Everyone has probably already written their take on Lindsey Graham. I’ll add mine but then take a look at it from just a bit of a different angle.
I know I’m not plowing new ground with this first part. Humor me.
Here are some quotes from people about Trump:
"He's a race-baiting, xenophobic, religious bigot." - Hillary Clinton
"He doesn't represent my party." - Jeb Bush
"He doesn't represent the values that the men and women who wear the uniform are fighting for." - General Joseph F. Dunford, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in 2016
"I don't think he has a clue about anything." - Senator Tim Kaine
You probably figured something out after reading those quotes. The quotes are real. The attributions are all fictitious. In truth, they all belong to one Lindsey Graham.
Now, let’s take a look at what proximity top power and pure fecklessness looks like (courtesy of Mrs. Betty Bowers):
In 2021, Graham said, “Can we move forward without President Trump? The answer is no. I’ve determined we can’t grow without him”. After winning the Republican nomination in South Carolina for another term in the Senate last month, Graham said, ““I want to start with a bunch of thank yous. I want to thank the big guy, God. Trump comes later. Mr. President, you’re not far behind God, but we’re gonna start with him.”
Gross. What happened to effect such a “change of heart” (and how legit can that change be after calling someone a “race-baiting, xenophobic, religious bigot”)?
Some of you may remember when Graham was considered a moderating force in conjunction with Senators John McCain and Joe Lieberman. They were known as the Three Amigos.
Senators Joe Lieberman, John McCain and Lindsey Graham - “The Three Amigos”
For Graham, it was all performance art.
Lindsey Graham was a fraud in virtually every aspect of his being, and it was a choice he reaffirmed daily.
…
The problem was that he then spent the rest of his life doing the only thing that mattered to him- doing whatever he could to elevate his status and increase his political power. That is all he cared about. He was in the Senate for 24 years and his signature legislation was the one big beautiful bill.
He was a centrist when it was profitable to stand in the light of McCain, he was a warmonger who always turned his back on the troops when they returned broken, battered, and betrayed from his overseas follies, he was staunchly anti-Russian until it mattered the most, and as with his personal life, he was a fraud.
And his behavior hurt people. Millions of them. At home and abroad. And he didn’t care and knew he what he was doing was wrong and made a choice to be who he was. He only cared about himself and he had no code.
…
In short, after reviewing his career before writing this, I can only find two things that Lindsey Graham really cared about and never flip flopped on his entire life. His love for himself and his love for killing brown people.
While he may have started out with noble intentions (as so many electeds do), Graham morphed into a chameleon who would change colors in order to camouflage who he really was: an insecure, self-doubting, unoriginal, small-minded person who latched onto others for cover, support and power.
Graham followed the wind in whichever direction he thought it was blowing. And when it swirled, he tried to have it every which way but loose…
Anne Applebaum (one of the truly great intrepid journalists) did a piece on Graham in The Atlantic in 202 that was prescient (to say the least): Why Do Republican Leaders Continue to Enable Trump? - The Atlantic (free link, I hope).
I’ll end this section with another quote from Cole’s vent over at Balloon Juice:
And his behavior hurt people. Millions of them. At home and abroad. And he didn’t care and knew he what he was doing was wrong and made a choice to be who he was. He only cared about himself and he had no code.
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Graham’s death was not just about the end of a lost soul searching for…something. It elicited certain reactions that, IMHO, highlight a major problem that still bedevils the Democratic party.
Congenialism.
Historically, the Senate was viewed as a Gentleman’s Club (yes, even after women were elected). The more deliberative body of congress where members got along even if they differed on policy.
Democrats - especially elected Democrats - need to understand something. Those days are over. They became threatened the day Trump was elected in 2016. They became endangered when senators refused to convict Trump during his two impeachments. They were all but wiped out on January 6, 2021. And they finally perished the day Trump was reelected on November 5, 2024.
Yet here we are:
Lindsey Graham Warmly Tributed by Biden, Franken, Klobuchar, Schiff, Contrasting Trump's Past Obnoxious Tirades - Showbiz411
Remember when Donald Trump said he was glad special prosecutor Robert Mueller was dead? Or called Rob Reiner names after he was murdered? Trump takes
Showbiz411 • Roger Friedman
The article is in many ways about Trump’s disgusting words and inability to empathize with anyone, especially those who he believes have wronged him.
To me, that is not the point.
The article is in many ways about Trump’s disgusting words and inability to empathize with anyone, especially those who he believes have wronged him.
But to me, it’s about a lesson the Democrats have still not learned or internalized.
Here’s Al Franken:
Here’s Joe Biden:
Here’s Elizabeth Warren:
Got it. Graham had friends. Graham had humor and wit. So do some serial killers and conmen. Oh - he also loved the Senate. Of course he did - it provided him with the lust for legitimacy he sought his entire life. But he and his Republican Senate colleagues - to a person - sold Democrats and the American people down the river in fealty and obeisance to an ignorant convicted felon, adjudicated rapist, pathologically lying, malignant narcissist out of fear and lust for power and personal political self-preservation.
Graham willingly chose that path. And choices have consequences, even if it’s a hallmark of the MAGA movement that they want to be able to make choices, say and do things, without having to deal with the repercussions of those choices and what they said/did. This is how they define “freedom”.
I understand that relationships form in any organization. In politics in “normal” times, that is generally a good thing even when there are significant policy differences. Generally speaking, compromise is an asset in passing legislation.
However, these are not “normal” times. Yes - the two major parties have policy differences. They always have and always will. No - this is about the continued existence of the United States of America as a representative democracy and its potential descent (already well on its way) into authoritarian rule.
It seems as if most of our Democratic former and current electeds at the federal level - even staunch progressives like Warren, Schiff and Franken and “moderates” like Biden - simply still don’t get the level of angst and anger in the American people right now. The masses want change and they want action and they want improvement in their daily struggles. Most struggling Americans care not about professional comity.
These Democrats mention “policy differences” and “disagreements”. No, dammit! Supporting the whims, lies and unconstitutional/illegal actions of a madman do not qualify as policy differences.
Historian Patrick Wymam put it well:
Another historian chimes in:
Simply acknowledging Graham’s passing and elected status might be ok. Saying nothing would be ok. Pointing out Graham’s hypocritical support for a wannabe tyrant would be ok. Lionizing and normalizing Graham is not ok.
Harsh. But our elected Senators swear an oath when they enter office: “I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter: So help me God."
Lindsey Graham did not adhere to that oath. Nor do almost all of his now-former Senate colleagues on the Republican side.
We can either recognize we are in THE fight to keep our short experiment in democracy alive or we can continue to act as if it’s all just squabbles over “differences” and slide into the abyss.
This is not the time to minimize differences with platitudes. Trump is truly one of the bad actors in history.
Congeniality, for the moment, should be dead, replaced by truth telling. We can resurrect it when/if we return to normal times.
The Beatles - Hello, Goodbye
