Saturday, May 20, 2017

Putting Country Above Party Works Both Ways

Throughout Donald Trump's short but eventful presidency, Democrats have been imploring Republicans to show loyalty for country over party.

If you believe our bumbling president's hiring of the likes of Paul Manafort or Mike Flynn—who was apparently under investigation when he joined the administration—reflects abysmal judgment, I'm with you. If you believe those decisions could turn out to be scandals, it's difficult for me to disagree. If you believe Trump's admiration for authoritarians in Russia undermines our standing in the world, I'm there as well.
Then again, recklessly throwing around words like "impeachable" and "treason" before the evidence exists to level those consequential charges also puts party over country. Hysteria also erodes trust in our institutions for nothing more than political gain.
You will, for instance, have to read six paragraphs into Reuters' recent highly shared scoop headlined "Exclusive: Trump campaign had at least 18 undisclosed contacts with Russians: sources" to learn that "people who described the contacts to Reuters said they had seen no evidence of wrongdoing or collusion between the campaign and Russia in the communications reviewed so far."
Talk about burying your lede.

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