Wrapped in an enigma
It’s the most conservative, farthest right Republicans who are pushing the impeachment of Rosenstein ploy, and what I’m wondering at the moment is what, exactly, is conservative about their lust to sabotage Mueller’s investigation.
After all, Mueller is a Republican, and a former Marine who fought in Vietnam, and a former head of the FBI. You would think all three of those descriptors would place him way the hell up there on the Conservative Checklist. Conservatives and Republicans generally favor other conservatives and Republicans, and men who enlisted voluntarily to fight in Vietnam, especially Marines. (I say “men” because the same doesn’t apply to women: conservatives and Republicans prefer the women to stay home and wait for their men to return.) As for the head of the FBI – come on now, you can’t get a better conservative Republican credential than that.
Yet these guys (I think they are all guys) who pride themselves on being to the right of most House Republicans (which makes them very far right indeed, do admit) are hell bent on discrediting Mueller and his investigation and the (Republican) Deputy Attorney General who is supervising both.
Why? What is conservative about that as a cause?
The explanation we see is entirely pragmatic – it’s worth it to them because Trump is destroying everything “liberal” he can get his hands on.
Maybe that’s all the explanation that’s needed, but it still niggles at me. Trump is a crook. He tells constant obvious lies. He’s mean. He fucks around and always has, including during all his marriages. He sexually assaults women and brags about it. He was a terrible father when his children were young. He hates our European allies and loves Russia. He’s a vulgar bullying asshole. You would think all those things would put extra-conservative conservatives way off, so way off that even the destruction of environmental and financial regulations wouldn’t be worth it.
It’s a puzzle; I guess I’ll just have to resign myself to not understanding it.
Maybe Russian money (via the NRA) is in there somewhere? Maybe they know if the Bully/Gangster?Asshole in cheif goes down, they go with him?
Just guessing. Maybe they’re just fucking nuts. (Though the two are not mutually exclusive).
Well, for one thing, as the recent Sacha Baron Cohen infotainment has shown us, some of these guys don’t seem to think like the rest of us.
But for those Republicans who still have a few brain cells left, it seems to me that they see that their days in power are numbered — they rode the Trump train about as far as it can take them, and they’ll do whatever they can to try stick it out through one more election cycle. That means, among other things, throwing up as many obstacles to the criminal investigation of Trump and his creatures as they can.
“Conservative” can diverge from “right-wing”, and here it does. There are a lot of people who would like to think of themselves as conservative, dedicated to the protection and nurturing of valued institutions that have withstood the test of time – Social Security, other New Deal programs, Medicare, Medicaid, public libraries, the postal service, interstate highways, etc. In effect, all the good things we managed in the U.S. between 1930 and 1970, and many of the better things we helped bring about overseas too.
But none of that is good by authoritarian lights or white nationalist ones, and those are the values running the Republican Party these days. That can all be torn down, and Mueller’s work is out to discredit the Great Leader anointed to do the destruction.
I’ve been saying this forever. The people who call themselves “conservatives” aren’t. They’re radicals who have been busily smashing institutions and replacing them with large corporations for the last four decades.
They, for example, pay lip-service to the institution of the family. They then give corporations carte-blanche to impose working hours and conditions that destroy family life. Same with church. They say go to church on Sunday, then encourage 24/7 commerce.
A recent example in Australia is the demise of penalty rates (a legislated increase of the minimum wage for people working on weekends, holidays and late shifts). Conservatives once supported them because they encouraged family and church life.
OB, it all made sense for me when I revised the list of things I thought conservatives favoured. I put tribalism at the top of the list, and suddenly everything clicked into place.
But Rosenstein is a Republican, so tribalism doesn’t really explain this. He’s of their tribe. So is Mueller, so is Comey.
All three have put their conception of their duty as public servants over their loyalty to Trump or party. That puts them out of the tribe – heck, worse than that, they’re traitors to it.
I suppose. But what a garbage party it will be, even in their terms. I probably shouldn’t be surprised but I am, that they’re not put off by all this squalor.
I think Holms @5 has nailed it. At this point the only thing that matters to the Republicans is power, not what they ultimately use it for. That enables those who are greedy to destroy and rort the system for personal gain (reduced regulation, sale or free use of Federal land, etc); and those who are religious cranks to promote god, discriminate against gays and subjugate of women; and those who are racists and imperialists to pursue their goals. Admittedly there is a fair bit of overlap on some of these archetypes. I suspect if push came to shove many of these people would allow the US to be destroyed or subjugated by another power, as long as their little sphere of influence remained as they wanted it to be.
I agree with Jeff Engel’s outline from a previous thread
Trumpism (our present era) brought this identity crisis to the surface, where we can see it. Rosenstein and Mueller are loyal to the second vision; they are traitors to the first.
One way we can see how Congressional Trumpists reconcile their incoherence is with a skeptic’s list of human foibles (motivated reasoning, etc.). Another way we can see their group dynamics is with Eric Berne’s theory of Transactional Analysis (TA). Predetermined conversational snippets are games; a person can collect their games into a script; and people can band together with their games and scripts to make a racket. Religions and Trumpism are TA rackets.
Other analyses can be true at the same time. I agree with Rob #9, after Trump met Putin in Helsinki, Congressional Trumpists can let the US be destroyed or subjugated to other powers, as long as Congressional Trumpists get their psychological payoff to feel power over others.