just but not funny

next step in Santos charade

It was another quiet morning along the Creek. As I told someone a couple of hours ago, I now appreciate so much that I long took for granted. I do not take these morning views as a given as life is so fragile.

The bipartisan (yes, we actually retain a couple of committees in Congress with that disappearing but invaluable characteristic) House Ethics Committee initiated a resolution to expel a sitting Congressman, George Santos (I think that is his name), the New York Republican. It’s tempting to giggle about the embarrassing report issued yesterday because of egregious (and salatious) criminal actions found but we are foolish to do so.

I sat in the House chamber as a wet behind the ears committee staffer in 1979 when his colleagues censured Detroit Democrat Charlie Diggs for taking kickbacks from his staff’s pay. Everyone in town had known it was coming for weeks and snaring a seat was a huge deal. The House of Representatives last censured—officially reprimanded—a member 56 years earlier.

I was sick to my stomach as I realised that someone who swore to uphold the Constitution against all threat foreign and domestic took kickbacks from staffers my age who had relatives and friends in his district. These people in Detroit were the only reason Diggs got to Congress yet he was screwing them over. I wasn’t surprised but I was sad. Yet I also saw a rule of law (he had been convicted by the Justice Department) system working along with House of Representatives’ response.

Was Diggs treated differently because he was African American? Later that year caucasian Pennsylvania Democrat Daniel Flood faced similar official reprimand for bribery; a handful of cases from both parties followed.

Santos, like every single other accused person in the country, will have a day in court. Senator Robert Memendez, also under indictment, will face a public trial and likely, if convicted, peer Senate rebuke for questions of ethical lapses and illegality. In Santos’ case, he has yet to face the jurors but his numerous lapses in judgment were so deep as to be laughable embarrassing for a body overflowing with bizarre behaviour these days, whether in hearings, in hallways, or in movie theaters off duty.

Every single time someone besmirches our institutions we all pay the price. All of us because the actions breed cynicism, igniting some perverse herd mentality that seems to encourage others to do similarly ridiculous things with all of these individual lapses leaving us weaker. Yes, of course, we all can cite cases where someone ‘gets away’ with crime and misdeeds, strengthening the cynicism and opening the door to more poor judgment. But calling it out can also make each of us take a stronger role in vetting our candidates. If we do not, then actions like spending campaign money on botox and lying about campaign loans will become murdering opponents or jailing them en masse for walking on the left side of the street.

None of us is perfect. None. Those who go into public service sacrifice privacy by making a choice engendering greater scrutiny. There is nothing targetted at Santos or Menendez or anyone else; it’s a choice with consequences. They knew the rules when they pursued their campaigns.

But this is why it is imperative that every single elected official recognise that rules do pertain to each of them, not to each of the rest of in their chamber. Those rules are within the bodies where they serve and across our society where the rest of us must obey those same rules. We empower these 535 in Congress to make many many laws affecting each of us so I would prefer someone without a multitude of ethical lapses higher than you average Bernie Madoff.

Most depressing, of course, is that we the public see this occur so often. And our response is to shake our heads, say they all do it, then go on. peers of the unethical today seem to retreat behind denial, hoping the guilty person will ‘do the right thing’. Since he or she didn’t to start with, why is that a sensible reaction we tolerate out of our elected officials? We and those we elect are responsible for the declining perception of the institutions of Capitol Hill.

We continue acting as if Washington were made up of people from other universes. The House and the Senate, along with the courts, the White House, the entire Executive branch, and the military are all folks just like us. This is representational democracy, folks. Each person working for us engages in human activities: raising children, paying a mortgage, participating in organised activities of some sort whether religious or civic, and making ethical decisions every single day—every…single….day.

George Santos’ behaviour already undermined a body on life support these days. The last thing we need is another mess. May he continue to abide by his decision not to seek re-election.

But can we all learn to be more scrupulous in exercising our individual due diligence by examining those we vote into office? In the end the people of his Long Island district didn’t do much to consider what were pretty fabulous (in a fable kind of way) details.

We get what we vote in. If we voted for more ethical, committed folks instead of reality television or radically anti everything characters, I am convinced our respect for the body and it work would grow back as would the body’s ability to function and, most importantly, govern successfully. Otherwise, we just keep mucking around as we sink further.

Thank you for reading today’s column. I welcome any and all thoughts on this or anything else.

I wish you a restful weekend, plowing through the masses at the grocery stores this weekend. Be well and be safe. FIN