The importance of Merrick Garland stating the obvious

One of the eternal questions among liberals and leftists is whether Donald Trump and the Republicans believe what they are saying.

These days, they’re saying Joe Biden manufactured the former president’s felony conviction in an effort to interfere with the 2024 election. They’re saying the president’s “weaponization of the legal system” is the reason for their own weaponization of it in the future.

“You have to wonder if the magas believe their own outlandish rhetoric,” Lindsay Beyerstein said in her latest for the Editorial Board.

Some do, she said, but most don’t.

“This embrace of frothing conspiracism is an excuse to justify the authoritarian measures they’ve long wanted to implement.”

I agree, but I want to add a layer.

Some don’t know.

The great depth of ignorance in America

I don’t mean the Republicans. As Lindsay said, they are not ignorant. They know they are peddling a conspiracy theory. They know the facts, too. They know the criminal trial of Donald Trump is led by a state law enforcement official who sought justice according to state law in a case presided over by a state judge in New York state’s judicial system.

They know the president – this one, or any other, at any time – has nothing to do with state and local law enforcement. The president is the executive of the federal government, not state government. He’s the leader of America, but he’s not the leader of Manhattan or Albany.

No, I’m talking about normal people, including some GOP voters.

Some don’t know.

We can ask if Trump and the Republicans believe what they’re saying, but let’s not forget the impact of their saying it on those who are, for reasons good and bad, too ignorant to even ask whether they mean it.

They just believe the Republicans do.

They don’t know enough about how government in America works. They don’t know enough about the US Constitution, the sovereignty of the states, the separation of powers. They don’t even know that Biden doesn’t control, you know, everything. (Indeed, lots of people, even quite famous people, believe presidents are very nearly omnipotent.)

This is important to point out, because liberals and leftists typically do not place value on the important role played by the ignorant. (We tend to go straight to whether the Republicans believe what they say.) The Republicans, however, do place value on ignorance. They depend on it. There are only so many people around as cynical and craven as they are. A vast majority of people don't agree with them or don't know enough about anything to know whether they agree with them.

Which brings me to Merrick Garland.

For the Republicans, conspiracy theories work

The US attorney general gets a lot of grief from liberals and leftists, because he’s an institutionalist who believes in maintaining norms. But what he said during yesterday’s testimony on Capitol Hill wasn’t just more of the same, not when you consider the great depth of ignorance in this country, which is usually working in the Republicans’ favor.

In front of the House Judiciary, he said what many needed to hear. “We do not control the Manhattan district attorney, the Manhattan district attorney does not report to us,” he said. Later, he added: "That conspiracy theory is an attack on the judicial process itself.”

That might have sounded obvious, and it might have come off as rather feeble on account of sounding obvious, but remember – lots of people just don’t know enough about how government works to know it was obvious. They might have been surprised to learn the president has no control over state criminal proceedings. (Perhaps they might have felt lied to!) And remember, the Republican response partly depends on ignorance. People who are knowledgeable about civic structures are unlikely to be duped into believing their conspiracy theories.

These days, conspiracy theories are the Republican party line, not because the Republicans are crazy, but because they are practical. Conspiracy theories work. “Joe Biden rigged the trial” attacks their chief adversary while softening the blow to Trump’s campaign.

But they only work on two groups. One is the cynics, that is, people who may know they are being lied to, but go along with it, because going along is useful. Two is the ignorant, that is, people who don’t know enough about anything to know they’re being lied to. Conspiracy theories rally the GOP’s cynics while bullying the ignorant (who are sometimes politely called “low-propensity voters”) into falling in line.

Together, these two groups may constitute a majority of American voters, but things like Garland’s remarks can wedge them apart. He can’t do that alone, of course. Fortunately, the Republicans themselves often provide the wedge by way of saying the quiet part out loud.

Wedge apart the GOP and the ignorant

According to Axios, on Tuesday, the Republicans in the House want to move on legislation that would “allow current or former presidents to move any state case brought against them — such as the one in New York that resulted in Trump's conviction — to federal court.”

With this bill, these Republicans are admitting they don’t believe Joe Biden rigged Trump’s trial. If they believed it, they wouldn’t be talking about moving things from the state to the federal level. They wouldn’t be talking about levels of government at all given that levels of government are entirely missing from their lies. According to the conspiracy theory, there are no levels. Biden controls everything.

“Current or former presidents” refers to Trump, presumably. Why move state criminal cases to the federal level? Because presidents administrate the federal government, not state governments. Trump can’t stop state trials, but he could (in theory) stop federal trials.

Moreover, if more people were aware of the fact that there are indeed levels of governments – by which one does not usually involve the other – the impact of their conspiracy theory on people who don’t know much about government would be blunted, perhaps neutralized.

Merrick Garland is trying to make them aware. So are the Republicans – indirectly. Liberals and leftists can talk about whether they mean what they say or we can talk about the meaning of what they say for the benefit of those who don’t know enough to know what it means.