In Trump era, ‘angry conservatives' have more explaining to do
Pipes's supposed history is too filled with reflexive Republican butt-covering to be taken seriously, but I want to confront Pipes over one sentence: He said, 'Barack Obama's two presidencies then confirmed the Democrats' leftward turn.' This is fallacious. Obama is a moderate Democrat squarely in the mainstream of American politics. His plans for government were less ambitious than those of President Lyndon Johnson, President Harry Truman, or President Franklin Roosevelt. Trying to blame Obama or the Democratic Party for the chaos in the Republican Party is irresponsible.
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Many Democrats feel like residents in a small apartment who suddenly discover that their roommate has been overcome by some kind of insanity. We look on as Robert F. Kennedy Jr. becomes head of Health and Human Services, and Elon Musk fires government employees without justification, and we wonder, where is this going? How bad could it get?
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Please, do not blame the Democratic Party even indirectly for this mess.
Stuart Gallant
Belmont
MAGA has deep roots in GOP history
Daniel Pipes's op-ed blames the rise of MAGA on Democrats, whose supposed leftward turn after Bill Clinton's presidency radicalized Republicans and drove them to adopt 'bad manners' and support 'the immoderate Trump.'
This argument is astonishingly myopic. Pipes must not remember that Newt Gingrich, US House minority whip during Clinton's presidency, instructed fellow Republican Party members to
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Pipes also neglects to mention that since Clinton left Washington, Republicans have held the presidency for 13 out of 25 years, and majorities in both houses of Congress for roughly two-thirds of that period. Republicans have also had the edge in federal judicial nominations. It's hard to see the post-Clinton era as one dominated by a 'reinvigorated left.'
Pipes predicts the MAGA movement will soon burn out. I hope he is correct, but MAGA's deep Republican roots make me skeptical.
Arthur Goldsmith
Brookline
The writer is a professor emeritus at the University of Massachusetts Boston.
Tracing Trump's rise, a laughable omission
Any op-ed purporting to explain the rise of President Trump that includes no mention of white supremacy or racism belongs in the comics section, not the Opinion pages. As for Pipes's prediction that this 'abnormality' won't last a decade, if you think we can survive 10 more years of this, you really aren't paying attention.
Chris Kelly
Reading
Questionable justifications for backing Trump
Daniel Pipes has joined a growing chorus of 'traditional' Republicans who try to justify their decisions to vote for Donald Trump for president. His explanation: 'The Left made me do it.' A simple 'I'm sorry' would have been more acceptable.
Pipes — like many other Reaganite Republicans who were frustrated by that president's inability to fully remake the country — saw in Trump and the MAGA movement an opportunity to get the country they wanted. Instead, they have given the rest of us the nightmare scenario of a moribund democratic Republic.
Pipes — and anyone paying attention — knew who Trump was in 2016. We knew he had called for the execution of five young Black men before they were found guilty of attacking a white woman, and reiterated his call after they were exonerated. We knew he had spent years harassing a sitting president, insisting he wasn't a US citizen. We knew he was a self-aggrandizing, publicity-hungry, bankruptcy-prone businessman.
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Any thoughtful person — which I presume Pipes is, and Mitch McConnell, and John Roberts — knew this. And rather than vote accordingly in the voting booth, in the Senate, or on the Supreme Court, they voted to favor the GOP, the
Marilse Rodriguez-Garcia
Belmont
Crisis won't end through wishful thinking
While Daniel Pipes now distances himself from President Trump, his admission of voting for Trump twice — despite Trump's corruption — reveals a contradiction he fails to address. By framing MAGA's excesses as a temporary phase that will 'burn out' within a decade, Pipes ignores the immediate threat to democratic institutions and the role enablers like him played in emboldening this movement.
Democracy is not self-correcting; it requires urgent, active defense. Pipes's passive assertion that time will restore decency ignores history's lesson: Extremism metastasizes unless confronted. His declaration of independence from the GOP rings hollow without accountability for past complicity or a commitment to resisting authoritarianism today.
Conservatives who reject Trumpism must do more than declare themselves 'unaffiliated.' True principle demands engagement, not detachment. The crisis Pipes describes will not resolve itself through wishful thinking. It demands immediate action to restore democratic norms, not a decade-long wait for renewal.
Jordan Ryan
Decatur, Ga.
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