![[image of the US Constitution being engulfed in flames]](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZntDbDHdUxgdifAy-IetR13HoXzsf0mJ7Bzb6tyGBlwZVjcX5VOUJdYDZT4Z-qPI56u9otOWUj1KOJh7XTdy4mwP-GLUhljjE5TYWGfrPtp5CH_Zgjx7I_I-u9xmWwyf7T_9mVDXPghl33TfeBzVOfI-u0qDYE_kZkHmCt22ePmwFa8ivZP4QYNcRpv4/s600/constitution-on-fire%28500x600%29.jpg)
I am unforgiving of GOP Congressional cowardice. They pledged an oath to support and defend the Constitution. They have historically sent millions into war, the sometimes-tenuous justification being a need to defend our way of life. There is now a coup afoot and it falls to Congress itself to defend us.
Any in Congress sustaining the coup because they fear for their job, their safety or the safety of their family are committing treason.
Protecting and defending the US is not optional, something to do if it's convenient. It is a sworn duty.
Their paid job is to represent the citizens who elected them—not party, not billionaires, not the President.
Why may Congress be more selfish than soldiers they send to battle?
Why are their families entitled to protection at the expense of our nation?
We know they speak privately of being afraid, but we citizens are afraid, too, and we have no recourse.
These people swore to act on our behalf.
These treasonous cowards of the GOP Congress, by their corrupt, selfish, and dishonorable action and inaction are, at every opportunity, unilaterally surrendering the Constitution they swore to protect, willfully ignoring that it leads us inevitably to authoritarian rule.
The cowardly GOP Congress plainly hope that passively turning a blind eye to a coup, ignoring their oath and instead pledging fealty to a would-be dictator, will leave them spared his wrath.
Yet dictators need neither Congress nor Courts. They make their own laws and brook no checks on their power.
We are all afraid. I do not forgive the GOP Congress their fear. I expect them to rise above it. Selfish action now is beyond shameful, beyond corrupt. Traitorous. No better than a deserter, AWOL from a post at a time when necessity and duty requires defending the Constitution and the nation.
If the GOP Congress won't do their job, they should step down and go cower in their basement as private citizens.
Even an empty seat could change the balance of power, allowing others to do THEIR job, tipping things enough to save us from autocracy.
Please, do at least that for the Constitution.
Author's Notes:
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This post originated as a thread on BlueSky. I've done very light editing of content and formatting, but the essential content is mostly unchanged.
The image of the Constitution is in the public domain, and was obtained from Wikipedia. The flames overlaid on it were added by me using Gimp. The flames were created from Abacus.ai using Claude Sonnet 3.5 and Flux 1.1 Ultra Pro, though I had such great difficulty getting it to give me a real-looking Constitution, without confabulating other text, that I had to just ask for the flames and merge things myself.
4 comments:
And why may Congress be more selfish than those who signed the Declaration of Independence nearly 250 years ago?
Weren't they afraid of being hanged for treason?
Well, indeed. Though I'm not sure the original Continental Congress, before we had a Constitution and a nation, swore any oath to that effect. Still, the broader point is that Congress right now is behaving like they are entitled to some special privilege, as if their safety is more important than the safety of the people they represent. But in a Democracy, such people are our equals. They are just chosen from among us to be the ones to act on our behalf, not to be ones more capable of isolating themselves from harm. That comes with some risk, and I wouldn't begrudge them a security detail. But to earn that protection, they must actually do the job. There is no purpose to a Congress that just shows up to say "The President already did our job, we're just here to draw a paycheck."
Definitely.
Except, and it is a very uncomfortable thought, there is such a purpose.
Usually that is called a rubber-stamp parliament and it helps an autocracy appear democratic.
(I have lived under such a regime.)
Yeah, I reluctantly get there's motivation for Trump not to shut that down. Not to mention the fact that he basks in adoration. But at some point, probably sooner than later, these guys may realize they have literally no other job than to rubber stamp. All the worse if you didn't want an autocracy but were just too afraid to say, and then you realize your job is to be a prop for one and to daily say how much you like it. I suppose cognitive dissonance kicks in at some point and you start to think you like it, though.
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