Napoleon once said “treason is a matter of dates.” The Democrats seem to have taken Napoleon’s words to heart in declaring Republicans traitors or anti-Democratic in their planned challenge the certification of electoral votes next week. Both the media and Democratic members have advanced this narrative despite Democratic members repeatedly raising such challenges in the past. In the few acknowledgments of that history, Democrats seem to be advancing a simple and familiar defense: Trump. Once again, open hypocrisy is negated by Trumpunity. After all, they cannot be anti-Democratic because they are Democrats. That conclusory position was evident in the spin this week on CNN by former California Sen. Barbara Boxer who led such a challenge to the 2004 election results.
In January 2005, Boxer joined former Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones to challenge George W. Bush’s victory over Democratic challenger John Kerry in the state of Ohio. I was working for CBS in that election and shared concerns over the voting irregularities. At the time, Boxer argued that Republicans had engaged in voter suppression that contributed to Bush’s victory. The media and Democratic leadership was highly supportive. Indeed, many who are condemning the challenge today heaped praise on Boxer in 2004. There was no hue and cry in the media over anti-democratic measures and refusing to respect the election results.
For example, Speaker Nancy Pelosi has called the current challenge an assault on democracy but, in the 2004 election challenge, she praised Boxer’s challenge as “witnessing Democracy at work. This isn’t as some of our Republican colleagues have referred to it, sadly, as frivolous. This debate is fundamental to our democracy.”
Notably, many Democrats like Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., raised analogous complaints over voting systems and insisted that “as Americans, we should all be troubled by reports of voting problems in many parts of the country.”
Sen. Dick Durbin has also denounced the challenge this year but took to the Senate floor to praise Boxer in 2005. He declared “Some may criticize our colleague from California for bringing us here for this brief debate. I thank her for doing that because it gives members an opportunity once again on a bipartisan basis to look at a challenge that we face not just in the last election in one State but in many States.”
Now however Democrats are claiming that it is unfair to compare their earlier actions and statements to the present day. As we have seen in other areas, such clearly conflicting positions present little problem for Democratic politicians when they are not being raised or challenged in the media. In today’s siloed media and politics, Democratic voters are largely protected from such counter viewpoints. Boxer’s interview is an example of the light treatment given to such members. She was left largely unchallenged on clearly opportunistic and assailable positions in the CNN interview.
Boxer insisted that the challenge had “nothing to do with overturning the election” because it was only brief and would not succeed. This current effort will also fail after a debate on some of the same issues of voting irregularities. Nevertheless, Boxer insisted “No, why would I regret spending an hour talking about the right to vote? Not at all. If these Republicans are going to lie about it and say it’s the same thing, that’s on them, and I’m sorry they’re doing this.”
CNN simply carried that transparently hypocritical spin without meaningful challenge. After all, this is deemed spin, not lies. While MSNBC host Lawrence O’Donnell (and recently Jake Tapper) have pledged not to interview Trump figures because they are “liars”, Democratic members can voice absurd denials without challenge. The fact is that this is an important interview despite the absence of a substantial questioning. It is information, not disinformation. The problem is the biased approach in booking such political figures depending whether they support or oppose Trump.
Ultimately, this is not “on them.” And it is on Boxer because it is the same thing. However, I did not view Boxer as engaging in an attack on democracy by using her right to object in 2005 and I do not view those objections today as anti-democratic. I did not support the challenge in 2005 and I do not support this challenge. Yet, this is a legal challenge under constitutional and statutory law. Yet, Democrats and media outlets like CNN want to portray the vote as virtually unprecedented and even treasonous.
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) told CNN that members of Congress who question the election results “are bordering on sedition and treason.” That would mean more than 70 percent of Republicans and 10 percent of Democrats nationwide are potentially traitors for believing Trump won. Shaneen and her colleagues denounced Trump for calling people traitors and sought to protect officials who denounced his use of the label “enemies of the people” against reporters. Just two years ago, Trump was called a Stalin for using such labels by Democrats. It is same position taken recently before the Supreme Court by Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro, who called a legal challenge to the election “seditious.” Of course, the use of the courts or Congress to raise such objections is the very opposite of sedition, which seeks to overthrow the legal system.
As I noted earlier, Democrats did not accuse their colleagues of treason or sedition when they sought to block the certification of Ohio’s electoral votes in Congress in 2004. They did not call Hillary Clinton traitorous for advising Biden not to concede any Trump victory on Election Night. They did not describe members of Congress or the media as traitors for repeatedly declaring Trump “illegitimate” over the last four years.
