Senator Jeff Flake follows in the footsteps of his maverick Arizona colleague John McCain. He's never afraid to piss off Republican voters. The latest example, Flake on a book tour for his conscience of a conservative, an obvious play on former Arizona Senator Barry Goldwater's conscience of a conservative, has been ripping President Trump up and down. The book itself doesn't pull punches. Flake says that Trump was, quote, a candidate who entertained voters and offered oversimplified answers. In an op-ed for Politico, Flake wrote, quote, we created him and now

we're rationalizing him. When will it stop? That unnerving silence in the face of an erratic

executive branch is an abdication and those in positions of leadership bear particular responsibility.

So, has Flake earned the respect of Democrats for his willingness to

go it alone? Have Democrats cheered Flake's apparent intrepidity? Have they celebrated Flake for

speaking what they perceive to be hard truths about Trump? Of course not. They've ripped him up and

down for continuing to vote for conservative policy priorities. Here's the Twitter take, quote,

voting in line with the guy you criticize is literally the opposite of intellectual honesty, David Greenwald. Thanks for your op-ed, Jeff Flake. Now back it up with reality on the Senate floor, you're just too dishonest, too. Cat with Bat. Here's Alex Shepard in the New Republic. Quote, in this respect, conscience of a conservative may be the most clear-eyed and righteous takedown of Donald Trump from a Republican in office. But what the reader may not know about Jeff Flake, and which he certainly doesn't reveal in his short book, is that he has voted with Donald Trump 95% of the time, according to 538. This is the problem for the left. They don't expect intellectual honesty from Republicans. They expect submission. They want Republicans not merely to criticize obvious moral failings within the party or buck Trump on policy heresies.

They want Republicans to vote for Democratic priorities in order to fight Trump, which is pretty convenient since they'd like Republicans to vote for Democratic priorities anyway.

If Trump were to push single payer, would they applaud Republicans for voting it down?

This is one of the big reasons

Trump actually won in 2016. Republicans got tired of hearing that they must hold themselves to a higher

standard when any standard other than complete surrender to Democrats is insufficient to Democrats. Democrats could

cheer Ted Kennedy and praise him as the conscience of the Senate. Democrats could openly state that

Bill Clinton's myriad moral monstrosities were just fine and dandy so long as he protected the killing of the unborn, but Republicans

are expected to condemn the moral behavior and abandon their own principles. If not, they're

hypocrites. The predictable result, a Republican party that embraces the Democrats' logic.

This should be a lesson for conservatives. No matter how intellectually honest you are with regard to your own side, no matter what moral

standard you hold them to, you'll be castigated alongside those whose behavior you condemn

if you share political priorities.

That's not an excuse to toss morality out the window, but it's certainly a reminder that the

leftist priority here is not a more decent country, but a more leftist one.

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