Let’s exercise our imaginations together...
No one likes corruption in high office, right? And when that corruption goes international, involving huge amounts of foreign aid, it’s especially troubling. After all, the taxpayers have a right to know that the funds being sucked out of their pockets are being used for real, important, public needs. You know, like big, showy office buildings and bridges to nowhere with politicians’ names slathered all over them. So to have public funds used to bribe foreign officials is a real no-no!
So when you, a public-spirited American citizen, confront an unconcealed case of such corruption – specifically, a federal official threatening to withhold aid to a foreign government unless that official’s son is relieved of the threat of prosecution and incarceration – you know you have a mission. A mandate to act! And act you clearly must, for the federal official in question wasn’t just some deputy undersecretary of state; he was the vice-president of the United States. Worse, he’s in the running to become the president! The public must know about all this before the levers can be pulled!
But wait just a moleskin-gloved minute there, Colonel: it seems you have a personal interest in this matter. You stand to benefit from the exposure of this corrupt official. Observers could suspect that your motives are impure. Because you’re not just any public-spirited American citizen; you’re the president of the United States, and that corrupt federal official is odds-on to be your opponent come election time! What are you to do?
The evidence is out in the open. The corrupt official hasn’t troubled to deny what plainly took place. He can’t; the whole affair is a matter of public record. Instead, he’s dispatched his minions to deflect attention from his misdeeds to your personal interest in seeing him wrung out and hung out to dry. So what now?
What now indeed, Gentle Reader?
The blatant corruption, anti-Constitutional and anti-American actions of the Obamunist Administration have been exposed to us all. They appear pervasive, contaminating everything Obama or any of his associates touched – and now that he’s out of office, all of it is grist for his successor’s mill. President Trump has even more access to public records than do we, for no “need to know” designation is proof against the sitting president. However, he does stand to benefit from having his most likely opponent disgraced out of the race before ballots can be cast.
Doesn’t the president, by virtue of his position as America’s head of state, have an even greater responsibility to act against corrupt American officials than a private citizen? When the corruption crosses national borders, enfolding the entire federal government in its implications, doesn’t that raise it to the pinnacle of a president’s responsibilities? Were he to shirk that responsibility, wouldn’t he be derelict by implication? Does it matter even a little that there’s an election ahead in which he’ll stand to be returned for a second term?
Last year, during a Council on Foreign Relations event, Biden told the audience that he pressed President Petro Poroshenko to fire Shokin, including threatening to withdraw a $1 billion U.S. loan from Ukraine, which had been economically decimated due to its war with Russian forces since 2014.“I said, ‘You’re not getting the billion.’ I’m going to be leaving here in, I think it was about six hours. I looked at them and said: ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money,’ ” Biden said he told Poroshenko.
“Well, son of a b—-, he got fired. And they put in place someone who was solid at the time,” Biden added.
Biden has not troubled to deny any of that. But the Left is up in arms that President Trump should dare to urge the government of Ukraine to reopen its corruption investigation into Biden’s dealings in that nation.
What would be best for the country? What would be best for President Trump? Is there a conflict between them? I can’t see it; can you?
I do see a parallel here. Back in my day, as a mischievous teen, if I pulled a stunt that was out of bounds by the then current mores and then went about bragging to my friends how cool I was, the consequences were inevitable. My parents or other authority figures would indeed have dealt swift and severe punishment for my behavior and I would be embarrassed in front of my peers.
ReplyDeleteToday, in the political arena, we have the perpetrator's cheerleaders put out front to obfuscate, deflect and protect for him, totally ignoring the facts involved. Furthermore, the media promotes a narrative blaming the truth seekers as to their endeavor to get to the bottom of the illegal actions. My how times have changed. Furthermore, the American public sees this m.o. on a regular basis to increasingly numb their God given consciences.
I'm shocked, shocked, that politicians are corrupt. Like that never happened before.
ReplyDeleteCome on folks. Isn't the whole point of getting into public office, to be corrupt? How does everybody but Ron Paul leave Congress vastly more rich than when they first got in? We are talking about government here. A river of money flows toward Washington DC. Pretty much all of it ends up flushed down the shitter, eventually. What would be amazing, would be seeing some of it used for good.
I don't actually care about the corruption; instead, I expect it. There are a lot worse things that can be done with the loot they steal from us.
"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good, will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience." -- C.S. Lewis
Of course, that's not to say that Trump shouldn't make some hay with it. All part of the mud-wrestling political game. I question the wisdom of taking out Biden though.