The Absurdity of Invoking Democracy to Help Trump Reign Again

It truly is astonishing that people support Trump by invoking “democracy” or “democratic values” or “democratic norms.” For such purposes, Justice Alito, for example, recently pretended to be concerned about “our country as a democracy.” He used those words during oral argument in Trump v. United States. Justice Alito suggested that Trump (a president who lost an election and then tried to retain power by criminally altering the results of the election—even to the point of using violent force and threats of violence) should not be “criminally prosecuted” because the enforcement of federal law (and the plain text and meaning of our Constitution) might “lead us into a cycle that destabilizes the functioning of our country as a democracy.”

Justice Alito (and other justices) appear shockingly indifferent to the evidence that Trump, himself, already led us into precisely such a cycle. What Trump did on January 6, 2021 was so exceedingly far outside our values and our Constitution that somebody definitely needs to do something about it. That is especially true because at least some SCOTUS justices (including Justice Alito) are pretending that something in the Constitution gave them the power to essentially grant Trump a pardon (without Trump even asking for a pardon or accepting the consequences of a pardon).

The purposes of such people is not merely to help Trump evade prosecution for the crimes he already committed but to allow Trump to reign again. So additional facts also are highly relevant. They highlight that everything that actually happened (and some things that did not happen) on January 6, 2021 had a greater context. Such events cannot rationally be viewed in isolation. Most telling, Trump thought (and actually said) American generals should behave more like the “German generals” of World War II.

Trump also said much more about how he expected to be able to use American generals and what he expected them to do for him:

on June 1, 2020, when [ ] protesters filled Lafayette Square, near the White House. Mr. Trump demanded to send in the military to clear the protesters, but General Milley and other top aides refused. In response, Mr. Trump shouted, “You are all losers!” [ ]“Turning to Milley, Trump said, ‘Can’t you just shoot them? Just shoot them in the legs or something?’”

Even the events and Trump’s words on June 1, 2020 were not alone. Trump repeatedly revealed his proclivity for using the military to inflict egregious physical injury on people exercising their First Amendment rights and freedoms. We should believe Trump. We should not believe (or trust) any SCOTUS justice who says Trump has immunity for what he already did. We should not believe that supporting Trump is supporting anything good about democracy or supporting our democratic values.

It is worth bearing in mind that a whole lot of people who have thought that their interests were aligned with or served by a tyrant or fanatics found out otherwise. People who think that January 6 was not so bad because it wasn’t worse should think about why it wasn't worse. Trump had to rely on a mob of civilians because he could not use soldiers to do his bidding. Trump did not have compliant generals in 2021. We should not blithely assume Trump will make the same mistake again.

Invoking the experiences of the German generals that Trump invoked isn't inappropriate. Within about 13 years, Germany went from being relatively free (and phenomenally superior militarily and technologically) to tyranny and then to totally trashed.

Now would be a good time to recall the words of warning by Alexander Hamilton in The Federalist No. 1 in response to the people of his time who argued against the Constitution:

a dangerous ambition more often lurks behind the specious mask of zeal for the rights of the people than under the forbidden appearance of zeal for the firmness and efficiency of government. History will teach us that the former has been found a much more certain road to the introduction of despotism than the latter, and that of those men who have overturned the liberties of republics, the greatest number have begun their career by paying an obsequious court to the people; commencing demagogues, and ending tyrants.