Yoram Hazony, President of the Herzl Institute, a citizen of both the United States and Israel, currently makes his home in Jerusalem. He is a brilliant scholar, the author of several books, including The Philosophy of Hebrew Scripture, The Virtue of Nationalism and God and Politics in Esther. He recently wrote a MUST READ essay, "The Challenge of Marxism," which I will write about another time. For now, watch the following fascinating interview and note especially what Hazony says about "the only way to avoid civil war." I will produce the text of his statement below.
(The bolding below is mine)
10:45 mark: I am sure that we have never seen in our lifetimes this degree of hatred. That's not to say there wasn't hatred. I remember when Ronald Reagan was president people hated him, and when the Bushes were president, people hated them. And they certainly talked as though they were fascists and monsters, and all the rest, but what's changed, I think what's clearly changed, is the next step which is the willingness to withdraw legitimacy from a Republican president. That's something that we have never seen before.
Even though people hated Reagan, they still understood that he was a legitimate president, meaning that there's a deal between the Democratic Party and the Republican party, and that deal is, instead of shooting each other in the streets, the way we decide who is going to get to rule is in periodic elections. And when I win, you grant me legitimacy, meaning you support my ruling. You are going to be the loyal opposition. And when you win, I do the same for you. That's the basic rule in democracy which prevents constant civil war. And it seems to me that with the resistance, with the concept of trying to at all costs remove the elected president and not recognize his legitimacy.. .
On social media I see people putting "president" in quotation marks, like "'President' Donald Trump" in quotation marks, as though he is not the actual president. People don't seem to understand that this constant delegitimization, first of Donald Trump, but then also of everybody who works with him, and then after that, of everybody who votes for him. That constant delegitimization simply is the road to civil war. And if you don't want civil war, then you've got to back away from that and be willing to grant the legitimacy of the other guy when he wins the election.