Playing It Straight

After FBI Director Comey’s remarkable statement today that he is still not going to recommend charges against Hillary Clinton after re-opening his investigation into the Clinton email scandal, I have to ask the question:

Can anyone play it straight?

With the election right around the corner, I am holding to my view that this is not about Democrat vs. Republican but rather Insider vs. Outsider, and that is what the Deplorables are mainly rebelling against. The past 8 years have given us a government that imposes rules, regulations and material changes to our society without our consent and in an opaque fashion, and that the independent safeguards of democracy have eroded.   Worse, the Insiders have taken Chicago style politics—that is using  the mechanisms of government to reward friends and punish political foes, scaled it, and have gone international with it.   This is what we mean when we say we want our country back.  We want it in the hands of people that will play it straight, and be straight with us.

In my last post, I decried the imposition of societal changes without any consent of the governed whatsoever.  Gay marriage was opposed by the electorate in California.  No matter.  They are going to have it anyway.  Dozens of governers  rejected the settlement of  unvettable Middle East immigrants in their territories.  No matter.  The federal government is going to make those states take them, regardless of what the people or their elected leaders think.  The majority of the US wants the Keystone Pipeline and the studies showed that it was the most environmentally responsible thing to do.  No matter.  Obama killed it.

In addition to taking away choices of the governed, we have now seen that the watchdogs and pillars of our democracy have been co-opted and tainted.  We have learned that the I.R.S. was used to punish political enemies.  We learned that Donna Brazile, in her role at CNN, was feeding Hillary Clinton debate questions ahead of time.  And we learned that New York Times reporters were sending quotes to the Clinton campaign before publishing them.   We also learned of the highly inappropriate meeting between Attorney General Loretta Lynch and former President Bill Clinton while Hillary Clinton was being investigated.  The Department of Justice, the F.B.I., and the news media should be impartial protectors of the system but they are not.  The Wikileaks releases and the events during this ugly campaign season have left voters distrustful of these institutions.

Much has occurred on the Democratic side, but not exclusively and that is why, in part, Trump’s appeal has been so sustainable.  And this is why Chris Christie needs to be banished from the Republican party.  At first, I liked Christie.  Through his straight talking, blunt style, although a bit boorish, he was able to say things others were not able to say and take on sacred cows like the teachers’ unions.  But he wore thin with me during the Republican debates when he needlessly and gratuitously destroyed Marco Rubio during the debates.  But not we find that Christie’s staff was doing EXACTLY what Insiders do---they used the mechanisms of government to punish political enemies, then covered it up.  This is precisely the kind of behavior people are rebelling against. 

If Trump somehow pulls this out (and I now think his odds are quite slim), he needs to  exile Christie and others of his ilk.  The voters are not supporting Trump just to put another set of corrupt politicians in charge. 

No matter what party affiliation, we desperately need people that will play it straight.