A functioning republic requires real opposition, asking real questions and demanding real answers. Outrage on its own, recycled forever, in the same form as if it was spat out of a computer, is a threat to the future.
At this point, we know the cycle better than we’d like. In what we can only call the Era of Perpetual Outrage, there’s almost no news or event, either large or small, that is not greeted by President Donald Trump’s detractors, including much of the mainstream media, with downright hysteria. The same pattern has played out so many times in barely 10 months, if not 10 years, it’s hard to provide an accurate count. Beyond the regularly recurring outrages, those that seem to play on repeat every month or so, such as that accompanying tariffs, immigration enforcement, and the endless recycling of the Russia Collusion era meme the President is somehow beholden to Vladimir Putin, we’ve been bombarded with breathless coverage about everything from cuts to government staff and funding to the use of a messaging app that was already installed on government phones, from the decision to procure a plane to serve as Air Force One from Qatar to the strike on Iran, from the the passage of the Big Beautiful Bill to the use of the National Guard to help reduce crime in inner cities, from walking in front of King Charles to hosting the new leader of Syria at the White House, from calls to cancel Jimmy Kimmel to the supposed persecution of political opponents, from the Epstein files to the construction of a White House ballroom, and more. At times, the coverage has bordered on the absurd, such as when reductions to staff at Yosemite Park were said to have eliminated the “institutional knowledge” required to unlock a bathroom, that Elon Musk’s email to government workers had caused “bedlam,” the insane speculation about a bruise on the President’s hand, or the images of the demolished East Wing prior to construction of the ballroom that were compared to the emotional impact of 9-11.
Regardless, almost innumerable people have made these claims. Everyone from Bruce Springsteen at concerts in Europe to politicians like Corey Booker breaking records for non-filibuster filibusters over what, no one was sure, except the need to resist. Hence, a new resistance figure emerged on a near-weekly basis. While many have noted the performative nature of the entire enterprise, where actual results were far less important than hyperbolic rhetoric, less attention has been paid to the utter lack of originality and repetitive nature of the claims accompanied by their steadfast refusal to ask real questions. Whether it’s the result of Trump Derangement Syndrome or The Orange Man Bad Theory of Everything, we should expect more from an opposition party than the same boring, banal, recycled tripe over and over again, applied to anything and everything. Even if we disagree with the detractor’s assessment, we could at least admire the wit should someone, anyone offer a few classic turns of phrase, something like Aesop’s “We hang the petty thieves and appoint the great ones to public office,” Napoleon’s “In politics stupidity isn’t a handicap,” Will Rogers’ “I don’t make jokes. I just watch the government and report the facts,” Robin Williams’ “People say satire is dead. It’s not dead; it’s alive and living in the White House,” or countless other quips that have stood the test of time for their combination of making a point and making it memorably.
Instead, we have been reduced to the equivalent of outrage by ChatGPT. At this point, I can’t even tell if they’re writing this stuff themselves, or just copying it from someone else and changing the dates and the name. Whatever the case, the language is always the same: Authoritarian, fascist, unconstitutional, illegal, unauthorized, and perhaps a handful of others at best. The message is constant, either one of impending doom or actual doom. The “criticism” or “scrutiny” is “mounting,” “growing” or “building” whatever the issue, the walls or closing in and a collapse of some kind is coming, either regarding President Trump personally, his staff, or the object of his policies. Whether actual people’s lives, the more figurative life of the country as a democracy, the economy as a construct, or the even more figurative international “rules based order” is at risk, something or someone is dying somewhere or will be very soon. Because of this, there is almost invariably a call for someone in the administration to resign or be fired, if not jailed, or for President Trump himself to be impeached, promptly removed from office, if not jailed, both of which are frequently accompanied by the need to immediately reverse the policy in question – and, perhaps needless to say, replace it with the preferred progressive, establishment-friendly policy of the day. Thus, whatever the issue at hand, large or small, true or untrue, precedented or unprecedented, we can expect a pre-programmed response in the following form: President Trump’s [INSERT ISSUE OR POLICY] is facing mounting criticism because [INSERT PERSON OR THING] will die as a result or is in danger of dying as a result, according to the experts [PERSON OR THING] is illegal, and [TRUMP-OPPOSED GROUP] are demanding the [RESIGNATION OR IMMEDIATE END] of [WHOEVER OR WHATEVER IS INVOLVED]. Though there might be more expletive filled and over the top variations, the conclusion will remain the same, repackaged for whatever issue is at hand regardless of the size or scope, an outright condemnation rather than any attempt to engage or even meaningfully question.
While this might be mildly amusing in isolation, ironic considering progressives generally laud themselves for their artistic appreciation and creativity, it is not without a cost because no one who isn’t already reflexively opposed to President Trump is inclined to listen and it comes at the expense of real questions and accountability. Whatever you think about the President, there’s such a thing as the law of diminishing returns and whether the latest outrage is true, false, or somewhere in between, if everything’s an outrage, nothing’s an outrage, and the past few weeks alone have been illustrative in this regard. While strikes on cartel drug boats have dominated the outrage cycle, rather than engaging in an actual debate that would be valuable to the American people, Democrats have taken the absurd position that the strikes themselves are illegal by definition and therefore should be stopped immediately, those involved either impeached or prosecuted starting with Secretary of War Pete Hegseth. In other words, their remedy to what they consider the problem is for President Trump to do precisely what they wanted all along. They opposed the Secretary before his confirmation, demanded his resignation after the Signal Chat snafu, and are once again demanding it now, claiming he is a war criminal issuing illegal orders that must be stopped at once and they are doing so without bothering to explain the most obvious point: Illegal according to what and prosecutable by what government body?
