You know who George Will is.
At least you know him as he used to be. The much-honored chief spokesperson of the conservatives. Winner of the Pulitzer and other awards. Highly respected for his astute mind, insights, gift of expression. Columnist in the best newspapers in America. Frequent guest on discussion shows on MSNBC even though his politics were quite unlike those of his hosts.
Above all he was a self-assured, confident, almost cocky man. He was a man sitting on top of the world.
Not any more.
He was on MSNBC one night this past week, and he was the saddest man I ever saw. I kid you not. There was even a sheen of unshed tears in his eyes. His shoulders were bent over. His face sagged into weary lines of sorrow. This was a beaten and suffering man. For a man of words, he certainly wore his sorrow on his sleeve.
This sad spectacle is the work of Donald Trump.
It's become a cliche that anyone who works with or for Trump comes away damaged and diminished. In the case of George Will there was no propinquity. George Will never associated in any way with Trump that I'm aware of. Instead Trump just destroyed Will's world.
In his first year of campaigning and his first in the presidency, Trump took away all the ground that the conservatives once stood upon. His crass Trumpland now occupies the right of the political landscape. Its doctrines of recklessly increasing the debt, launching trade wars, breaking treaties, depriving people of their rights, attacking environmental protection, attacking our law enforcement branch of government — all of these defy true conservatism. The GOP has been so seduced by Trump that it has forgotten that Nixon was a fine environmentalist, in fact the best environmental president we ever had. To Nixon's credit: the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, the Environmental Protection Act, Executive Order 11593 that protects historic sites. The GOP has forgotten that Ronald Reagan entered anti-nuke treaties with Russia. It has forgotten the strong Republican support for NAFTA, the Pacific trade agreement, elements of NATO. It has forgotten that in the 1960's the GOP leader in the Senate, Ev Dirksen of Illinois, fought for the Civil Rights Bills in cooperation with President Lyndon Johnson. All of this rich contribution by the GOP is gone with the wind, the destructive tornado that is Trump.
Civility is gone too. Conservatives knew how to be civil. Now Trump has reduced politics to a nasty name-calling brawl, full of threats and pseudo-tough guy talk. This brawl has come out of the mob gutters of New York and into the almost sacred halls of our Congress and the White House.
And the corruption! It mounts daily. The latest this past week was revelation of the $4.5 million that has been paid by corporations to Trump's "personal attorney" for the strange task of providing "insight" into the Trump administration.
George Will has no home any more in the political landscape. Will he and the other exiled conservatives and moderates in the GOP creat a new home for themselves? Or will they fight to take back their old party? I have no idea. Ordinarily I would say that creating a new party is virtually impossible, but the alternative is even a dimmer prospect, i.e. taking back the GOP from the Trumpies looks nearly impossible.
Well, it's not my problem. The Democrats' big problem is getting Nancy Pelosi to shut up about impeachment. Her babbling on about it may inspire the uninspired GOP ranks to turn out for the midterms and in 2020 so as to protect their poor picked-on Donald Trump.
Also the plight of the GOP is their own problem because they made all this bad stuff happen. George Will has lost his home because his party created a monster faction in order to stay in office. There is some justice in life: they may be in power now but they are in terrible, terrible trouble as a party. (More soon on how the GOP fatally wounded itself.)
Is America also in terrible trouble because of Trump? I don't think so. More on that also another time.
As for George Will he is a well-read man and surely he is familiar with the saying: "When you sup with the Devil use a long spoon."
Too bad that warning slipped his mind.
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