Tyranny's Foothold

This WSJ editorial came out last week. This concluding sentence nails it:

"Mr. Trump somehow seems to believe that his outsize personality and social-media following make him larger than the Presidency. He’s wrong."

My January 29 post made the case for invoking the 25th Amendment on the grounds that Trump's mental disorder -- malignant narcissism -- prevents him from discharging his duties as President.  The WSJ puts it another way here by pointing out that Trump thinks he's "larger than the Presidency."  He thinks he is above the Office, above the law.  Why else would he and his lead attorney Jay Sekulow be exploring the idea that he can pardon himself?  What is that if not the very definition of "above the law"?

Trump is EXACTLY who Adams, Madison, Jefferson, and the framers feared might one day ascend to the Office of the President.  It is time for the GOP to stop fiddling around the edges in order to squeak through ACA reform, tax reform, or their flavor-of-the-month legislation.  Whenever they (Ryan, McConnell, Graham, and other GOP leaders) are pressed on a daily/weekly Trump travesty they say things like, 'That doesn't help' or 'That doesn't reflect the principles of our party'....or some other mealy-mouthed talking point.

This man, his family and his henchmen are slowly, inexorably destroying our democracy.   

"All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent."
-Thomas Jefferson

When will the people of good conscience in Congress break their silence?

#POTUSLIES Update

This NYT tally of Trump's lies is all well and good, but where was the WSJ, National Review, FoxNews and other conservative media while candidate Trump was lying his way through the primaries? Megyn Kelly took a shot at him at one debate only to be bullied into silence and complicity. If the responsible conservative media had called Trump a liar starting the day he announced his candidacy, maybe we wouldn't be reading about him as POTUS today. Instead, the broader media -- liberal and conservative alike -- fed on the ratings and revenue Trump drove. 

Back on January 5 I wrote this of the WSJ Editor's defense of why they had not labeled Trump a liar during the campaign.  The first paragraph quote is WSJ Editor Baker:

Baker: "To refrain from labeling leaders’ statements as lies is to support an unrelenting but not omniscient press, one that trusts readers’ judgments rather than presenting judgments to them. If we routinely make these kinds of judgments, readers would start to see our inevitably selective use of a moral censure as partisanship. We must not only be objective. We must be seen to be objective to continue to earn our readers’ trust."

Paul: "Here's the problem with Baker's argument: because he and the leading conservative press think they're only writing for their primary reader -- people who actually can make sound judgements about the character of guys like Trump-- the WSJ and their ilk allowed Trump's ascension by not branding him a lying BS artist in month 1 of his campaign.  Their assumption about their audience is dead wrong: they're not just writing for their primary reader.  Rather they are setting the standard, the tone, and the agenda for the conservative press.  If a scion like the WSJ had called Trump what he really is -- a liar -- Fox and other outlets likely would've followed suit.

Unlike the WSJ's primary readers, Trumpeters -- the 40 million or so yahoos who generated the momentum that got him the nomination and scared the GOP into full support that gave him the platform for victory -- can't make that same sound judgement."

So here we are, 166 days into the Trump Presidency and the NYT catalogs his lies by the day.   According to this tabulation he told an outright lie or falsehood every day of his Presidency for the first 40 days. 

The only question remains is whether the conservative press will do the right thing now.  However, they are still feeding off his media stardom as he slowly erodes The American Presidency from within. Huh. Maybe they know what they're doing after all.