Imagine that you are a Never Trumper. You despise the man on golf cart for all of the reasons that the left does. You view him as a corrupt, inept, would-be authoritarian who is rotting the foundations of the American political system. He has to go. You agree with large parts of Trump’s domestic agenda, however. So how do you resolve this problem? By rooting for the GOP to retain control of the Senate. That will put an end to the legitimacy crisis without giving free rein to the left. It sounds like a perfect solution.
Except that it leads to a different kind of roller coaster. It doesn’t just mean that the progressive agenda is dead in the water, and that the government’s ability to deal with the pandemic and the recession will be hobbled; it means gratuitous shutdowns and debt ceiling crises on top of that, as McConnell reverts to his favorite game of taking hostages for partisan gain at the expense of the public interest. In addition, one can easily imagine McConnell being emboldened to the point of refusing to confirm any Biden judges–period. Instead of one Merrick Garland, we could have a hundred. Is that what we really need, if we’re looking for decency and stability?