Mr. Vice President, Now Is the Time

Defense One
January 12, 2021 06:58 PM ET

 

Mike Pence must unify the nation. He must tell the truth about the election results to the millions who voted for him on the same ballot as Trump.

R&I – TxPAT *** 

An existential threat requires a unified response.

 

In the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, part of which was aimed at the Capitol Building, Americans united behind President George W. Bush despite their feelings toward the results of a disputed election just 10 months earlier. Today, our Republic requires another such moment of unity. Tragically, President Donald Trump has shown himself incapable of acting in anyone’s interest but his own. But we cannot wait until the new Biden administration takes office, lest America be seen as just another dictatorship where a new government’s first order of business is to punish the supporters of its predecessor.

 

This is therefore Vice President Mike Pence’s moment to lead. He must unify the nation. He must tell the truth about the election results to the millions who voted for him on the same ballot as Trump. He must deliver an explicit, unequivocal rebuke to the ideas that led to this disaster and hold accountable all those who fomented it, regardless of rank. He must isolate and expose the violent insurrectionists and their backers. He must urge both parties in Congress to respond with a unified tone equal to the shared danger we all face.

 

To help Congress reach that unity, he must urge all of the Republican lawmakers who voted against accepting the Electoral College to admit publicly that their political stunt was a mistake. He must urge them to declare that there was no significant fraud.

 

It is crucial that we urgently confront this domestic cancer to our democracy and to defeat it, operationally, culturally, and politically in a unified manner.

 

Story Continues

Bugs Marlowe

Article URL : https://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2021/01/mr-vice-president-now-time/171360/