by Rich Nelson
“You’ve done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir?” Thus spoke counsel Joseph Welch, admonishing Senator Joe McCarthy during a 1954 congressional hearing, in reaction to McCarthy’s rabid and ruthless “hunt” for Communist sympathizers in the U.S. Government. “Our job as Americans and as Republicans is to dislodge the traitors from every place where they’ve been sent to do their traitorous work,” McCarthy said. Welch’s scolding of the demagogic tactics of that man in that era is just as applicable today in response to the current administration’s compromise of integrity, judgement, reason, and empathy. Dan Rather’s media company “News and Guts” evoked, “It’s come to the point that Donald Trump’s lying is the news. In a morning appearance on the White House lawn (June 15), it was a grandiose display of falsehood and pomposity the likes of which will only be exceeded by the next time Trump talks.”
During that meandering June 15th stroll with reporters, Trump fawned over North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un, calling him a “strong head” of his country, stating “He speaks and his people sit to attention. I want my people to do the same.” Even though the White House spin (mopping up, once again, after this impulsive president) suggested it was meant as a frivolous comment, the patterns established in the first 17 months of this administration preclude any dismissal of such outlandish utterances. In the aftermath of an embarrassing display by Trump at the G7 conference in Ottawa, he tweeted on his way to North Korea, rebuking Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as “weak” for his challenge to proposed tariffs.
Many in the cast of characters in Trump’s orbit should also be cited for their negligence of moral conviction, with Republican leaders in Congress complicit through their paralyzed silence. Attorney General Jeff Sessions cherry-picked Scripture to justify the administration’s zero-tolerance policy on immigration, arresting, then separating, families at the border, many of whom are seeking asylum from a sustained pattern of violence and persecution in their native countries. “I would cite you to the Apostle Paul and his clear and wise command in Romans 13 to obey the laws of the government because God has ordained them for His purposes,” Sessions said on June 15. This verse has a history – it was used to justify the continuance of slavery in the pre-Civil War years. This biblical tirade, both then and now, is abhorrent and antithetical to American principles.
Another swampish player on the Trump team, EPA administrator Scott Pruitt, is currently under 15 separate federal investigations into misdeeds, including blatant misuse of public funds (such as hiring a security team of 30 bodyguards), according to Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. More troubling, though, is that, underlying all the noise created by Trump and his sect, there are consequential policy decisions being made with potential dire results. A recent study by two Harvard social scientists concluded that an estimated 80,000 more Americans could die each decade if EPA reversals of clean air and water regulations are fully implemented. Attempts to delay energy efficiency standards, the allowance of new asbestos products into the market, and the rollback of clean car standards are but a sampling of the EPA’s assault on the environment and its citizens.
This is a taste of the Trump administration’s reckless and short-sighted efforts, autocratic in their presentation. In her new book Fascism: A Warning, former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright states that Trump has “shown an astonishing disregard for facts, libeled his predecessors, referred to mainstream journalists as ‘the enemy of the American people,’ touted mindlessly nationalistic economic and trade policies, vilified immigrants and the countries from which they come, and nurtured a paranoid bigotry toward the followers of one of the world’s foremost religions.”
Enough.
Contact Rich at richmskgn@gmail.com
