The Case for Matt Gaetz

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Posted on 11/19/2024 10:37:00 PM PST by Bobbyvotes

att Gaetz is the closest America can get to having Donald Trump himself as attorney general. Like Trump, the Florida congressman is a reformer who doesn’t conform to reassuring myths about the character a reformer should have. Those myths have an enduring hold on the legacy media, especially, but voters rejected them in 2016—and again this year.

There are two ways to look at the corruption that is rife in 21st-century American life. One view is that reform demands a saint to reproach the wicked. While we await a political hero with the character of a second George Washington, we must make do with morality-reinforcing illusions, according to which our most powerful institutions—the federal government, the media, the medical establishment—are also good institutions, while wickedness is a characteristic of lone individuals, especially of those who challenge the norms of our institutions.

The second view is that if we must await an immaculate reformer, reform will never come. So we ought to support even obviously flawed individuals when they take on the necessary work of confronting systemic evils. Those systemic evils aren’t impersonal, of course—they are the product of people who insist that they are upholding what is good even while they do what is bad. The merely human, rather than angelic, reformer has a doubly difficult task: In addition to being assailed for his mortal failings, he is charged with attacking the very decency of our institutions. Hence, the campaign against Trump branded him as a threat to democracy itself, as well as a convicted felon.

(Excerpt) Read more at compactmag.com ...

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if we must await an immaculate reformer, reform will never come. So we ought to support even obviously flawed individuals when they take on the necessary work of confronting systemic evils.

1 posted on 11/19/2024 10:37:00 PM PST by Bobbyvotes

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