Where Is Honor to Be Found?
By • August 16, 2023 0 1284
The founders of our great nation knew our Constitutional Republic could only survive if our citizens were honorable. But now we search in vain for traces of character in our body politic and the sinews of our democratic institutions.
Our three branches of government are smelling foul. And we are losing our “eternal vigilance.”
There was a day when a president facing impeachment had sufficient honor to resign rather than imperil the nation with a Senate trial. When a mendacious U.S. senator could be lastingly rebuked with simple words: “Have you no sense of decency, at long last?” When a Supreme Court justice, wounded on the battlefields of the Civil War, could serve valorously on the high court for decades without blemish.
Today, in our nation’s capital, a new cast of charlatans arrives each election cycle determined to fleece their way to fortune, to sow discord for their own ends, and pander with their ignorance.
The rot goes far deeper than our previous president’s mounting list of criminal charges – 91 at last count. The U.S. military is hampered by one U.S. senator’s hold on advancements in rank and the U.S. Marine Corps has no Commandant for the first time in its history. This senator, Tommy Tuberville (R) of Alabama, skipped military service during the Vietnam War, yet defends his patriotism by lying about his father’s military exploits during the Second World War. Now we learn he secretly lives in Florida.
But corruption is also found to the left. Even vaunted progressive Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), refuses to vote to ban lucrative stock purchases by members of Congress. And political fundraising for all members has essentially devolved into legalized graft.
On the Supreme Court, conflicts of interest abound. The most contemptuous cases, of course, arise from justices Alito and Thomas. Accepting millions of dollars in exclusive Alaskan fishing vacations from billionaires with interests before the court, Alito doesn’t blush; he pens a Wall Street Journal editorial to say Congress has no power to regulate the court’s ethics.
Justice Thomas meanwhile has been exposed by ProPublica for accepting a Christmas list of gifts: 38 destination vacations, 26 private jet flights, 12 VIP passes to sporting events, 8 helicopter flights, 2 luxury resort vacations, one standing invitation to an exclusive, members-only golf club… and a partridge in a pear tree.
“I prefer the Walmart parking lots to the beaches and things like that,” Thomas bragged. “There’s something normal to me about it… I come from regular stock.” Note: Thomas drives around the country in a luxury quarter-million-dollar RV, questionably funded by a benefactor.
Even liberal justices Sotomayor and Kagan have profited from increased book sales through reciprocal arrangements with universities, according to Forbes magazine.
Let us return to honoring our Constitutional norms.
