The Washington Post published an editorial by Fred Hiatt, editor of the editorial page, excoriating Senator Rubio for his unprincipled remarks about President-Elect Biden’s first appointments. He seems to think they are too well-qualified, too well-informed, too well-educated to serve.
Let’s say you’re a Republican senator who claims to support democracy and U.S. leadership in the world.
Let’s imagine, too, that you’ve spent four years excusing and supporting a president who fawned over North Korea’s odious dictator, encouraged China’s ruling tyrant to build his concentration camps, took the word of Russia’s strongman over U.S. intelligence agencies and celebrated the Saudi despot who orchestrated the dismemberment of a dissident journalist.
And let’s posit that, on top of all that, you’ve been a profile in cowardice as your president tried to nullify a democratic election here at home.
Now the president-elect appoints a team of seasoned, moderate foreign policy experts who support democracy and American leadership in the world.
How do you respond?
Like this, maybe? “I’m sure I will have my differences with President-elect Joe Biden and his team over the coming years. But we share many fundamental principles. His nominees are beyond well-qualified.“For the good of our country, I wish them every success.”
In our dreams.
Here is the way Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) actually greeted the new team: “Biden’s cabinet picks went to Ivy League schools, have strong resumes, attend all the right conferences & will be polite & orderly caretakers of America’s decline.”
I suppose this sour, graceless tweet shouldn’t surprise us. It shouldn’t surprise us to see Rubio, along with Tom Cotton (Ark.), Josh Hawley (Mo.) and other Republican senators, disparaging the incoming Biden team. They are now in the opposition, after all.
In an ideal world, constructive criticism from the opposition might help keep an administration sharp and focused. In a USA Today op-ed following the tweet, Rubio said his main concern is the new team will be too soft on China.
But there is something particularly galling about this instant pivot to attack mode from senators who couldn’t even bring themselves to acknowledge the results of the election — who have stood by or cheered as President Trump has attempted to overturn those results.
Rubio obviously knows that Trump lost clearly and convincingly, in the electoral college as well as the popular vote. Rubio has been silent as the president claims, with no basis, that the election was stolen.
He applauded as Trump attempted to make that case in court, where his lawyers were turned away again and again because they had no evidence.
And when Trump then pressed state and local officials — the secretary of state in Georgia, legislators in Pennsylvania, the Board of State Canvassers in Michigan — to nullify the results, Rubio offered no objection.
If Trump’s coup attempt has failed, it is because his defeat was so decisive — and because those state and local officials had the integrity and courage to resist Trump’s pressure.
But here’s the essential point: Almost no Republicans on the national stage had the integrity or courage to offer backup for these local officials. Almost none of them gave the public any reason to hope that if Trump’s effort to steal the election state by state had gained traction, they would have stood against it.
It wouldn’t have been difficult. Rubio only had to say, “My fellow Americans, this election was not rigged or stolen. There was no communist conspiracy to alter the results. We should be proud that, in the face of a pandemic, we turned out to vote in record numbers, and our votes were counted conscientiously and honestly by thousands of fair-minded Americans across the country.”
Instead, he followed the standard evasive Republican script, legitimizing Trump’s conspiracy theories without parroting them word for word. “Democrats have contested & gone to court after many elections,” he tweeted. “Like any candidate, President Trump is well within his legal rights to request recounts, contest unlawful votes and if he has clear evidence of widespread misconduct or irregularities take them to court.”
After such a near-miss of a constitutional crisis, you might hope Rubio would opt for a few days of quiet self-reflection — or at least abashed silence.
You might hope that he would reach out with an offer of cooperation to Secretary of State-designate Antony Blinken — a man with a long record of bipartisanship and commitment to human rights and free speech, values Rubio claims to champion.
You might hope Rubio would at least wait until the current president had the decency to concede before pronouncing the next one a failure.
But no. Rubio is already suiting up for the politics of destruction, already certain that this new team will preside over America’s decline.
It’s enough to make you despair that he may be right, though not for the reasons he would have us believe.
Rubio and the GOP have raised hypocrisy to a high art form. They are without an ounce of shame or self-awareness. They only know attack, attack, attack and then attack some more. How do you have bipartisanship dealings with such rabid pit bulls?
Rubio wants to be seen as being one the first out of the gate to pile on the Biden administration, even if his “damning” criticism is too many Ivy League graduates. “Little Marco” is desperate to appear relevant after years of being subdued by the Trump administration. Being critical of the new administration is getting him the media attention that he believes will bring him back into the spotlight as he ambitiously eyes the 2024 election.
Rubio wants to be first to claim “the uneducated,” beloved by Trump.
