Many of my essays over at Precipice share a common theme, common enough that I often title them "The Sliver of Terrain I Inhabit Grows Narrower Still."
What I mean by that is that I can neither think of myself as a Republican any longer, given over as that party is to an identity as a cult in thrall to the most unfit president in US history, but am horrified by progressivism's all-too-successful aim of dismantling Western civilization.
I usually know better, after much experience getting entangled in toxic pissing matches on social media, than to chime in on the comment thread under some pronouncement by either a Trumpist or a leftist. But once in a while, against my better judgement, I take the bait. And then, after some unproductive back and forth, I have to take a shower. If it's not "you ineffectual little dweebs don't really want to fight," it's "you have a problem with equal rights for all people."
It wears me out to think about it.
When public figures inhabit this narrow sliver, the stakes are higher.
Representative Peter Meijer from Michigan can tell you all about that:
After the impeachment vote, I was immediately censured by two county parties in my old district. In my new district, the Republican Party of the largest county repudiated me a few weeks ago. The Michigan GOP Chair joked about my assassination. There have been too many online threats to count.
The piece to which I'm linking and from which I've excerpted is about how the Democrat party is shoveling money at the campaigns of MAGA Republicans contending against sane people like Meijer in primary races. The motivation seems to be to make sure the public's impression that MAGA is the true face of modern Republicanism is firmly entrenched.
So a guy like Meijer has even more kinds of slings and arrows directed his way. They don't just come from the drool-besotted true believers or Democrat political opponents, but Democrat strategists who see dirty pool as an advantageous maneuver.
It's no fun - in fact, it's dispiriting as hell - to stand on this infinitesimal piece of real estate, but it's the only place to plant one's feet after having surveyed the lay of the land and checked in with one's sense of right and wrong.
May the good representative prevail.
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