Democrats in Congress are saying that Republicans are giving them a hard time over the creation of a "Jan. 6 committee" because they are "afraid of the truth."
I carry no water for the Republicans of today, but I have to say, THAT way of putting the problem is a little ... meh.
The kind of August Commission and Big Thick Book of conclusions that the Dems have in mind here isn't meant to set out The Truth. It is meant to present an official version thereof. Consider the Warren Commission, by way of example. Even people who believe that Oswald killed Kennedy and did so acting alone will likely tell you the Warren Commission's connection with truth was, at best, casual. Johnson believed that the country needed a soothing tale. He tapped Earl Warren, who agreed to provide a soothing tale. If they did stumble upon the truth, the fact is a coincidence.
And the problem with Republicans today isn't that they are afraid of The Truth. It is that they are afraid of demographics.
What is more: I am nearly convinced (though I am open to dissuasion) of the view that the Republican Party is on its last legs. Against the usual off-year election trends, they are likely to be creamed in 2022, in part because of those demographics but in larger part because many voters they could reach in other circumstances are rather tired of the madman living on a golf course and demanding their fealty.
People have been talking of late about the death of the Whig Party. I don't think that is apt. Let us go back before that -- even before the birth of the Whig Party -- for an analogy. We are seeing the death of the Federalist Party again. The Federalist Party, in its death, left no heir. So the Democrats became the only national party of importance for a period that was called the "era of good feelings." Nobody's feelings about that were good, and in due course the Dem coalition broke apart, Webster going one way and Calhoun going the other.
The Whigs, in short, were born after the "good feelings" had raged for a few election cycles. They picked up support from remnants of the old Federalists.
A sane center-right party will eventually come about in the US again. It will come about as the Sanders-Manchin off-couple coalition of todays' Dems fades. Some will go one way, some the other.
Let us hope we can get through all this, this time, without some of the nasty stuff in the last era of good feelings. The whole thing about Canadian soldiers burning the capital to the ground? Let's skip that, okay?
Thinking in these terms, the thought of a Commission leaves me untouched.
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