A Tribute to Charlie Sykes, the Supreme Court and Section 3, and Threats to the Republic
This is supposed to be a day for focus on other projects but events intrude. I will keep it brief.
Charlie Sykes, a Never Trump conservative from the beginning, dubs himself a contrarian conservative, or a conservative contrarian, in perhaps something of the same spirit I think of myself as a faction of one out on the left. Above all he is an voice of conscience, as I hope to be here, even when I go off on that fawning, hypocritical, toady, lickspittle, lackey, the senior senator from my native state of South Carolina, Lindsey Graham as he joins other Republicans in the betrayal of Ukraine. Ah, but I digress.
Today let’s take to heart Charlie Sykes's parting words as he steps away from “the hamster wheel of crazy” in his final column at The Bulwark's Morning Shots: “Remember: You are not the crazy ones. And don’t stop believing.”
It's looking dark out there with the Supreme Court on a path to repeal Section 3 of the 14th Amendment and Donald Trump’s consolidation of absolute power over the Republican Party. Some of the justices’ questions and the reasoning behind them spoke to genuine concerns and issues. Although I disagree with the anticipated decision, I am sympathetic with the court’s dilemma and its reluctance to open the door to the chaos that would accompany removal of a major-party candidate from the ballot in a national election on a hodgepodge, state by state basis. The outcome would be a mess no matter how the court decides. Kim Wehle provides her customarily excellent analysis of yesterday’s oral arguments this morning at The Bulwark: SCOTUS Likely to Rule States Can’t Bar Trump from Ballot Under 14th Amendment.
Donald Trump is not the only, and perhaps in the long run not even the greatest, threat faced by the republic. House speaker and self-styled constitutional scholar Mike Johnson has close ties with “right-wing charismatic/Pentecostal and evangelical Christian leaders” affiliated with the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR). “In the chaotic season between the 2020 election and the Capitol riot on January 6, 2021, NAR leaders were enormously influential mobilizers who convinced many right-wing Christians to turn out for the storming of the United States Capitol” (Matthew D. Taylor, Mike Johnson Is Mainstreaming the Spirituality that Gave Us the Capitol Riot, The Bulwark, February 5, 2024). Last week Johnson and other members of Congress gathered with NAR leaders at a National Gathering for Prayer and Repentance at the Museum of the Bible in Washington DC.
Yes, you read that correctly: This past week, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, second in line to the presidency, spent hours praying with the Christian leaders who did the most to encourage religious participation in what became the Capitol riot. (Taylor)
The agenda advanced by Johnson and the NAR goes beyond restoration of Trump to the presidency. They view a Trump restoration as a means to their goal to put an end to constitutional governance and rule of law and replace it with a Christian nation-state under Biblical law as they, and they alone, interpret and understand it, a Christian version of an Islamic state under Sharia law.
This is what we are up against. “Remember: You are not the crazy ones. And don’t stop believing.”
I have some thoughts about Biden and the age issue in the aftermath of the special counsel’s report on his possession of classified documents. In the interest of brevity I will hold those for another day.
Keep the faith. Stand with Ukraine. yr obdt svt