Why Justin Amash stands alone

“Contrary to Barr’s portrayal, Mueller’s report reveals that President Trump engaged in specific actions and a pattern of behavior that meet the threshold for impeachment,” Amash said. “In fact, Mueller’s report identifies multiple examples of conduct satisfying all the elements of obstruction of justice, and undoubtedly any person who is not the president of the United States would be indicted based on such evidence.” That judgment is supported by more than 900 former federal prosecutorswho have signed onto a letter reaffirming this exact point.

Not surprisingly, Trump punched back at Amash on Sunday, tweeting that Amash is “a loser” and “a total lightweight who opposes me and some of our great Republican ideas and policies just for the sake of getting his name out there through controversy.”

.. First are the cynics who know Trump is unfit, if not dangerous; however, they’ll get what they can (e.g., judges, tax cuts) and bolster their resumes (e.g., working for the administration, getting fawning Fox News coverage). When Trump bottoms out, they’ll move on, probably insisting they were secretly against Trump all along. They consider Republicans who’ve resisted Trump such as the Weekly Standard’s editors and writers, who refused to imbibe the Trump Kool-Aid and in the process lost their publication, to be fools, saps and fusspots upset about a few tweets, dumb lies and crass language. All politicians are rotten, right, so why not grab what you can get?

..So we return to the question that vexes NeverTrumpers and Democrats: Why are Republicans such quivering sycophants, willing to lie and debase themselves in support of an unpopular president who is repudiating many of the principles they have spent their lives advancing?

I’d suggest there are three distinct groups of Republican grovelers. Some may fall into multiple categories.

  1. First are the cynics who know Trump is unfit, if not dangerous; however, they’ll get what they can (e.g., judges, tax cuts) and bolster their resumes (e.g., working for the administration, getting fawning Fox News coverage). When Trump bottoms out, they’ll move on, probably insisting they were secretly against Trump all along. They consider Republicans who’ve resisted Trump such as the Weekly Standard’s editors and writers, who refused to imbibe the Trump Kool-Aid and in the process lost their publication, to be fools, saps and fusspots upset about a few tweets, dumb lies and crass language. All politicians are rotten, right, so why not grab what you can get?

  2. In the second category are Republicans convinced that they’ll never find work if they speak out against Trump. They’ll lose their offices and/or offend Republican officialdom, including think tanks, right-wing media, donors, party activists and elected officials. (They are part of a right-wing ecosystem; some might call it a racket.) No plum lobbying gigs or Fox contributorships for them. They fear ostracism would ruin them financially and personally, leaving them in a political wilderness from which they fear they’d never return. They, like the cynics, occasionally feel a pang of conscience, especially when NeverTrumpers remind them that there is an alternative to self-debasement. They then will swiftly revert to “But Gorsuch and Kavanaugh” or “But taxes” to justify their moral and intellectual collapse. They’ll whisper behind closed doors that Trump is a menace, but coo and kvell over him when the cameras are on.

  3. And finally, there are the cranks, the zealots, the racists and the haters — a group, it turns out, much larger than many ex-Republicans could ever fathom. This includes not just the overt white nationalists and the tea party crowd but also those who have been simmering with personal resentment against “liberal elites.” Vice President Pence insists he and his fellow evangelical Christians are hapless victims; the children and grandchildren of Dixiecrats fume that everything went downhill in the 1960s. Some of these people will insist they are not racists nor misogynists — but yet they sure seem to have an extraordinarily high tolerance for those who are.

If you eliminate the retirees who couldn’t take it any more (e.g., former U.S. senator from Arizona Jeff Flake), the cynics, the scaredy-cats and the resentful self-made victims, you’re down to a precious few congressional Republicans who will refuse to rationalize (and even praise) whatever Trump does. Only 13 House Republicans and 12 Senate Republicans voted to block Trump’s noxious emergency declaration on the U.S.-Mexico border, which amounted to a repudiation of our constitutional government of separation of powers.

I’d love to think Amash’s statements free and embolden many more Republicans in the House and Senate to step forward.

Is that likely? No.

This is why voters must continue to reject Trump and Trumpism, driving the current crew of Republicans out of office. Only then, like saplings poking up from the ashes of a forest fire, can new, sustainable and decent political life on the right emerge. Unless and until Amash has many, many allies, the voters must do the heavy lifting of ridding ourselves of Trump and Trumpism.