Attention "Reasonable" Republicans: We Have Good Reason Not To Trust You

Meghan McCain decided to wade into the wide, wide world of false equivalencies this week, tweeting, "None of you are listening, and none of you are open to the other side. It's exhausting, disheartening and un-American - I pray this stops." The implication is that liberals and conservatives both need to focus on coming together in good faith to make this country a better place, and both sides are equally responsible for the challenges of doing so (even though Republicans currently control all three branches of federal government).

I want to believe that there are genuine, reasonable Republicans who are willing to stand up to Donald Trump and stop him from his worst impulses. The problem is, Donald Trump is already acting on his worst impulses, and these mysterious "reasonable" Republicans aren't doing a damn thing. In fact, they helped to create this monster. How do we come together in good faith when the other side hasn't shown any?

Let's go back to the halcyon days of 2012, when our electoral choices were Barack Obama (*swoon*) and Mitt Romney (at least definitely not a fascist). In February of that year, Mitt Romney sought and received the endorsement of one Donald Trump, whose main political stance at that point was that Barack Obama was born in Kenya. By doing so, Romney elevated Trump, recognizing the importance of holding Trump's (racist) supporters in the Republican coalition. Then, in 2016, as Trump's own presidential campaign picked up steam, Romney tried to throw up a roadblock by launching a scathing critique of Trump's ethics and morals. And that critique did absolutely nothing, because, as Trump was all-too-eager to point out, Romney had already sold his soul back in 2012. Mitt Romney learned the hard way that you can't put the racist genie back in the bottle. And once Donald Trump got elected?

Romney would even go so far as to write a hearty endorsement of Trump's most obviously ill-qualified Cabinet member, Betsy DeVos.

Speaking of which, a woman with no education credentials or government experience who couldn't even guess the difference between growth and proficiency based on the actual definitions of those words, as of my writing, has only garnered two Republican Senators in opposition to her nomination. That's two out of fifty-two, or a little under 4% of them.

John McCain and Lindsey Graham have been at the forefront of opposing some of Trump's (impossibly numerous) egregious faults, such as his immigration order and his attempts to improve our relationship with Russia despite obvious attempts to meddle in our democracy. They deserve plaudits for that. But Republican leadership in both houses of Congress has been far more tepid on both fronts.

It's not just Republican politicians. The National Review, after crafting an entire #nevertrump issue last year, has come around to Trump's staunch defense, essentially asserting that Trump's Muslim ban isn't a Muslim ban because it's a temporary ban on Muslims from a select group of countries that Donald Trump crafted while trying to figure out the legality of a full Muslim ban. Those are the kinds of mental gymnastics that "intellectuals" are doing to validate Trump.

There are two reasons they're doing this. The first is that they believe that they can get their programs approved by a Trump administration. They already got the Supreme Court appointment of their dreams. They're getting deregulation people in place in several Cabinet posts, and if Americans don't like the consequences of that deregulation down the road, Republicans know Trump can take the blame for it. Fair play to them on those grounds.

The second reason is more cynical, and it's only going to get worse the longer Trump holds office. It's the same reason Mitt Romney coveted Trump's endorsement those five long years ago. It's the same reason GOP primary opponents held their fire on Trump until it was too late. The GOP coalition is old, and the demographics are shifting against them. They need Trump's base of white, working-class voters to stay engaged with the party, or the long-term future is done.

Trump won in large part because moderate Republicans came home at the last minute. The "reasonable" folks decided that supporting Donald Trump was better than allowing a Democrat to hold the White House for another four years. So to all of those reasonable folks who are now seeing just how bad it can get, please stop telling Democrats that we need to come together with you. We're the Charlie Brown to your Lucy, and you've pulled the football away one time too many. Get your own house in order and show us that you're going to fight Trump, and we'll happily welcome you to the resistance, but we're not going to let you lecture us on how to stop a monster you've created.

UPDATED 2/4/17 1:21 p.m. A previous version of this article credited Peppermint Patty with pulling the football away from Charlie Brown. The sentence in question has been amended. We apologize for besmirching Patty's otherwise sparkling reputation, and resolve to read more Peanuts before referencing it again.

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