Marjorie Taylor Greene vows to play nice. Snow predicted in hell.
Marjorie Taylor Greene has apparently grown tired of being a punchline.
Perhaps she’s realized being a mean, bullying troll has no real future, especially if President Donald Trump implodes.
Possibly it dawned on her that seriously reckoning with the nations’ concerns is what matters.
Or maybe we’re just getting “Punk’d.” Is Ashton Kutcher and his camera crew hiding around the corner?
For weeks, Greene has espoused a surprising side to her political approach, so much so that AJC political columnist colleague Patricia Murphy last month wrote a column headlined: “I was wrong about Marjorie Taylor Greene.”
At first, I worried my colleague had struck her head on a low-hanging branch while riding her horse. But, no, she spelled out an argument that Greene had broken with the president on such matters as Obamacare subsidies and releasing the Epstein files.
Murphy noted that Greene was a GOP rarity — someone speaking truth to Trump’s power. In doing so, that would be a politically courageous act at a time when most Republican politicians have become the president’s simpering toadies.
Trump is unaccustomed to GOP pushback, so he has called Greene out as a “ranting Lunatic,” as “Wacky Marjorie,” as a “disgrace” and “Marjorie Taylor Brown (Green grass turns Brown when it begins to ROT!).”
He even branded her a “traitor,” which she complained has threatened her safety because there are all sorts of radicalized nuts out there — an environment she has fostered.
Greene, who has been trying to rebrand, has appeared on shows like “Real Time With Bill Maher” and even “The View” for crying out loud.
Over the weekend she appeared on CNN, saying she wanted to end “the toxic fighting in politics” that has “divided our country and split up friends and neighbors.”
CNN host Dana Bash noted Greene has been mum when Trump attacked others, adding, “I haven’t heard you speak up about it until it was directed at you.”
“Dana, I think that’s fair criticism,” Greene responded after a long pause. “And I would like to say humbly, I am sorry for taking part in the toxic politics. It’s very bad for our country.”
“And I’m only responding for myself with my own words and actions,” she added. “I’m committed and have been working on this a lot lately to put down the knives in politics. I really want to see people be kind to each other. We need to figure out a new way forward.”
So, do we have a modern-day Road to Damascus, with Greene playing the role of Saul (turned Paul), a real crumbum who was stricken by a divine light and turned his life around.
I can almost hear a booming voice from above: “Marjorie, Marjorie! What hath you wrought?”
Since the Congresswoman is vowing to be nicer, I suppose that I, too, should be more cordial in my analysis. That is, of course, until she reverts to old form.
The over/under, I’d wager: two months.
I called Dr. John Cowan, a neurosurgeon from Rome who ran unsuccessfully against Greene in the 2020 GOP primary and is considering another run. I asked about the Road to Damascus and I could almost hear his eyes roll over the phone.
“I don’t think I remember Paul booking time on CNN to publicize his concerns; he did it with his deeds,” Cowan said. “This seems more like ‘I haven’t gotten attention lately.’ Although I fully admit the Lord works in mysterious ways.”
Cowan, an evangelical Christian, added, “I pray and hope she has seen the light. But she has left a heap of destruction in her path. God values humility. I haven’t seen a lot of that.”
“If you’re truly repentant, then you’d empty your campaign funds and resign from your job,” he added. “The whole way you got to where you are is through manipulation and toxic garbage.”
In a Facebook post over the weekend, he wrote, “Today, spectacle often beats skill. Volume beats competence. Drama beats maintenance. And we — the paying customers — seem oddly willing to reward it.”
Seeing Greene’s mea culpa tour, I thought of former state Rep. Wes Cantrell. The conservative Republican once brought to the Capitol Pastor Andy Stanley, who then proceeded to scold his captive legislative audience about their divisive ways.
The good reverend said those who use fear to “demonize” opponents “are terrible leaders” who need to get back to the “messy middle” where problems get solved.
Cantrell, a Baptist preacher from Woodstock, said he bashed some Dems on Twitter back when he was in the game. But he later felt sorry about it and apologized to them.
Perhaps he was not cut out for this sometimes unholy business.
Cantrell experienced the 2020 post-election kookiness and nastiness and left the state House.
“It just keeps getting worse,” he said. “I keep wondering if we can ever go back or if we’ve crossed a Rubicon.”
The game has changed deeply from when Cantrell came to the House in 2015.
“Trump ran as one of the nastiest, immature, childlike candidates on record,” Cantrell told me. “If my kids’ basketball coach talked like that, my kids wouldn’t play. But he won.”
And that’s what pols remember.
So what about Marjorie and her contrition?
Cantrell, ever the man of faith, wants to hope for the best.
“She could be believing it for the moment,” he said. “I don’t think we’ll know for three to six months whether she means it.”
About the Author
Bill Torpy, who writes about metro Atlanta for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, joined the newspaper in 1990.
