QOTD: Vichy America

 

Julia Carrie Wong, writing in The Guardian about the institutionalist Dems who are having difficulty resisting the Malignant Fascist:

"At the dawn of the second Trump presidency, defiance has given way to compliance.

While Donald Trump has rapidly and ruthlessly thrown the federal government into unprecedented chaos, the leaders of the Democratic party have offered up little more than limp banalities and platitudes. 'Presidents come and presidents go. Through it all. God is still on the throne,' tweeted the House minority leader, Hakeem Jeffries, at the end of Trump’s first week in office.

Asked who was leading the caucus’s pushback, the Senate minority whip, Dick Durbin, told Semafor on 23 January: 'I can’t answer that. Give us a little time.' Another senator said, 'We’re obviously in a bit of disarray,' though Senate Democrats have arrayed themselves enough to provide bipartisan support for a number of Trump’s cabinet appointees.

For the leftists and liberals who had hoped to see the opposition party mount some kind of opposition to Trumpism, this spectacle of capitulation has inspired a new historical analogy, or at least a new insult. La Résistance is dead. Welcome to Vichy France."  (our emphasis)

We'll see the Vichyites bend on votes for the MF's bills (Laken Riley Act) and appointees (Rubio, Ratliffe, Bessent, Duffy), and some may outright defect to the MAGA side (Sen. Fetterman). They will honor the boundaries and rules that the other side will beat them over the head with as they gain more power. Showing the MF decency and normalcy as at the Inauguration only serves to deepen his contempt for them as "weak" and "losers." Until the white glove, patty cake Dems get serious about the threat the MF poses and punch back hard, perhaps that contempt is warranted.

As Marc Elias put it, don't bring norms to a Trump fight. 

BONUS:  Tom Sullivan at Hullabaloo -- "Fight, Fight, Fight."  Make sure your Democratic Rep/ Senator is fighting (202-224-3121).

(photo: Sen. Klobuchar (D-MN), former President Biden, former VP Harris politely applaud at "threat to democracy" Trump Inauguration ceremony.  Kenny Holston vía Reuters)