#JOURNALISM: Jonathan Chait Writes the Same Ron DeSantis Column Again, Is Still Wrong.
His latest column warns darkly that “Ron DeSantis Would Kill Democracy Slowly and Methodically.” Both the motive and the rhetorical trick at work here are fairly transparent. The motive is the same one that led Chait, back in 2016, to argue that liberals should prefer Donald Trump to Marco Rubio or Ted Cruz. It is the same one that leads panicked progressives such as Charles Pierce of Esquire to rise up in alarm against a DeSantis presidential campaign: “Dear America, Do Not Walk Away From Ron DeSantis—Run.” Chait, Pierce, and others on this beat recognize that Trump would be more likely to lose in 2024 than DeSantis, and that DeSantis (if elected) would be more effective in advancing conservative policy. So, they prefer another Trump nomination, and if pressed, they prefer Trump in power again to DeSantis in power. That’s what this is all about.
The rhetorical trick is to convince readers that the loudest alarms about Trump — that he’s a threat to democracy who won’t abide by the results of elections, as evidenced by his “stop the steal” campaign and January 6 — can be seamlessly transferred to DeSantis. There is, however, a problem in making that leap, and we can illustrate it with what never appears in any of Chait’s many columns on this same topic: the Democrats. Is it bad and dangerous to peddle stolen-election conspiracy theories, attack the legitimacy of election results, try to get them thrown out in court, object to certifying electors in Congress, and generally treat the winners of elections as if they have no right to exercise the powers of office? If that is your standard, there are a lot of Democrats who are threats to democracy, including Hillary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi, Jimmy Carter, Al Gore, Stacey Abrams, John Lewis, former DNC chairs Terry McAuliffe, Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, Howard Dean, January 6 committee chair Bennie Thompson, and — of course — Jonathan Chait himself. I have documented this in depth here, here, here, here, here, and here, as well as several other places linked in those items. Heck, the current president, Joe Biden, has preemptively attempted to delegitimize the upcoming midterm elections, while the current Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, described American elections as a “rigged game.” Chait appears to have no problem with any of this, having participated in some of it himself. Chait complains of a “belief that Democratic election victories are inherently illegitimate” but freely participates in a movement to treat Republican election victories as inherently illegitimate.
Once you realize that it’s all bullshit, you’ll understand that it’s all bullshit.