“He has a DEATH WISH,” wrote Donald Trump, on Truth Social, his version of Twitter. “Must immediately seek help and advise from his China loving wife, Coco Chow!”
The “he” is Senator Mitch McConnell. The “China loving wife, Coco Chow!” is Elaine Chao, McConnell’s wife, who was the transportation secretary in the Trump administration.
This is the kind of thing that most Republicans chuckle at, in my experience — Republicans in politics and in the media. “Well, that’s the way he talks,” they say. “He may not be as polished as a Buckley or as genial as a Reagan, but he believes the same things, and he fights, and” blah blah blah.
Someone ought to pull a Joseph N. Welch on Trump — some top GOP-er, in politics or the media. “Have you no sense of decency, sir? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?” Who will do it? McConnell? Some cable host? One of the big podcasters?
I guess Lindsey Graham is out.
Liz Cheney has done it, of course — and the GOP is done with her (and I think she with it). There would be a cost to saying no to Trump’s nastiness, even at this late date. But when is there not a cost to courage? Otherwise it would not be courage.
I myself am an appreciator of sharp elbows. Mine are pretty sharp themselves. But what Trump manifests — and has always manifested — is something else. Peggy Noonan wrote a book about Ronald Reagan called “When Character Was King.” Character was cast out of the kingdom some years ago. But maybe it can come back?
Lately, I have been noting the comebacks of “America First” and “Christian nationalism.” If those things can come back — maybe other things can as well. Everything in its season, whether we like it or not.
I have had frequent occasion to quote Roger Scruton, in his appreciation of Kenneth Minogue (what gents! what minds! what excellent company!):
In many ways he was a model of the conservative activist. He was not in the business of destroying things or angering people. He was in the business of defending old-fashioned civility against ideological rage, and he believed this was the real meaning of the freedom that the English-speaking peoples have created and enjoyed.
Said Roger further, “For Ken Minogue, decency was not just a way of doing things, but also the point of doing them.”
That seems like a thousand years ago. “. . . his China loving wife, Coco Chow!” is now. I hope that now will be yesterday, before too many more years pass.