Når den indre opposition er en del af problemet

Susan Collins is “extremely troubled” again. This time, it's over the revelation that Trump administration officials have been texting war plans to a reporter. This is merely the latest episode in her long-running performance of concern that stretches back to the earliest days of the Trump era.

[...]

What passes for Collins' conscience is merely an algorithm designed to calculate precisely how much verbal discomfort she must express to maintain her brand as a “moderate” while never risking the consequences of actual moderation. She has reduced ethical deliberation to a public relations strategy—a series of carefully calibrated statements that create the illusion of independence while preserving the reality of compliance.

The woman specializes in adopting the facial expressions and verbal intonations of ethical distress without accepting any of its obligations. She has perfected what might be called the politics of performative anxiety—appearing perpetually on the verge of principled action that somehow never materializes. Her brow remains permanently furrowed, her voice consistently troubled, while her voting record demonstrates all the moral complexity of a party-line calculator.

The Unbearable Lightness of Being Concerned
 

The Unbearable Lightness of Being Concerned

Susan Collins and the Theater of Moderate Dissent