By CHRIS POWELL
Those six Democratic members of Congress who last week managed to provoke more hysteria from President Trump by noting that American soldiers can disobey “illegal orders” would have been far more helpful if they specified the illegal orders they fear Trump may issue.
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After all, there’s really nothing to argue here. “Illegal orders” are illegal orders.
Trump chose to ignore the “illegal” part and misconstrue the congressmembers to be advocating disobeying his orders as commander in chief generally. Only in that sense could he accuse them of “sedition” and approvingly quote a social media post: “Hang them.”
The congressmembers should have known this would happen. Indeed, triggering Trump may have been their objective. It’s easily done.
It would have been harder for Trump to misconstrue and rage if, instead, the congressmembers challenged the president to cite any legal authority for his directing the military to kill drug-smuggling suspects in boats on the high seas as he has done lately around Venezuela and Colombia.
The United States is not at war with those nations and there is no evidence that the people in the boats destroyed by U.S. military aircraft were military personnel. The U.S. military itself seemed to recognize as much when it repatriated two survivors of an attack instead of detaining them as prisoners of war.
It also would have been harder for Trump to misconstrue and rage if, instead, the congressmembers had asked whether his recent dispatch of an armada toward Venezuela was meant to contrive an excuse for war without a declaration of war by Congress — as President Lyndon B. Johnson contrived the so-called Gulf of Tonkin incident in 1964 to justify more U.S. military intervention in Vietnam.
Of course the Venezuelan regime is reprehensible, but does Trump intend to overthrow it without a declaration of war by Congress? The congressmembers should have asked that question as well, instead of letting the president get away with changing the subject.
But continuing his campaign to become the darling of the apoplectic wing of the Democratic Party, Connecticut U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy jumped into the fray with his own vulgar hysteria.
Citing Trump’s denunciation of the congressmembers who raised the “illegal orders” issue, Murphy said: “If you’re a person of influence in this country and you haven’t picked a side, maybe now would be the time to pick a #!@$%+# side.”
Since he comes from a state that long has seemed inclined to elect Democrats to statewide office no matter how questionable their positions, qualifications, and records, Murphy has never been compelled to reflect on how difficult it has been lately for many Americans to “pick a #!@$%+# side.”
The essential question facing the Democratic Party since Trump’s election as president last year remains unanswered by Murphy and most other leading Democrats: Why would most voters decide to return to the presidency someone as megalomaniacal, reckless, unstable, corrupt, and cruel as Trump?
Surely Murphy might have noticed that while Connecticut didn’t come close to giving Trump its electoral votes last year, he substantially increased his support in the state and throughout the country. So how come?
Having replaced Trump’s first administration with a Democratic administration in 2020 only to get roaring inflation, worsening poverty, open borders, incompetence, senility, and claims that civil rights require putting men into women’s sports, bathrooms, and prisons, might some people voting for president last year have concluded that they had to pick a different side even if by doing so they might doom themselves to picking a different side again in 2028?
Senator Murphy is sore to the point of vulgarity that so many people still have not yet picked his side, though, on top of the nonsense of last year’s campaign, his side now is also advocating nullification and insurrection. In Scottish dialect from a few centuries ago the poet Robert Burns might explain the senator’s problem to him:
O wad some Pow’r the giftie gie us
To see oursels as ithers see us!
Chris Powell has written about Connecticut government and politics for many years. (CPowell@cox.net)
Chris Powell column 
Keep up the good work, Chris.
Happy Thanksgiving — Kevin
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“After all, there’s really nothing to argue here. ‘Illegal orders’ are illegal orders.” Great explanation of why everyone pretends not to understand that.
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