On Tuesday, I told you about how I’d like to know which of the congressional Democrats really meant it when they said that Donald Trump is a menace to democracy, the rule of law and the constitutional order, and which of them said those words because they sounded real nice. 

I had the president in mind, too.

“Donald Trump and his maga Republicans [are] determined to destroy American democracy,” Joe Biden said late last year. He added: “Every generation of Americans has faced a moment when they’ve had to defend democracy. Stand up for our personal freedoms. Stand up for the right to vote and our civil rights. And this is our moment.”

But since the election, and until last weekend, Biden had been treating the president-elect as if he were any other winner of a presidential contest, including by honoring him with an invitation to the White House and joking with him in front of TV cameras once he got there. 

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Something changed, however, after Trump nominated a statutory rapist and sex trafficker for US attorney general (Florida Congressman Matt Gaetz has since withdrawn) and after he nominated last weekend a bootlicking toady by the name of Kash Patel as director of the FBI. 

Biden seems to have changed his mind about those norms. 

Not only did the president pardon on Monday his son, Hunter Biden, who had been subject to a yearslong prosecution, he is now reportedly considering an expanded list of pardons to include many, or even most, of the people who are literally on the maga enemies list.

I agree in part with the Monthly’s Bill Scher, who said: “In pardoning his son, Biden said, ‘In trying to break Hunter, they’ve tried to break me – and there’s no reason to believe it will stop here.’ Nor should we assume it would stop to spare anyone on the Trump and Patel enemies lists. They deserve the same protection from Biden that his son got.”

But I also agree with Marcy Wheeler. She said pardons might feel like the right thing to do in the face of Trump’s assault on the rule of law. They won’t stop the assault, though. They might even contribute to it.

Nothing Biden can do will eliminate the risk that Trump will keep doing what he has been doing for eight years. Someone or someones will be that target, and imagining we can make that risk go away, it’ll only lead people to look away again instead of giving the attention the focus that it has lacked. If we don’t find the solution to that problem, if we seek instead a quick fix, then it’ll get continually harder to defend rule of law as Trump stacks the courts and guts the guardrails at DOJ. You can’t pardon your way out of Trump’s attack on the rule of law. It’s going to take much harder work than that.

Indeed, Biden’s son’s pardon won’t stop his son’s persecution. House Oversight Chairman James Comer said he plans to continue investigating. Kash Patel, as head of the FBI, will find some other way. Trump’s new pick for AG, Pam Bondi, will also find some other way. The incentive to find all the ways will inevitably increase as the consequences of Trump’s insane economic policies become apparent. He will need a boogeyman to distract the press corps and public. 

As long as there’s a Donald Trump, there will be a Hunter Biden.

So Joe Biden should probably reconsider. Instead of protecting the likes of Barack Obama and Liz Cheney – political elites who have the means and power to defend themselves in a court of law if need be – he should focus on people who can’t or whom the justice system has failed. 

Massachusetts Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley asked him to pardon federal prisoners with “unjustified sentencing disparities,” the old and sick, death row inmates, and women punished for the crimes of their abusers. “Joe Biden should not stop at Hunter Biden,” she said.

He should also come clean.

He changed his mind about pardoning his son, because he changed his mind about the virtue of maintaining political norms. He was wrong to invite a fascist menace to the White House. He was wrong to joke around with a fascist menace in front of television cameras. He was wrong to give the impression that everything’s going to be fine. 

Everything is not going to be fine.

It’s here that some suggest that Biden should save democracy by throwing it away – by “annulling” the results of the election or otherwise doing to Trump what Trump tried doing to him. 

But Biden needn’t be lawless to set the tone for resistance to tyranny. 

First, he could say he really meant what he said – that Trump is going to try to destroy democracy and that he’s not going to help by being nice to him. Otherwise, he might exploit junctures along the transition process. He could order the CIA not to give intelligence briefings. He could tell the FBI to block his people from accessing anything until they complete congressionally mandated criminal background checks. 

The most powerful message might be rooted in norms, which is to say, Biden could say the most by breaking more of them. There’s no reason, for instance, why he should attend Trump’s inauguration next month. (Trump didn’t attend his and the Republicans never suffered for it.) He could also say that Trump shouldn’t bother with the oath of office. He didn’t mean it when he took it last time. He won’t mean it this time. It will be a lie that will be the basis for the fascist purge that’s coming.

 “When Biden and other Democrats stand on ceremony, they present the message that everything they said during the campaign was just talk. It was all hysterical political blather designed to raise money from people who believe gas prices are too high,” Stephen Robinson said.

Stephen is right. 

Either Biden meant it or didn’t.

He should come clean.