Forgive Americans if they no longer remember that the elephant is the symbol of the Republican Party. Elephants are supposed to never forget, yet Republicans seem more than happy to memory-hole the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol riot, as GOP members of Congress find absurd reasons to oppose a bipartisan commission to examine the beginnings and unfolding of an attempt to upend a presidential election.
It’s yet another aspect of the party’s service to a former president insistent on warping the facts of a general election he refuses to admit that he lost. And it’s yet another piece of evidence that the party itself shares his delusion.
Call this affliction the New McCarthyism, after House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy. He first forced out Liz Cheney, the No. 3 Republican, who pointedly refused to go along with Donald Trump’s nonsense. He then performed a flip-flop for the ages.
McCarthy assigned Rep. John Katko of New York to negotiate the nature of the commission – a 10-person panel, equally divided between out-of-office politicians of both parties. Katko gave McCarthy precisely what he wanted, which turned out not to be enough.
Separately, McCarthy stood by as members such as Andrew Clyde of Georgia claimed that it was a lie to call the Jan. 6 riot an “insurrection” because, in fact, it was not too dissimilar from “a normal tourist visit” of the Capitol. Shortly afterward a journalist tweeted a photo of Clyde helping to barricade the doors to the House floor, attempting to keep out the invading hordes.