This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.
The Hollow Men, T.S. Eliot
Jeff Flake’s scalding attack on Donald Trump yesterday lacked only one thing: A commitment to staying in the Senate and fighting for a Republican Party that isn’t an offense against American values and ordinary human decency. As too many others have, Flake is quitting the field and surrendering the Party to the barbarians.
Which is not to say I’m without sympathy. After all, Trump has created a coalition of the sick and disaffected, and they love to send abusive e-mails; it has to take its toll, and you can’t blame a man for muttering “I don’t need this $λιζ.”
But, as Ross Douthat so rightly points-out in today’s New York Times, “In the end, if you want Republican voters to reject Trumpism, you need to give them clear electoral opportunities to do so …”
There is only one way to fight nihilistic fanatics: Openly, and to their irrevocable destruction.