Editorial: Profiles in capitulation

CBC Editorial: Friday, May 3, 2024; #8927

The following is the opinion of Capitol Broadcasting Company

By their words and actions top leaders in Washington, D.C. around the nation and even in North Carolina seem more attuned to the views of the Russian revolutionary Vladimir Lenin than American Revolutionary War hero George Washington.

Whether it is failing to stand up to phony claims of election fraud, ignoring efforts to subvert justice and democracy or showing a reluctance to disavow dangerous and violent rhetoric of party nominees, it is the good of the Republican Party first. What’s best for the nation or the state is, at best, a distant second.

“Our party, like any other political party, strives for political supremacy for itself.” said Lenin. These many years later it could just as easily have been U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell, state Sen. Phil Berger or state House Speaker Tim Moore.

They certainly don’t heed the admonition in George Washington’s Farewell Address 228 years ago. He watched, with deep concern, the emergence of the Federalist (of President John Adams) and Democratic-Republican (of Thomas Jefferson) parties.

Washington warned while political parties “may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely, in the course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.”

Washington’s Farewell Address isn’t an obscure, dusty bit of history but, along with Martin Luther King Jr.’s Letter from Burmingham Jail, is a part of the state’s English Language Arts Standard Course of Study for high school students.

Party over country?

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) continues to enthusiastically back Donald Trump for president even after criticizing Trump declaration, echoing Nazi rhetoric, that immigrants are “poisoning the blood of our country.” McConnell pointed out Trump named his wife, Elaine Chao who is Taiwanese American, to be secretary of Transportation in 2016. Trump, on a Truth Social post, said she was “China-loving” and called her “Coco Chow.”

Asked about Trump’s controversial comments, which have drawn comparison to Nazi rhetoric before and during World War II, McConnell pointed out: “It strikes me that didn’t bother him when he appointed Elaine Chao the secretary of Transportation.”

Still, McConnell endorsed Trump. “As the Republican leader of the Senate, obviously, I’m going to support the nominee of our party.”

New Hampshire Republican Gov. Chris Sununu (whose father was President George H.W. Bush’s chief of staff), recently said: “I’m going to support the ticket. I’m going to support Donald Trump,” adding that he’d back Trump even if the former president were convicted of mishandling classified documents or of business fraud. That came after he said Trump “absolutely contributed” to an insurrection and “was not a real Republican.”

Former Attorney General Bill Barr said Trump was “detached from reality” and “shouldn’t be anywhere near the Oval Office.” Now he says: “Between the two of those candidates, Biden and Trump, I plan to vote Republican.”

To take them at their words assessing Trump, they’d never engage the former president in a business deal – but still they’d trust him to lead the nation.

Patriotism takes a back seat. What of character? Partisanship and selfishness triumph over integrity.

Profiles in courage? More like profiles in capitulation.

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