The other day, every Republican on the House "Oversight" Committee -- all 26 members -- would not sign a two-sentence statement proposed by Jamie Raskin that denounced white supremacy. The main reason behind Raskin offering the statement, he said, was because the “great replacement theory” of white supremacists has grown violent, indeed people have been killed because of it. And every single Republican on the committee wasn’t bothered enough by the hatred, violence and death to denounce it.
In most circles, this is considered a layup. One of those easy questions you can't lose by answering in simple, "Well, yes, of course!" support. Not much more difficult than, "Senator, are you for or against puppies?" But every Republican whiffed and refused. The entire Republican contingent on the committee would not denounce white supremacists. You can't dance around that or try to explain it away. This wasn’t about free speech, cancel culture or “wokeness” – nor was it about anything related to personal choice, or any way you want to twist it. This was about elected members of the U.S. Congress being asked to denounce the virulent hatred of white supremacists – which includes neo-Nazis – who have become emboldened in the country, building to the point of people dying, in an effort to make clear to such hate groups that their violent malevolence and venal cries of “replacement” is anathema to what the United States stands for and together work to stop it. And not one Republican out of 26 would denounce it. You can’t whisk that away however convoluted your attempt. But then, this is today's GOP. Making this all the more pointed was a seemingly-unrelated action by the committee which can only be seen for how, in fact, it overlaps. That’s when later in the day, Republicans on this House "Oversight" Committee announced that they will be visiting Jan. 6 criminals who are in jail. These are the very same GOP members who all refused a statement denouncing white supremacists. The best I can figure is that they want to visit prison just to tell their base the news in person. In a normal world, all that about Republicans on the House “Oversight” Committee would be the full story – because it’s a pretty full banquet all on its own. But, of course, we live in a world with social media. When I initially saw the story about all 26 Republicans on the “Oversight” Committee not denouncing white supremacists, I posted the fact on Twitter. It should not come as a shock how venal some of the response was to give an indication the “Oversight” Committee view reflected the party as a whole. Because, after all, this is today’s GOP. (And lest anyone think I'm being biased in saying this, just know that this morning -- right before posting this -- I received a tweet from "Aletheia" in support that said, in part: "Wow, the vermin that crawl out of the woodwork to challenge your very respectable and reasoned posts gives me pause to believe that we're anywhere close to removing the MAGA influence from our midst.") To be clear, a group of tweets, regardless how large or small is not evidence of the party as a whole. But it’s certainly a good starting point to view some of the party, especially given how crass it was and how non-existent there was of Republican criticism about the unanimous GOP House action. This is not all I got, or necessarily the worst. Just some of the tweets that I saved before blocking them. For instance, there was the response from “Michael” who, putting aside that there was zero truth to his bizarre effort, lashed out with -- “Democrats won't denounce pedophiles, drug cartels, traffickers, smugglers, drag queens, black supremacy, female supremacy, gay supremacy, trans supremacy, non-citizens committing crimes, drug abuse, the two billion in damages from BLM / Antifa, infanticide”. Okay, in fairness, no, Democrats won’t denounce drag queens (which should be a relief to Dame Edna), nor Antifa, which is fighting against fascism. And it’s a shame, too, that too saying Black Lives Matter is seen as something to be denounced, but then that’s today’s GOP. That aside, though, what a woeful defense of the House Republican committee’s refusal to denounce white supremacism. Then there was “John Kovalchuck” who at least was willing to go full anti-Semitic when he replied – “They should have signed a statement that denounced Jewish supremacy.” And while I’m sure he believed his words, they don’t really go very far in refusing to denounce white supremacy. On the other hand, “Christi” thought it was a scathing defense of GOP refusal to denounce white supremacism by saying – “Next he should see if they will denounce unicorns and orcs.” Which would have been a winning slam if Jamie Raskin’s goal was to go after mythical creatures – and if he thought unicorns were evil and killed people. “Glenn leader” seemed to think that flipping the attack around would fool people when he replied, “That's election denier Jamie Raskin to you!” But I suspect he forgot that when talking to people outside the Fox “News” bubble, they actually follow the news, which makes his defense of white supremacism sort of stupid. There also was the fellow who just decided to go “all ad hominin” and think that saying, “Since you’re old as f*ck, you won’t have to be around long to worry about this” was a good defense of House “Oversight” Republicans refusing to denounce white supremacy. Finally, I have to admit, the baseball fan in me thought it was great to hear from former Major Leaguer Lenny Dykstra, who began his career on the New York Mets. He wrote cryptically, “Maybe they see right though [sic] Jamie Raskin’s krassensteining?” (I had to look that up. It turns out that the Krassensteins are brothers who were harsh critics of Trump and later banned from Twitter, though they’re back on the service. Still, I’m not 100% sure what Mr. Dykstra means – though in fairness, I’m not sure that he does either. And I must clarify: my pleasure at hearing this from Lenny Dykstra wasn’t because I like being cryptically criticized, but rather it was great to confirm that this member of the hated Satan’s Team lived down to his reputation, as best-described on the respected Bleacher Report website when the rated him the #9 biggest “sleazeball” ballplayer in Major League history. In fact, they even put him in the title of the article. “Lenny Dykstra and the 25 Biggest ‘Sleazeballs’ in MLB History.” (And no, I’m not kidding, the article is here.) Quite a few other replies tried to explain away the GOP refusal to denounce white supremacists as just a political trick. If so, it's was an incredibly easy trick to participate in, along the lines of playing peek-a-boo with a baby. Getting someone on the record to denounce white supremacy (whether it's a "trick" or a statement of national wellness) is the kind of thing that has no downside. None. Unless, perhaps, it's the base of your party. Again, the responses I got on social media are not proof of anything. But then, they’re not intended to be. It’s just to show one part of today’s GOP that sits in white supremacist support of all 26 Republicans on the House “Oversight” Committee, each of whom refused to denounce the white supremacy, emboldened by such silence and tacit approval. But then, that’s today’s GOP. Venal, virulent, racist, white supremacist, anti-Semitic and woefully uninformed. I am sure there are many good, even wonderful people in the party. And each one of them in their silence are enabling the rest. And no matter how convoluted your attempt, you can’t twist it into knots and make it go away.
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AuthorRobert J. Elisberg is a political commentator, screenwriter, novelist, tech writer and also some other things that I just tend to keep forgetting. Feedspot Badge of Honor
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