The politics of treason: Trump & the Dems are reckless in calling each other traitors
https://jonathanturley.org/2018/02/...s-in-calling-each-other-traitors/#more-133404Suddenly Washington appears to be a den of traitors. For months, various Democratic politicians and commentators have all but accused President Trump or his family of treason. Now Trump has said Democratic lawmakers who failed to clap at his State of the Union address are “un-American” and traitors.
These accusations reflect the distemper that has taken hold of our politics. Calling opponents traitors has a long and dark history in our country — a history we would be wise not to repeat.
Not long after the president’s inauguration, Democrats began alleging more and more serious crimes committed by Trump and his family. For months, commentators and lawmakers referred incorrectly to the crime of collusion with Russians — despite the absence of such a crime in the federal code. It then became allegations of obstruction or loosely defined conspiracies or election fraud.
Politicians who traffic in the rhetoric of treason are betraying more than their oaths to uphold the Constitution, they are betraying us — a pluralistic people bonded to each other by a common constitutional covenant. We have learned from painful experience that those who are the first to cry “treason” are the last to support our freedoms. We are all Jacobins when we defy our government or our neighbors, but that defiance is what defines us as a free people.