Standing Up for What's Right

It is refreshing when relatives of people who have done immense damage to our world—undermining truth and science, spreading fear and division, delegitimizing the political opposition and eroding democracy, all in the nihilistic pursuit of power—step forward and demand better. Kathryn Murdoch, who is leaving her family's media empire to fight climate change, is an inspiration.

Something similar is happening in countless families across America who were caught up in supporting a dangerous and altogether terrible man in 2016—justifying their misjudgment with the fear and hatred that they sincerely (if irrationally) felt toward politicians whom Murdoch media had cynically and relentlessly portrayed as an existential threat. People like Kathryn—no matter how rich or poor, no matter their political persuasion—are speaking out against this madness, pleading with loved ones to confront the truth about the man whom the likes of Vladimir Putin, for obvious reasons, wanted badly to see elected.

Early this week, that man strode into the United Nations and made clear that he would continue to ignore the most serious crisis humanity has ever faced, a cause for which millions of young protesters around the globe had marched three days earlier. Moreover, he mocked the demeanor and passion of the autistic 16-year-old Greta Thunberg, who had inspired those protesters with her courage, and who is as close to a Martin Luther King Jr. as this world has, for her efforts to confront the dire peril we face. Her sole message is “listen to the science”—her only goal being to remind us that there is such a thing as truth, and that we’ve been willfully ignoring it. She knows that, if we only acknowledged what we know, we would never tolerate leaders whose inaction ensures that hundreds of millions will be uprooted or face mortal hardship, that a million species could go extinct, that civilization itself could teeter. She is urging us to reconnect with our conscience, to act like adults, and there is no more important message now. Trump's mockery of her rips off the mask of the nihilism he represents. There is no longer any pretense that supporting him is justified for the sake of tax rates, that condoning his racism and corruption and abdication of leadership is in any way patriotic. Enough with the what-about-ism, the "What about Biden’s son and Ukraine?" Enough with the "I don't love Trump, but I could never vote for a Democrat." Enough. 

Matthew Dowd was the chief strategist for George W. Bush’s re-election campaign. He is among the growing chorus of conservatives who understand that silence in the face of evil is inexcusable. Dowd responded to Trump’s mockery by writing to Greta: "You stand more for the ideals of America than nearly every member of this administration and nearly everyone at Fox News.” That is the voice of truth. That is what the better angels of our nature are telling us. 

Let’s hold onto our values, our identities, our faith, while being also on the right side of history. It is ok to admit wrong, to admit that perhaps George Will was right to have called for Trump's defeat in all 50 states, or that John McCain’s 2008 campaign manager was onto something when he called recently for the electoral annihilation of the party to which he’d dedicated his life. It is ok to change your mind. Future generations will be grateful that we looked around, like Kathryn Murdoch, and couldn't stand for what our silence would have abetted.