Contrary to their claims, there is a reason why military matters are generally viewed outside of the legal sphere and they know it. Both the Department of Defense and the Department of Justice report directly to the President. Are they suggesting President Trump should prosecute the military for following his own orders, or even prosecute himself? The military, of course, has its own code of justice, but these tribunals ultimately report to the President as well, meaning the situation is the same. While some have looked outside the United States to international law, such as the Law of the Seas Treaty and the International Criminal Court, we are not a member of either and are not subject to their jurisdiction. Whatever progressives may think of the strikes, illegality requires an authorized body to make an indictment and mount a prosecution. Outside of fantasy land, what is the body in this case? Even CNN in an article largely lamenting this reality was forced to admit as much, though they did so without asking the obvious point that Democrats are wasting the country’s time in what amounts to witch hunt that will accomplish nothing. After making a bizarre reference to how SEAL Team Six came up in the Supreme Court Case about Presidential immunity and has also been involved in the strikes, claiming it “should be lost on no one that the hypothetical that animated the Supreme Court arguments about Trump’s immunity involved a president ordering SEAL Team Six to take out a political rival” and the “Washington Post reports it was SEAL Team Six that carried out the boat strike that many experts say is illegal,” they brought in an expert to conclude that it would require a future Democrat President to do anything “the subsequent administration may have the political will to pursue accountability.” Instead of recognizing this truth, Democrats have simply ignored it, preferring to endlessly repeating the illegal mantra like medieval monks warding off a demon and they have done so at the cost of legitimate criticisms and questions: What criteria and evidence are we using to ensure we are only targeting cartel boats? What safeguards and review processes are in place? What long term objective is there other than destroying the boats? Is this a stand alone policy, or part of a larger initiative? Why did the policy appear to change at some point given that the September 2nd strike ended with killing everyone onboard, but afterwards we rescued survivors? Even more importantly, how does this policy relate to actions we are taking in Venezuela and what is our policy towards the socialist state?
While it has garnered much less coverage, we have also deployed expanded forces in the region including an aircraft carrier over the past several weeks, authorized the CIA to carry out secret operations inside the country, issued a vaguely worded threat that might be construed as a no-fly zone, and apparently told Venezuelan President Nicholas Maduro that he needs to either depart or be forcibly removed from power, even as the Administration has been simultaneously telling the media not to “read anything” into these various moves. Though tensions with Venezuela have persisted for decades and date back to President Maduro’s predecessor, Hugo Chavez, something certainly seems radically different this time around and no one is quite sure why. As early as July, Secretary of State Marco Rubio insisted President Maduro was “the leader of the designated ‘narcoterrorist’ organization Cartel de los Soles,” responsible for “trafficking drugs into the United States and Europe,” suggesting that stemming the flow of drugs is the most important concern. At the same time, some pundits have emphasized a Russian connection, believing Venezuela is at least partially propped up by President Putin and viewing our increasing aggressiveness as essentially another theater in the Ukraine War. There is, however, also the reality that Venezuela possesses vast oil reserves that have been languishing for decades under socialist control. Is that really what we are after?
The Administration isn’t saying and while I am not necessarily opposed to these actions – indeed, there’s an argument that the Monroe Doctrine demanded they be taken as soon as Russia got involved and anything that can weaken Russia is worth exploring – neither I, nor anyone else outside the Administration knows what the plan or purpose is. Senator Rand Paul, at least, believes we are preparing to invade, calling the cartel strikes merely a “prelude.” “I think the boat attacks are a prelude to an invasion of Venezuela,” he recently told Fox Business’ “Varney & Co.” “I don’t like the idea of an offensive war. I don’t like the idea of a regime change.” While he hopes that President Maduro’s time in power ends quickly, “for the good of his people,” he fears a military intervention will cause “chaos, and great expenditures both in lives and in treasure.” “It’s an imperfect world, and we continue to strive for better, but we don’t think that we have the ability or the obligation to replace governments around the world,” he added. While Senator Paul is speculating, he certainly has a point. Venezuela barely has a functioning military, counting only 229 aircraft, 172 tanks, and 34 naval assets, many of which are likely either ancient or non-functional. It’s an easy target and there’s little doubt we could topple the regime if we chose, but what next? To my knowledge, there is no shadow government or opposition that could step in afterwards, meaning some external power would have to govern the country for some unspecified period. Some might argue that it doesn’t really matter when the entire country ran out of something as basic as toilet paper in recent memory and nothing could be worse than the current regime, but are we really going to sit back if even more anarchy and chaos descends? We don’t know, and that’s the problem. A functioning republic requires real opposition, asking real questions and demanding real answers. Outrage simply isn’t enough. In fact, on its own, recycled forever, in the same form as if it was spat out of a computer, it’s a threat to the future.
Confessions of a Conservative Atheist 