One Worried and One Content: World Power Pillars in Sync With One Goal and Aim

New MAGA vs. Old USSR: Bring America to her knees

(Who and what is driving the agenda)

From Slate via MSN with this article headline [some of my notes herein]:

“This Is the Saturday Night Massacre. It’s Just Happening in Slow Motion.”

With the firing of Attorney General Jeff Sessions, America is in [new] uncharted territory. The last time a president made a personnel change to undermine an investigation of his associates, Congress forced him to resign. That was when President Richard Nixon pushed out his attorney general and deputy attorney general so he could fire the special prosecutor. 

President Trump has launched a piecemeal Saturday Night Massacre of his own. He first fired FBI Director James Comey last year for his handling of the Russia probe, then he fired the Jeff Sessions the AG for failing to protect him from the Russia probe. His intent to undermine an investigation of his campaign has been clear throughout — he barely tries to hide it — but the difference this time is that he has acted with impunity. What comes next could be anything.

Uncharted territory is the last place a conscientious government official wants to be and the first place an unscrupulous one wants to go. Forty-five years ago, the leaders of the Department of Justice found themselves in similar uncharted terrain. An unscrupulous president was attempting to abuse his authority to undermine a special counsel investigation of individuals associated with his campaign for reelection.

S/C Archibald Cox had demanded President Richard Nixon’s tapes of White House deliberations. Nixon responded by negotiating a compromise with AG Elliott Richardson that would have allowed him to withhold the tapes, summarize the contents of some of them, and let a third party verify his summary. 

Cox rejected the compromise, so Nixon ordered Richardson to fire him. 

Had Richardson been unscrupulous, he could have asked the DOJ’s OLC for an outcome-driven opinion justifying the politically motivated personnel change.

At that time, a LBJ-era EO on ethics was still on the books. Its first section declared: “Where government is based on the consent of the governed, every citizen is entitled to have complete confidence in the integrity of his government. Each individual officer, employee, or adviser of government must help to earn and must honor that trust by his own integrity and conduct in all official actions.” 

Few could dispute the virtue of this executive order, but ideas about its real-world application may have varied.

The executive order did not say that each officer, employee, or adviser should blindly comply with a corrupt presidential order [much of what we see now].

Instead, its ethical mandate reflected the constitutional structure of a government that places the rule of law above the president. The current framework for ethics in the executive branch similarly demands loyalty to the Constitution, laws, and a set of 14 ethical principles rather than slavish obedience to the president’s every whim.

Richardson recognized that he could not both fulfill his ethical mandate and comply with Nixon’s order. Instead, he resigned in protest. His deputy, William Ruckelshaus, also ended his tenure at the DOJ by refusing to carry out the order that would ultimately end the Nixon presidency. 

What prevailed that day was an abiding loyalty to something bigger than a president.

Now, we again find ourselves charting new territory. The argument that Comey’s firing might not be a catastrophe for democracy was that we now had Robert Mueller in the role of special counsel.

The argument that Sessions’ firing might not be a catastrophe for democracy is that Mueller’s investigation may yet overcome any obstacles and reach its natural conclusion. Maybe, maybe not. But whatever the outcome of Mueller’s investigation, America is establishing new precedents: 

One precedent is that President Trump fired the FBI director — and Congress did nothing. 

A second precedent is that Trump admitted the FBI’s investigation of his campaign motivated the firing — and again Congress did nothing.

A third precedent is that Trump fired the AG after having railed against him publicly for refusing to intervene in the investigation — and again Congress has done nothing.

A fourth precedent is that Trump circumvented the DOJ’s order of succession so he could replace the AG with an individual who has directed partisan attacks at the special counsel, has described publicly how a new attorney general could undermine the investigation, has had a personal and political relationship with an individual involved in the investigation, and has been associated with a company that is the focus of a separate FBI investigation – that is Matt Whitaker now interim or acting AG.

We’ll see what a new Congress does about that when it is sworn in this January, but options may be limited unless the Senate’s leadership has a change of heart.

Summary of the article:

Even if the appointment of Whitaker were to be invalidated, Trump would still be guilty of having fired the nation’s top two law enforcement officials in an effort to obstruct the investigation of his campaign.

If members of Congress or the American people fail to act, these precedents will become the guideposts for future presidents who follow the path President Trump is blazing.

A new tenet of American democracy will become that a president is permitted to evade investigation by firing the heads of agencies that investigate the president’s close associates, even when the investigation is the reason for the firings. This cannot stand.

Putting a president above the rule of law is a threat to democracy.

That my friends is a worried look

(And rightly so)

Related story here (The Daily Beast) on Trump tactics to date get rid of Mueller and more of what may be coming – stay tuned in the regard.

My 2 cents: This all would set us up to have tyrant or dictator in the Oval Office with heavily armed supporters who believe every word he says just like Trump does now that which that heavily-armed base who believes that the 2^nd Amendment is only law that applies to and for them, and who stand ready to launch Civil War II – believe it. 

Two Notes: The entire article is here (from Slate via MSN) w/o my inserts or editing and such designed to fit the blog. It is truly worth reading. 

Also, here is more on the author, Walter Shaub here (NY TIMES). 

Thanks to him for his honorable government service and this fine article – a keeper for sure. 

As always, thank you for stopping by.