By Charles C. W. Cooke
Monday, September 14, 2020
I enjoy reading Shadi Hamid at The Atlantic — not
least because, although we disagree a good deal, he’s a genuine “liberal” who
believes in free speech, American institutions, and the importance of real
pluralism (that is, in respecting real differences rather than in assembling
people with different immutable characteristics and demanding that they all
think the same things). Nevertheless, I think that Hamid misses the mark a
little in his piece
this morning.
Hamid’s essay is titled “The Democrats May Not Be Able to
Concede,” and its subtitle is, “If Trump wins, especially after losing the
popular vote, the left may draw the wrong conclusions.” Specifically, Hamid
contends that “liberals had enough trouble accepting the results of the 2016
election”; that “in some sense, they never really came to terms with it”; and
that, if they were to lose again in 2020, elements within the Left may become
so disillusioned with America that they declare the system illegitimate and
take violently to the streets. There is no misunderstanding Hamid’s meaning
here, nor is the direction of his concern unclear. Despite considering that
Trump is unfit for office, he does not “believe Donald Trump is a fascist or a
dictator in the making,” or that “America is a failed state,” and he is “truly
worried about only one scenario: that Trump will win reelection and Democrats
and others on the left will be unwilling, even unable, to accept the result.”
Some have interpreted this as a threat or as
excuse-making. But, as a long-time reader of Hamid’s, I think this is unfair.
That’s simply not who he is, or how he sees the world. And yet,
well-intentioned as I am sure it is, I cannot help but see Hamid’s conclusion
as something of a non sequitur. He writes that, as a result of the possibility
that the “left will be unwilling, even unable, to accept the result” of the
election, “strictly law-and-order Republicans who have responded in dismay to
scenes of rioting and looting have an interest in Biden winning—even if they
could never bring themselves to vote for him.”
To which one must ask: Why?
As a matter of general principle, I have no time
whatsoever for the argument that anyone — let alone a voter — should
hope that his opponent wins as a defensive measure against his opponent being a
bad loser. Indeed, to follow Hamid’s advice here would be to permit the
heckler’s veto to reign within our politics. If there is any action to be taken
in response to the behavior that Hamid anticipates, it must surely be taken
against the perpetrators of that behavior, not against its victims? “Donald
Trump may refuse to concede, so we’d better hope he wins” is not an argument
we’ve seen advanced. Its opposite is no better.
Later in his essay, Hamid focuses in on the Electoral
College, which he believes would serve as the primary target of anger in the
case of a Trump victory. Were Trump to win the election but not the “popular
vote,” he suggests, the outcome might “fuel disillusion not just with the
election outcome but with the electoral system.” I will not rehash my support
of the Electoral College here, and nor will I point out that the Electoral
College is, and always has been, at the core of the American system, and that
everyone has known this in advance since 1788. Rather, I will simply observe
that Hamid’s conclusion seems off here, too. If it is the case that “the left”
will refuse to accept the outcome because it has decided that it doesn’t like
the system, then those “strictly law-and-order Republicans” who “could never
bring themselves to vote for” Biden should hope that Trump wins the
“popular vote,” shouldn’t they? That, not the alternative, would be the course
of action that defends both “law” and “order.” Moreover, if the primary threat
to the Republic is that “Trump will win reelection and Democrats and others on
the left will be unwilling, even unable, to accept the result,” then non-Republican
voters should surely be lining up to help, too?
This, I should make clear, is not my preference.
My preference is that every voter votes freely for whomever he wishes, that the
system is used as it is constructed, and that everybody respects the result.
But if, as Hamid suggests, one side is unlikely to play ball, it seems a touch
unfair to suggest that the responsibility for preserving order falls to that
side’s opponents.
No comments:
Post a Comment