MAGA: You can let Trump go now. He’s a tyrant, not a patriot.

A vote for Trump is not only tragic and misguided, it’s anti-American. There, I said it, breaking a self-imposed rule never to play the patriotism card in an argument.

I learned long ago, when I was a kid and American troops were coming home every day in body bags from the Vietnam War, that citizens who opposed the government were not unpatriotic; they were raising their voices in protest, a totally American exercise. Those who marched against the war deserve a monument for having saved countless lives. The U.S. death toll in Vietnam was 58,220. How many more soldiers and Marines would have died had Americans not protested that horrible war?
So I never subscribed to “America: Love it or leave it.”
And I never believed, until now, that Americans who take up a protest — and supporting Trump is a form of protest, however dubious — could be considered anti-American. But Trump presents a special case: Everything he stands for goes against what the country should stand for.

He eschews truth and facts for harmful lies and inflammatory rhetoric. He does not believe in the peaceful transfer of power; that makes him a tyrant. He pledges harsh punishment for criminals, but has little regard for the laws of the land himself. He exaggerates the nation’s problems, aspires to be a dictator and expresses admiration for Orban of Hungary and Putin of Russia. He also evokes Hitler with his blatant racism and vile fear-mongering of immigrants.
And I don’t even need to mention his criminality, his abuse of women, his record as a poor businessman and con artist, his declining mental health.
If Americans want a felon, sexual predator and old racist to be president, there isn’t much I can say about that except that it’s effed-up.
But all that other stuff — refusing to admit he lost an election, inciting a mob, keeping classified documents after his presidency, seeing himself as an autocrat or dictator, vowing to prosecute political enemies, repeatedly lying about the condition of the country — those things undermine American democracy. And if you’re out to undermine American democracy — to tear down the constitutional government “for the people and by the people” that so many women and men have defended for more than 250 years — then you’re no patriot. And those who support him, who would give that man again the power of the presidency, have no business calling themselves patriotic, either.
MAGA: Most of you know better. It doesn’t have to be this way. You can let Trump go now. As Tom Nichols writes in The Atlantic, the November 5 election represents a moment of truth: The reelection of Donald Trump would mark the end of George Washington’s vision for the presidency—and the United States. Read on, a gift read from this Atlantic subscriber.