Even now, Republicans are ignoring the storm clouds

Not so long ago, Republican leaders prided themselves on protecting middle-American minds from the liberal intellectual rot being spread by politicians and college professors they viewed as being hostile to law enforcement, contemptuous of constitutional traditions, indifferent to personal morality and accommodating to Russian tyrants. They claimed to be the intellectual heirs of Edmund Burke, Russell Kirk and William F. Buckley Jr. Now those same politicians debase themselves daily in service to Trump.

.. In the Age of Trump, it is no longer in vogue to stand athwart history in defense of American institutions, constitutional norms and cultural traditions. These days, Republicans’ intellectual firepower is rather focused on defending Stalinist attacks on the press and pricey payoffs to porn stars.

.. Early in his presidency, the commander in chief demanded a loyalty oath from FBI Director James B. Comey and pressed him to drop the investigation of the national security adviser, Michael Flynn. This presidential pressure was applied even though Trump would later admit that he knew Flynn committed a federal crime. After Comey rebuffed Trump’s loyalty demands during their famous one-on-one dinner, Trump would fire the FBI director, concede to NBC’s Lester Holt that he did it to end the agency’s investigation, and offer the same confession to both Russia’s foreign minister and the ambassador to the United States.

.. “I faced great pressure because of Russia,” America’s president told the Russians. “That’s taken off. I am not under investigation.”

.. As a storm gathers over Washington and the world, Donald Trump’s Republican Party remains complicit in his frenzied efforts to undermine the American institutions and established values that conservatives once claimed to share.

And while the clouds overhead are cause for all to be concerned, it will be the husk of a once-proud Republican Party that will be swept away first by the deluge that is sure to come.