But according to media rumor, Trump will announce his 2024 candidacy in midst of Biden inauguration.
Then where does that leave little Marco?
Little Marco might try for VP or a cabinet post. Or, because he is lawyer, he might aspire to Bill Barr’s position or Trump’s inner circle of lawyers who are free of mishaps with hair dye.
Rubio’s bio is at the link below. Along the way the bio needed some correction in the timeline. https://www.biography.com/political-figure/marco-rubio
Would a second run for the White House be met by some Republicans and all Democrats with a massive investigation of all his activities? He cannot claim immunity from prosecution as an ex-president.
Dump surrounds himself with morons and grifters.
And now this:
IRS Says Its Own Error Sent $1,200 Stimulus Checks To Non-Americans Overseas
Sacha Pfeiffer6-Minute Listen
https://www.npr.org/2020/11/30/938902523/irs-says-its-own-error-sent-1-200-stimulus-checks-to-non-americans-overseas
The tragedy of this revelation is that it plays into the hands of the people who benefit from a failure of government. Trump and his believers will blame the “deep state” for these failures, even though the failure is a direct result of their own incompetence.
I am seriously tired of insanely ignorant people like Trump and Rubio. It is getting to the point that the media and any person with any intelligence should just ignore them. They will eventually wilt away like unwatered plants and throw on the pile of heap to be taken to the landfill.
The mainstream media won’t ever ignore people like Trump because they generate public interest and hence dollars for them.
Thanks for this column. I can’t imagine how these Repubs live with themselves.
One of the biggest roadblocks that President-Elect Biden will have is Senators and Representatives like McConnell and Rubio. They will do all they can to bring Biden down and in the end further destroy our democracy. These two individuals as well as other like them are as un-American as they come. Their oath of office is, as Trump’s was, meaningless.
Of course Rubio is far from the only one who sneers at Ivy Leaguers. There is a strong anti-intellectual streak that runs across the ideological spectrum. I guess I should be glad I went to a female Ivy (and am nobody) since women are less likely to be tarred with this particular brush. There is no doubt there is some truth behind the bias; Ivy Leaguers do have a old boy network that can feed them into potentially lucrative and/or powerful careers. I tend to think that Diane is more an example of the quality of people who have benefited from an Ivy education.
I went to a public school in Houston. Most of my classmates in 1956 did not go to college. Most of the other girls got married after high school graduation. By chance, I was steered by a mentor to Wellesley. Half the students at the college went to public schools, most from affluent suburbs. Wellesley changed my life. Someday when I’m gone, there will be a professorship named for me, to encourage students to consider education as a profession and to protect the common good.
There might be a justification for lashing out against those who attended the most recognized institutions of American higher education, if the people coming from these places were part of a monolithic thing. But the voices from America’s Ivy League are varied. Screaming “Ivy League” gets votes for the same reason that screaming Socialist gets votes; it absolves the user of the epithet of the responsibility of thinking.
Roy, you are correct. As Breonna pointed out, Trump himself went to an Ivy League institution as did Bill Barr, Mike Pompeo, and other Trumpers.
Trump is still dumb, in spite of this degree. ☹️🔔
Indeed, Eddie!
Yup.
In 2016, Politico broke with the established media norm. An article about Rubio explored his experience with religion. The Rubio biography that Laura Chapman linked above reflects the common blackout that disconnects from his/her religion, a politician’s pro-life position, authoritarian political preferences and opposition to separation of church and state. The Politico article provides insight into the fusing of the U.S.’ two primary religions that developed into support for Rubio.
Daily Beast omits religion in its 11-29-2020 article about Trump supporter Maria Bartiromo of Fox. Still, the article sheds light on the network’s ability to find a sweet spot
that creates zeal for Trump and his political allies.
Marco Rubio can’t control his height. He is about average height for a man. 😐
““Biden’s cabinet picks went to Ivy League schools, have strong resumes, attend all the right conferences & will be polite & orderly caretakers of America’s decline.”
He is correct, though, if by decline he means America’s decline as a leading global power. Better to have this happen with such “polite” and professional guidance than with “let’s burn down everything so that nothing is left for those coming after us”.
Think about reading the opposite side of Rubio’s tweet:
He wants cabinet appointments who did NOT got to Ivy League schools, do NOT have strong resumes, do NOT attend all the right conferences, and are NOT polite. Wonder who fits his bill?
Well, I agreed with his literal statement not with what his sarcasm might have implied.
And I wouldn’t call it decline, it’s more of a transformation to a gentler nation which keeps its spirit of helpfulness but drops the chest pounding.