The Fourth Quarter is here
Some time in 1973 I finished my last college class for the day and went to the bar. Not that it was that bad of a day and a beer sounded good, but the Senate Watergate Hearings were on TV and I knew the bar would have it on. The place was only a few blocks from two campuses, only public and one private, and a favorite hangout for college students, ex-college students and any workingman or woman with time on their hands.
I didn't go there and catch all 250 hours of hearings. My mind was already made up. Nixon's actions in Vietnam, Cambodia and the killings at Kent State in Ohio were the prime motivators for my distaste of him. He was a crook surrounded by shady characters, mainly CIA trench-coat wearers, suits where an ethics book never found a pocket, and so called professed soldier-of-fortune types. They could con the unknowing Cuban with talk of getting back at Castro and lure them in further by fanning some cash before them.
To see and listen to the hearings didn't destroy my faith in politics. Though it wasn't hard to feel the stink, I was glad that justice seemed to be working. That feeling was reinforced by the characters on the committee. All seemed to take their responsibility serious and reciting principles on which the country was founded didn't cause them to mumble or deflect to an unrelated rejoinder. Norms and decorum were at work.
An attraction to me was 77-year-old Sam J. Ervin Jr., U.S. Senator from North Carolina and decorated World War I veteran. He was everyone's vision of a wise grandfather guarding against intrusions that challenged what he loved and cherished calling himself, despite the blue-blood education, "just an ol' country lawyer.”
With his folksy dignity came sadness. "How could this be happening?" I'm sure he asked himself more than once. But he and another committee member Herman El. Talmadge, senator from Georgia, were Southern Democrats, supporters of racial segregation and Jim Crow laws. Ervin didn't ask that wondering question concerning those beliefs. That Richard Nixon was a Republican probably helped them maintain a balance of perspectives in judging those who came before the committee. That and the faith in the bible.
Ervin said during the hearing that Watergate, "defies the laws of man and the laws of God." Later he called it the "greatest of tragedies," adding, that even in the Civil War there were "redeeming features on both sides, a spirit of sacrifice and heroism displayed on both sides. I see no redeeming features in Watergate." Ervin never delivered such spiritual pronouncements of condemnation concerning his belief in the separation of races.
Watching the Academy Award winning film "All the President's Men" got me thinking about the Watergate Hearings. The film was more about journalism rather than a righteous exposure of crooked politics. Still, the efforts of The Washington Post, coupled with the Senate Watergate Hearings, did bring down a president.
Despite the iniquity of Nixon's actions the national tribulations associated with the Watergate scandal could be called waggish in comparison to the gangsterism of Donald Trump. I have little expectations to be sitting at a bar 52 years after the Watergate Hearings watching the Trump Overturning the 2020 Election Hearings, or the Trump National Security Documents Hearings or the Trump Racketeering in Georgia Hearings. The hope I had to toast some senator publicly exposing the degeneracy of Trump or one of his camp followers evaporated when the Mueller Report drifted onto a dusty shelve along with the media's lament as right-wing miasma descended upon Washington.
Confounding most Americans not enamored with Trump's cruel sovereignty is Musk's takeover of the federal government, leading to massive firings, the elimination of nonprofits, the demise of the Department of Education, and the deportation of people without due process. The destruction is wide, purposely deep wanting to erase any vestige of Biden, Obama and FDR actions, and make adherence to The Constitution suspect. Calling it a conservative revolution makes a mockery of distinguished thinkers like William Buckley and Russell Kirk. Musk and Trump lead a nihilistic libertarian revolt where White Nationalism is the consort.
To those airing grievances against this wretched upending of moral values the simple question is: Doesn't illegal mean illegal? Most people understand what that means. Most people expect authorities to act if illegality is determined. Most people understand that punishment could be involved. But in America little of that exists when it comes to Musk and Trump. Political morality, its core values and expectations having historically come from the principles of justice, compete with an overflow of propagandistic sewage spouted by a retinue of miscreants.
To repulse the vandals housed throughout the federal government, Americans are left with the courts. But the rule of law doesn't generate revenue to keep the courts functioning and independent, and courts have no army or police force to enforce their rulings or keep them separate from those that dispute their conclusions. Judges can issue ruling after ruling and it will be money that keeps the appeals going and a likely majority Supreme Court that give Trump the shade to escape accountability. Many philosophers and scholars have determined that accountability is the bedrock of morality. Trump's escape from it proves his lack of moral grounding.
Americans understand that fundamental unfairness becomes analogous when declaring that a president cannot be indicted for wrongdoing while in office. For many the learning pattern for accepting such a connection has been through their dealings with the police.
Saying institutions failed in bringing Trump to answer for his various crimes is stating the obvious. Asking whether we're in a "constitutional crisis" plays rhetorical gymnastics, a distraction that protects the status quo. Institutions only function rightly by those who run it, and those in the legal profession, Republicans in Congress, and leaders in higher education who claim that ethics mandate application of the law have abandoned their allegiance to their profession and citizens they claim to represent.
Yet, institutions, where their applications complement the desires of citizens, have been failing for years, evident by how the wishes of governed — be it health care, housing, education, childcare, economic inequity and other policies that benefit the majority of working people — endure only incremental change if any at all. Thus most institutions, especially the elected representative houses and political parties, suffered under the moniker of being status quo. In a somewhat weird dichotomy anger against the status quo bought Trump to the forefront and later became an anchor for Democrats under that auspices of "defending democracy," a defining reason for their defeat against Trump.
Anger against the status quo is now even more pronounced. No distinction of a political party is made at town halls or in front of Tesla dealerships. Polls show a distinct lack of approval for the Republican leadership and the push for change has not transferred to faith in the Democratic Party. Telling of people's anger toward the established public policies and private management is that approximately $700,000 has been raised for legal defense for Luigi Mangione, the person allegedly responsible for killing a health company CEO.
Money now rules the institutions of America, at least those that haven't been totally destroyed by Musk-Trump. Musk's billions, along those of Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg, control the ethos of Republican office holders and can muzzle legal firms and higher education dictates. Nothing points to danger of allowing one man to accumulate great wealth without any restraint on how it is spent in influencing others as Musk. Together with Trump, they have turned America only toward capital, not free speech and free association, as the lodestar for a few wealthy white men.
Whether the courts hold in the face of the avalanche of Musk's money is a debatable question. Trump will continue the test the courts until he eventually ignores rulings he doesn't like. Already being banner about is the actions of the military, other law enforcement personnel and public service workers to save the constitutional order. How will military men and women, having given oath to the Constitution, react to the commander-and-chief order to attack fellow citizens, to land in Panama, Greenland or mass on the border with Canada?
Nothing is out of bounds for Trump and little should be excluded in saving America from him, Musk and the obscenity of holding great wealth.