Captain Obvious has competition.
Via The State:
President Donald Trump’s critics view Republican congressmen as his enablers.
James Fallows, in The Atlantic, describes their behavior as the most discouraging weakness our governing system has shown since Trump took office. He singles out Nebraska Sen. Ben Sasse for scorn because “he leads all senators in his thoughtful, scholarly ‘concern’ about the norms Donald Trump is breaking — and then lines up and votes with Trump 95 percent of the time.”
Another journalist, Ron Brownstein, has written similarly. When various Republican senators objected to Trump’s attacks on MSNBC co-host Mika Brzezinski’s appearance, Brownstein asked what they intended to do about it. Other Trump foes echoed this critique: The Republicans’ stern words were empty.
Most of this criticism is unreasonable.
It fails, for one thing, to account for what the Republicans have done. That includes “mere” criticism, since words matter in politics. Some of those words — such as “we need to look to an independent commission or special prosecutor” (Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski) or “our intelligence committee needs to interview” Donald Trump Jr. (Maine Sen. Susan Collins) — can have a fairly direct effect on what happens in Washington.
But it’s not just words. The Republican Congress held hearings about President Trump’s firing of FBI Director James Comey. Congress is set to pass sanctions on Russia that the president opposes, with most Republicans supporting them.
For the Republicans’ critics, these steps were the least they could do. But they weren’t. The Republicans could have, for example, not held hearings.
It’s unusual for senators to hold hearings into possible misconduct by 1) a president of their party 2) who is still fairly new in office and 3) supported by the vast majority of their voters. Perhaps the Republicans should have taken even more extraordinary action. But they’re falling pitifully short only if the baseline expectation is that they do whatever liberal journalists think it’s their duty to do.