WaPo Editorial: Memo to Republicans: Democracies don’t lock up political opponents
By Editorial Board July 20 at 5:21 PM
THE THEME of this years Republican National Convention was visible early, in the Hillary for Prison T-shirts being hawked outside the arena. Republicans expanded on it during the first night of speakers, when a macabre parade of the grieving blamed the deaths of loved ones directly on Hillary Clinton. It descended to a new low Tuesday night when delegates assembled in Cleveland kept repeating their favorite chant: Lock her up! Lock her up! Make America Great Again! is emblazoned on the walls of the convention hall, but lock her up captures the frenzied, angry mood.
Embarrassed for my country by this chant, Stanford University professor (and Post contributor) Michael McFaul tweeted Tuesday. Dictatorships lock up the opposition, not democracies. Mr. McFaul should know: He was U.S. ambassador to Vladimir Putins Russia and is a leading scholar of that countrys turn toward authoritarianism.
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie led the crowd in a trial by mob Tuesday night, lobbing accusation after accusation at the former secretary of state, asking the crowd after each one to declare her guilty or not guilty. Guilty! was the predictable reply, though nearly all of his charges concerned policy choices, not behavior that was even conceivably illegal. After absurdly accusing Ms. Clinton of being an apologist for an al-Qaeda affiliate, Mr. Christie criticized her for being too soft on dictators and the Kremlin. He, of course, said nothing about Donald Trumps recent praise for Saddam Hussein or Mr. Trumps admiration for Mr. Putin and other despots.
Mr. Christie, a former prosecutor and would-be attorney general, presumably knows that the U.S. legal system is meant to be insulated from politics. He should know better than to weaken that all-important separation. But you could say as much about many formerly self-respecting Republican leaders who have let themselves sink to Mr. Trumps level this year.
more
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/memo-to-republicans-democracies-dont-lock-up-political-opponents/2016/07/20/ff0f40ae-4ea8-11e6-a7d8-13d06b37f256_story.html