I personally don’t think we can afford to wait until Trump gets to Mueller—I think any action taken against Rosenstein, a lesser-known figure than Mueller, should be the trigger.
We must not let Donald Trump rob us of the flawed but precious gem we inherited from all those who came before us. We cannot allow him to steal it from us or our children or future generations. Not on our watch.