Читать книгу Disloyal Opposition - Julie Kelly - Страница 11

The de facto leader of NeverTrump kept his well-documented political losing streak intact during the Trump era. Kristol’s predictions about the “end days” for Trump were wrong every single time. A paid propagandist for both the Russian collusion hoax and the impeachment crusade, Kristol also supported Democratic candidates and declared in February 2020, “we are all Democrats now.” His contemptuous campaign against Trump and the GOP propelled the demise of the Weekly Standard, the magazine he founded in 1995.

The phoniest conservative of all the so-called conservative NeverTrumpers, Rubin, a columnist for the Washington Post and an MSNBC contributor, eventually alienated even her onetime allies in NeverTrump. She encouraged violence against Trump associates, peddled phony Russian collusion, and rooted for Democrats to take back Congress in 2018. She reversed herself on every previous opinion including climate change, the Iran nuclear deal, and tax cuts, just to name a few.

The male version of Rubin—he also writes for the Washington Post and appears on MSNBC—Boot renounced his past views in a desperate attempt to please his new allies and paymasters on the Left. Trump forced Boot to confront his own “white privilege,” Boot revealed. The Russian immigrant claimed that because of Trump, he no longer felt welcome in America. Boot became so unhinged toward the end of Trump’s first term that he was calling National Review writers white supremacists.

After twice failing to win the White House, Romney settled for the consolation prize of junior senator from Utah. Before taking office in January 2019, Romney authored an editorial in the Washington Post pledging to stop the president’s worst impulses. He worked to thwart Trump’s agenda on every issue from border security to foreign affairs. Romney is the only senator in history to vote to convict a president of his own party. In 2019, reporters uncovered his burner Twitter account: Pierre Delecto.

An unknown until Kristol floated his name as a rival to Trump in 2016, French leveraged his NeverTrump credentials to earn newfound fame. French, a columnist for National Review, routinely ridiculed evangelical Christians for backing Trump, insisted the government declare war on white supremacy, and pushed Russian collusion fiction. French supported the Democrats’ impeachment effort and commended Sen. Mitt Romney’s vote to convict the president. For his insufferable lecturing and proselytizing, French is often referred to as Pastor French. He left National Review in 2019 to join the Dispatch.

Once a fixture at National Review, Goldberg left the publication in 2019 to form his own outlet, the Dispatch, with fellow NeverTrumper Stephen Hayes, the former editor of the Weekly Standard. His predictions of doom about Trump’s presidency never materialized. While helping promote suspicions about Russian collusion, Goldberg insisted that anyone who believed in a “deep state” operation to oust Trump was a promoter of conspiracy theories. Trump brought impeachment upon himself, Goldberg argued, because he’s a man of low character who can’t act presidential.