Former Vice-President Dan Quayle, a much-maligned figure for misspelling potato, evidently had no trouble spelling democracy nor telling Mike Pence how to spell it.
According to Bob Woodward and Robert Costa's forthcoming book Peril, Pence was under pressure from Trump not to certify the 2020 election. His fellow Hoosier was having none of Trump's nonsense:
Pence reportedly asked Quayle a number of times if there was anything he could do, but the former vice president told him to “forget it.”
“Mike, you have no flexibility on this. None. Zero. Forget it. Put it away,” Quayle told Pence, according to the authors.
“You don't know the position I'm in,” Pence reportedly said, again asking Quayle if he had any options.
“I do know the position you're in,” responded Quayle, who was vice president to the last incumbent president to lose an election. “I also know what the law is. You listen to the parliamentarian. That's all you do. You have no power.”
What is frightening here is that it is clear that Pence was considering going along with Trump. No wonder Quayle told him, "Forget it. Put it away."
The truth is we were lucky this time. Because there might be a Republican Vice-President down the road like Josh Hawley or Ted Cruz who would have no qualms about not certifying an election for a Democratic President.
Nevertheless we must be grateful for Quayle's intervention because we would be in an awful place had he remained silent and didn't spell out democracy for Pence.
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