President Trump repeatedlypressuredher to engage in illegal behavior — to sidestep the rule of law. That should be disqualifying conduct for any president. But it won’t have any discernible impact on Trump. He won’t lose any votes because of it. It won’t even make many headlines. Instead, it remains buried within a bigger story about the resignation of a cabinet secretary who was effectively imprisoning children after tearing them away from their parents at the border.
Worse still, that’s a comparatively minor scandal these days. Trump has almost certainly committed federal crimes by directing alleged hush-money payments and reimbursing them while in office. There is strong evidence he engaged incriminal tax fraudfor decades. Heattackedhurricane victims like a social media bully while an estimated 3,000 of them died on his watch. And his entourage is defined by criminal or corrupt conduct, including close associates who are now in jail and family members who should be allowed into the White House only on a visitor pass.
The United States has reached scandal overload, a political tipping-point when the news is so overloaded with corrupt or criminal behavior that it has already become the new normal. We’ve started to tune it out. Another indictment? Another abuse of office for private gain? Welcome to your average Tuesday in the Trumpiverse.
scandals are a barometer for democracy. In particular, there are two key metrics: how often they occur and whether they produce serious consequences.
North Koreans don’t hear about the murderous abuses of their glorious leader because there’s nobody willing to blow the whistle, to tell the truth, to override state media. The scandals never see the light of day. They are buried. And even if a scandal did emerge, the ruling regime enjoys complete impunity. Totalitarianism is defined by a lack of both scandals and consequences.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opin...-democracy-survive-it/?utm_term=.6b8236142442
Worse still, that’s a comparatively minor scandal these days. Trump has almost certainly committed federal crimes by directing alleged hush-money payments and reimbursing them while in office. There is strong evidence he engaged incriminal tax fraudfor decades. Heattackedhurricane victims like a social media bully while an estimated 3,000 of them died on his watch. And his entourage is defined by criminal or corrupt conduct, including close associates who are now in jail and family members who should be allowed into the White House only on a visitor pass.
The United States has reached scandal overload, a political tipping-point when the news is so overloaded with corrupt or criminal behavior that it has already become the new normal. We’ve started to tune it out. Another indictment? Another abuse of office for private gain? Welcome to your average Tuesday in the Trumpiverse.
scandals are a barometer for democracy. In particular, there are two key metrics: how often they occur and whether they produce serious consequences.
North Koreans don’t hear about the murderous abuses of their glorious leader because there’s nobody willing to blow the whistle, to tell the truth, to override state media. The scandals never see the light of day. They are buried. And even if a scandal did emerge, the ruling regime enjoys complete impunity. Totalitarianism is defined by a lack of both scandals and consequences.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opin...-democracy-survive-it/?utm_term=.6b8236142442
