By Charles C. W. Cooke
Monday, April 27, 2026
Here is Tim Miller of The Bulwark, in response to
Sean Trende’s suggestion that his outlet treats Trump “as the Satan of a
Catholic Baptism, where you’re morally bound to reject all his works and
promises”:
I am a broken record on this topic, and I have been for
eleven years. And here I go again: This approach sounds very righteous and pure
until you realize that, by adopting it, you’re outsourcing your soul to Trump
in precisely the same manner as his sycophants have. Ultimately, if you oppose
something because Trump wants it, you’re not sticking it to him, you’re
sticking it to yourself. Note the language Miller used: “opposed on all
counts.” That, right there, is the problem. It’s entirely reasonable to take a
binary view of the man’s character or electoral desirability, to submit that
you will never trust him, or even to declare that he is the worst commander in
chief in the history of the country. But to oppose him on “all counts”? That’s
not judgment; it’s oppositional defiance disorder. Donald Trump is the
president whether one likes it or not, and he’s going to take political positions
and exercise political power whether one likes it or not. To decide ahead of
time that one will oppose all the decisions he makes is to subordinate oneself
to him. I refuse to do that. I think everyone else should refuse to do that,
too.
Miller’s colleague, Cathy Young, weighed in on the same
debate by describing herself as “an anti-Trump absolutist” who
believes that “when he does/says smth I agree with, I think he discredits those
things.” This, too, sounds good. But it doesn’t make much sense, does it? Are
we really to believe that, say, school choice is rendered better or worse as a
policy depending on who says they agree with it? If so, what is the mechanism
by which that happens? If Jeffrey Dahmer had been in favor of the dissolution
of the Soviet Union, would that have “discredited” the goal by even half an inch?
That is superstition. In fact, it’s worse than superstition: It is a politics
of men, not laws. If Donald Trump says something I agree with, I say that he is
right. If he says something I disagree with, I say that he is wrong. Likewise,
if he does something I agree with, I say he’s right, and if he does something I
disagree with, I say he’s wrong. To do so is not to endorse him or to
“normalize” him. Nor, if one has taken such a stance, is it to abandon one’s
steadfast vow to vote against him every time, or to dilute one’s conviction
that he is a uniquely bad person. Rather, it is to assiduously play the role of
citizen in a free country, and to emphatically insist that there is nothing —
not even hatred — that is capable of persuading you to hand your conscience
over to another, and in so doing, to render your voice a mere tool of the
ventriloquist behind the stage.
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