It’s evidently going to take some time for the post-Kavanaugh confirmation healing to begin at the New York Times. With near unanimity the paper’s columnists, some of them former reporters, are reacting with anger and contempt over Trump’s victory against the Democrat’s Supreme Court smear campaign.
Columnist Paul Krugman on Tuesday rehashed his tired old line about “The Paranoid Style in G.O.P. Politics.” The text box read “Republicans are an authoritarian regime in waiting.” The last paragraph delivered a scathing scolding: “Well, think of what Trump and his party might do if they retain both houses of Congress in the coming election. If you aren’t terrified of where we might be in the very near future, you aren’t paying attention.” Who’s the “paranoid” one again?
Not to be outflanked on the paranoid left, columnist Michelle Goldberg graced the same edition with “Trump Gives Dictators the Green Light.” The text box: “No wonder Saudi Arabia feels emboldened.” That’s a reference to the possible murder of Saudi dissent at a Saudi consulate in Turkey.
It’s not surprising, however, that the Saudi government would think it could get away with it. The United States has long maintained a close strategic relationship with Saudi Arabia despite the kingdom’s abysmal human rights record, and tacit American support for its brutal war in Yemen began during Barack Obama’s administration. But there’s never been an American president as enthusiastically pro-Saudi as Trump.
Monday’s paper found former Washington bureau chief David Leonhardt in sore-loser mode, while scolding any insufficiently angry readers.
If you’re not angry yet, you should be.
After listing old controversies like Trump’s “birther” claims against Obama, and blaming indifference to Russia's pre-election meddling solely on the GOP (and not a passive, over-confident Democratic administration), Leonhardt ranted about Republicans “stealing” one Senate seat and gaining another through “a brutal, partisan process.”
Together, the two new justices have cemented an extremist Republican majority on the Supreme Court. It has already begun acting as a kind of super-legislature, throwing out laws on voting rights, worker rights, consumer rights and political influence buying. Now, the court is poised to do much more to benefit the wealthy and powerful at the expense of most Americans -- and the planet.
This is not how democracy is supposed to work.
...
Again, if you’re not angry, you should be, and I realize that many of you already are....
So is everyone scared and angry now?
From anger to contempt: Former White House reporter Frank Bruni twisted Sen. Lindsey Graham’s fierce defense of procedural fairness during the Kavanaugh hearings into a supposed betrayal of his anti-Trump credentials, and “The Saddest Story in Washington” in the Sunday Review. The text box was offensive: “Lindsey Graham has completed his transformation into the president’s slobbering manservant.”
