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The only way the administration of ‘President’ Trump could be seen as a positive thing, would be if its ethical madness causes subsequent generations to be determined never to allow it to happen again. The Teapot Dome Scandal, the Harding Administration, and Watergate itself now look almost quaint compared to what is playing out before our eyes.
As usual, Eugene Robinson chronicles our times for those coming generations, and this quotation within his piece is the only way to come close to describing what is happening as we speak.
“I spent years as a foreign correspondent in Latin America. To say we are being governed like a banana republic is an insult to banana republics. It’s that bad, and no one should pretend otherwise.”
Opinion | Never have we seen such chaos and corruption https://t.co/5yxqK3J4J4
— Eugene Robinson (@Eugene_Robinson) March 2, 2018
Off topic, but since this is Terry’s post I just wanted to drop a note to say it was good to meet you in person at the Chelmsford caucus the other night.
It is amazing in retrospect how close we were teetering towards this total collapse in ethical standards.
And since the GOP majority shows few signs of controlling Trump on this front, I keep coming back to the same conclusion: GOP delenda est.
The thing that really concerns me is not so much the ‘here and now’, As bad as that is, it is not what people who work in the area of transparency will worry about in terms of how profoundly difficult it is to root out corruptive practices and expectations once they take root.
It’s not like a switch that one simply flips on and off. Once a society develops the habit of corruption, the effects of that go well beyond the immediate corruptive act. For example, in countries with low corruption, there is the belief that if I don’t win today, or if I don’t receive a particular benefit today, or if I don’t receive a certain permit today, my valid appeal may result in vindication. The result of this is that people permit the system to work over periods of time.
In societies with high corruption, people correctly believe that they need to grab what they can today. Once that believe sets in, it is like poison ivy – not easily removed.
The destruction of civilization is the greatest threat to human existence today. A civil discourse is virtually disappearing before our eyes. Political and economic corruption is only the most obvious manifestation of this downward spiral.
Also too, you said banana.