Thus, in the end, as Napoleon said, “treason is a matter of dates.” And the key date in the United States, for now, appears to be Nov. 7 — the day the media declared Joe Biden the presumptive winner. All court challenges then became unethical for lawyers and all congressional challenges became sedition for members. It is just a matter of dates.
Please, don’t feed the trolls.
Diogenes, you ‘are’ the troll and everybody knows. Just go back to being ‘Rhodes’.
Anon, you ridiculous sasquatch, you keep accusing me of multiple ID’s. This is my ONLY user name and avatar.
Instead, you are the imposter. You and your confederate trolls have stolen the good name of Anonymous from my friend and ally, Sal Sar, who I might add, is the twice the man of all you dung beetles.
How could anyone have stolen the name Anonymous from Sal Sar, when people have been posting anonymous comments for years before Sal Sar even showed up?
TURLEY REMEMBERS DIFFERENTLY
I don’t recall John Kerry commanding legions of rabidly loyal followers threatening civil war. In fact the very problem with John Kerry is that most Americans thought of him as an aloof New Englander disconnected from the average Joe. Therefore Boxer’s challenge never came close to threatening violence in the streets.
Treason is out of season.
Pelosi is the reason.
Trump is just another bump in the road.
Josh Hawley is a toad.
Typical Turley “what about this thing the democrats did/do” column:
States his opposition to something a Republican/s did/is going to do (though he has not written a column or even a paragraph on what or why he opposes it, and certainly has not criticized the motives of said Republican/s) and then quickly pivots to something similar done by a Democrat/s, no matter how faint the comparison (no, Kerry – or any Democratic heavyweights at the time – did not support the very limited complaint by Boxer and what, 6 representatives (we are told there will be upward of 120 GOP reps this time)) and then go on to criticize the character of the Democrats. Throw in a fastball to the head of CNN (NEVER to Fox) and voila, column done.
Mr. Objective Moralist never writes that column with parties reversed, or any columns critical of Republicans, and especially whatever it is he claims he has opposed that they have done. It’s only been a week or so that he was still telling us how Biden owed it to the country to dignify the whiny Loser’s excuses by supporting an investigation, when those excuses have all been shot down or thrown out by judges and election officials of both parties. Could Turley have been demonstrated by facts to have been more wrong on his position on this? NO! He should be writing an apology column for fueling this BS which he now pretends he has opposed in any meaningful way. He hasn’t and deserves our scorn.
This is like watching a ventriloquist who doesn’t even try to hide his moving lips or a magician who never guesses the right card.
Joe, we don’t remember John Kerry waging a disinformation war and bringing endless, frivolous lawsuits that were thrown out of court. The fact that Turley would reduce this traumatic split to an overly simplistic What About is insulting to our intelligence.
The sick humor here is that Trump made calling fraud his strategy before any votes were cast. With the polling, he knew he would probably lose (and by close to the 5% nationally that the polls showed) and came up with this script. Why Turley or anybody took it seriously is due to stupidity or partisanship, take your pick.
Joe, your wife took it like a pro last night by several horned up dudes. When they asked whether you were home, she said she was not familiar with your name, bent over and took it like a well greased ho. Good girl! She has become a reliable service gal and we thank you
No doubt we’ll hear from monument and other Miss Manners types here on this typical Trumpster post above. Is it possible to be more self-mocking without laying a glove on your target?
Joe Friday, +10
Turley rings in the New Year with good old fashion conservative double speak. Trump spent the past 4 years relentlessly accusing Obama of treason for “the biggest political crime in US history.” Now here’s Turley going all Napoleonic on Boxer, Jones & Durbin while deliberately ignoring they all accepted Bush as the winner of the 2004 election & Kerry conceded the morning after the election.
After conservatives roundly criticized election polls for all being wrong, Turley has newfound confidence in a poll taken 6 days after the election. JT wants his faithful readers to accept his premise that 70% of Republican voters continue to believe Trump was reelected in a landslide despite losing 59 judicial reviews, numerous recounts & having swing state election results confirmed by Republican governors, state secretaries & federal judges after that poll was taken. After that poll was posted, Trump fired Homeland Security’s cybersecurity chief for verifying the 2020 election was the most safe & secure election in US history. Turley steadfastly believes 70% of Republican voters completely supported Trump’s decision to fire any Homeland Security officials who certified Biden as the winner of a free & fair election.
