The past few weeks have been exciting for opponents of the Clinton
administration because new evidence suggests that administration
officials hid loads of e-mail related to a number of other
scandals
committed by various high officials in government.
Not only did the administration “allegedly” conspire to hide White
House e-mail related to Monica Lewinsky, Filegate, campaign finance
abuses and perhaps even Chinese espionage activities from House
investigators years ago, some of these buffoons “allegedly” threatened
people with jail if they discussed this “Project X”
with anyone, including their own bosses.
Yes, it sure seems as though “we’ve got ’em this time,” doesn’t it?
But wait a minute — today is “April Fool’s Day” and we have to remember
who we’re dealing with.
Bill and Hillary Clinton have managed, over the span of about eight
years, to construct in Washington one of the most powerful crime
syndicates ever assembled anywhere on the face of the planet. They’re
powerful not because they’re particularly strong per se but because they
control all of the judicial, legal and legislative apparatus that
normally would be hedges against such abuses of power. In doing so these
people have effectively neutered Republican “opposition” by collecting
raw FBI data on each member and on many former GOP administration
officials because, I’m guessing, they too are just about as guilty as
the Clinton administration of doing many of the things they have accused
this administration of doing.
So, knowing this in advance, why is it so many millions of us
now expect the wheels of justice to turn — because this latest
snafu over White House e-mail seems to be such an obvious violation of
the law? Well, so were Filegate, Commercegate, Travelgate, Chinagate,
and a host of other “gates.” As a matter of fact most of the same people
who have refused to act on behalf of the people who pay them (the
American people) are still in office controlling these levers of
power.
What has changed?
Not much, but we can still benefit from this new information — and a
deluge of other information that has come before and is sure to follow
— if we simply put the entire sordid history of U.S. politics in the
1990s into perspective:
- Knowing what we know and learning new things everyday will,
if nothing else, remind Americans of all political stripes what happens
when you don’t pay attention to the folks minding your store in
Washington, D.C. - Seeing a deluge of information about scandal and violations of
law stream out of the White House alone will help all of us realize that
presidents have inherited far too much power from an inattentive
Congress. - Learning about the depth and gravity of the numerous scandals of
this administration will also help us to discover that habitual
lawbreakers can become habitual lawbreakers only if they’re allowed to
get away with what they’ve done. - These scandals have shown all of us how much hypocrisy there
really is on both sides of the political aisle — Democrats for
remaining loyal to a criminal administration, Republicans for doing
little to nothing about it, and both parties for lecturing the
rest of us about the importance of laws and law enforcement in this
country. - Thanks to some very intrepid news services (this one included),
Americans were able to learn that both sides have committed many
of the same crimes they accuse each other of committing. - Americans have discovered that good politicians, public servants,
judges and federal employees — Republicans, Democrats, independents,
moderates and far (both left and right) wing believers — are far
outnumbered by weasels, scoundrels, liars, cheats, hypocrites, thieves,
and losers in all branches of government and in all agencies employed by
government. - Finally, Americans who are worried sick that this country is one
flush away from the septic tank of history have been given a huge
opportunity to change everything about everything because of the
evidence we’ve seen, heard, lived and breathed for a decade.
But will we have the guts to make the necessary changes? Will we
have the courage to stand united and demand an end to “politics as
usual”? Or will we simply log on to the Net, check our stocks, click on
the TV, watch the game, check out the latest pay-per-view, and keep our
heads buried for another four years?
Will we have the fortitude to “just say no” to the establishment
political parties or, at a minimum, to the establishment politicians
(and candidates), or will we trudge to the polls in November (those of
us who still bother to go) and pull the lever for “more of the same”?
If President Clinton’s charades, along with the GOP-controlled
Congress’ compliance, have taught us anything, it is this: Our political
system is broken and like all broken things it either needs to be fixed
or replaced in order to function properly again.
And because politics and politicians drive so much of our society,
our culture has been severely damaged as well by the abhorrent behavior
of a handful of political miscreants, deviants, and power-hungry
psychopaths. Though much of the work of reforming our society has to
come from each of us, clearly there is a need to reform the institution
— politics — that has so much influence over cultural issues.
This isn’t going to be easy and it will require that each of us make
conscious choices and decisions about what we will or will not permit
any longer. While it might be easier to ignore the cancer ravaging the
body politic, cancer eventually kills the body if left untreated.
Most importantly, there is a cure for this kind of cancer.