JT attacks Democrats while ignoring the stated goal of Trump, 140 Republican House members & Senator Hawley is to overturn the 2020 election 5 days from now. Trump continues to claim he was easily elected in all the swing states & insists there’s no way Biden won 81 million votes. Turley predictably ignores all of that as he gets up on his soapbox to speak so eloquently about hypocrisy.
New Year, same old Turley.
+10 Race.
Turley is a world class hypocrite badly pretending to have standards and principles. He has none except taking shots at Democrats and networks he’ll never get on again.
Stop gaslighting. You’ve exceeded your carbon allowance.
George Washington, our only independent President summed it up perfectly and prophetically in his farewell address:
“However [political parties] may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely in the course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.”
The Democratic and Republican Parties are dying a slow and well deserved death. I look forward to pissing on their graves.
In case you missed it, JT at one point in passing says “I do not support this challenge”. Accordingly, I encourage JT to make this point loudly in this blog, the Hill newspaper, Fox News, and other places where you are a contributor so that Republicans and others know your views on this important issue.
Concerned, Turley doesn’t want to be lowd in claiming he doesn’t support the challenge. He knows how fast he will be ostracized by Trump supporters and even get a dreaded Trump tweet. His “credibility” as an intellectual will be ruined if he does.
This is why Turley has this habit of deliberate ignorance of the facts when he’s in an intellectual corner he painted himself into. Rather than admit he’s in a corner which everyone can see he focuses on other irrelevant issues to distract from the fact that HE is in a corner.
This is why people loathe politicians.
How is it that people who are supposed to be the leaders of the nation, including lawyers, can’t seem to understand that treason can only occur in time of war and consists solely of “providing aid and comfort” to an enemy of the United States? This is the definition from the United States Constitution – 18 U.S. Code § 2381 – Treason
U.S. Code
Notes
Whoever, owing allegiance to the United States, levies war against them or adheres to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort within the United States or elsewhere, is guilty of treason and shall suffer death, or shall be imprisoned not less than five years and fined under this title but not less than $10,000; and shall be incapable of holding any office under the United States.
Now, there are traitors in the United States, specifically those who protested the war in Vietnam and chanted “Ho, ho, Ho Chi Minh, Ho Chi Minh is gonna win.” That’s traitorous. Protesting in itself is not treason but supporting the enemy is. Of course, many of those now in Congress and the Senate are traitors because of their actions then.
As for the current issue, there is strong evidence of mass election fraud. The irony is that Democrats practically announced that they had fixed the elections. They forecast a false “red tide” on election night that would change when absentee ballots were counted. There is only one way they would have known how absentee ballots would trend, and that is if they had fixed the election. Democratic officials all over the country violated or attempted to violate state election statutes, justifying it by claiming they were making it easier for people to vote. A classic example are the actions of local officials in Texas, particularly the Harris County court clerk, who sent out unrequested absentee ballots and placed collection boxes all over the county in violation of state law that specifies that only one collection box is to be available in each county and is only available on election day to voters who first must show ID to an election official prior to putting the ballot in the box. If there is a word, it’s sedition and it is Democrats who are seditious.
Such strong evidence that no judge could accept (even R ones) and the DoJ could not substantiate election fraud. Even Bill Barr, a guy who trained his whole life to stick his head up Trumps ass said there was no evidence of fraud. Oh ya, I forgot that anyone who does not see this fraud is “Deep State”.
“Up Trump’s ass?” Lady, brown is the new blue. Just check out the Embarcadero.
That is shorthand for “Barr wants to see a very strong President and believes that there are few constraints on the presidents authority and has been waiting decades to find a president who is eager to put Barr’s ideas into practice.”
Molly G, “ That is shorthand for “Barr wants to see a very strong President and believes that there are few constraints on the presidents authority and has been waiting decades to find a president who is eager to put Barr’s ideas into practice.”
That “very strong president with few constraints” is the very definition of what a dictator is. Trump admires dictators. He marvels at their ability to get things done because they hold absolute power. That’s why he has a loving relationship with fellow dictators such as Kim and Putin. Dictators have overturned elections when they lost. Trump is just following his inspirational views from them.
He seeks to punish states and governors when they criticize or don’t bow down to his demands by withholding money and federal support. That’s pure dictatorship behavior. To top it off every dictator has his loyal sycophants and Trump’s loyal sycophants are plenty in congress.
Unfortunately for trump and his sycophants their attempts at overturning a valid election is too much even for republicans who created and enabled this disaster of a president. Now they have to deal with the consequences of their greed. It’s going to be a painful four years for republicans if they lose the senate.
What the Rs is trying to do is completely unconstitutional.
From 12A:
“The President of the Senate shall, in the presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the certificates and the votes shall then be counted;-The person having the greatest Number of votes for President, shall be the President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed;”
Since Biden got the majority of the EC, there is no vote to take, no procedure to object to EC votes, and no certification needed from the VP.
Also big difference from then to now is that then the losing candidate had already conceded and it was well understood that it was a meaningless political stunt. The traitors now are dead serious to overthrow a legal election and the president is egging them on.
The citing of previous wrongs every time someone presently does a bad thing gets old and just keeps bad behavior rewarded.
What Republicans are doing to our country is unique, not in a good way. Of course it’s not the first time they have tried to do it it. MCCONNELL has been doing it for years, blocking the will of the people and like a dictator blocking votes on legislation. There is no moral equivalency.
Professor, it you agree with the Republican tactics, say so. Don’t pretend everybody does it.
“Justice,” how is this “unique?”
I am looking forward to just having a SINGLE day without an example of Democrat hypocrisy. Still waiting!!!
Good luck, between that and the projection its difficult having reasoned dialectic with them.
@Paul please write me when you find one as blatant as the GOP (especially Graham’s) complete flip flop on voting on a Supreme Court nominee in an election year, Trump criticizing Obama on everything from Golfing to vacationing then proceeding to do it four times as much, or GOP reps impeaching a president for lying about a personal affair stating “You don’t even have to be convicted of a crime to lose your job [president] in this constitutional republic if this body determines that your conduct as a public official is clearly out of bounds in your role […] because impeachment is not about punishment. Impeachment is about cleansing the office. Impeachment is about restoring honor and integrity to the office.” then refusing to even hear witnesses following trumps impeachment in order to “get this thing over with.”
Ooh, ooh, can I play?
Chuck Schumer
You won’t find that day on this comment board.
Thank you again for hitting the nail on the head. The clarity and being able to look at his political mess with rationale gives me faith in our democracy.
Turley should produce an academic paper instead of trying to advance his career with op-Ed’s based on non comparable “what abouts”.
There is no equivalence between the earlier instances to which he refers and the current efforts with which he equates them.
Nobody is making you come here.
What Boxer did was wrong. The people voted, a Senator from California has no place objecting to how another state voted in the Senate without strong evidence of wrong doing. Otherwise, the place to do that is through legislation setting national voting standards.
What the Repos are doing is despicable. They want to throw out at least 20 million voters and 6 states because….fraud? But where is the evidence? 60 lawsuits about voting, 1 success that said observers could stand a few feet closer. No evidence of fraud. Oh wait, there where the 2 people that voted for Trump twice and I think there was one that voted twice for Biden. Is that the fraud we are talking about? Where is the fraud? Every time they go to court they yell FRAUD on the steps of the courthouse and in interviews with reporters, then they tell the judge, oh no your honor, we are not saying there is fraud here, we just um, um, um, think trump won and want you to declare him the winner.
Let’s say the Repos are successful, 6 states electoral votes are tossed, Trump is declared the winner and next president. Do you think the states and voters that just had their desires tossed would be upset? Might there be rioting in the street? civil war? Really, because they want the guy that lost by 7 million votes to remain president? The repo party is sick and will pay a heavy price for this trump worship.Time has a way of healing wounds and letting the truth get out. The scales will fall from the trump believers slowly but surely and the die hard trump sycophants in congress will go down in the history book as stooges.
Don’t be a stooge,
+10
“Might there be rioting in the street? civil war?”
We got that message 9 months ago, from the Antifa/BLM rioters: Elect Biden — or else.
The BLM message was “Stop the police from murdering black people.” It was actually the Trumpers who has violent language around the election.
Thank you for always pointing out hypocrisy! You are one of the few who do it now. It’s much appreciated!!
Not Napoleon’s observation (“Treason is a matter of dates”); Talleyrand’s. A far nimbler speaker and politician.
Once again, Dems show themselves to be both partisan and dishonest.
If they want to be fundamentally unfair, that is a political decision; being dishonest is a character issue.
I am amazed at the ease with which so many Turley readers accept being lied to – even seem to welcome these s–t sandwiches.
Now listen to the cries of: “But Trump…”