In the Trump Cabinet Room, a Failure of Spine and Moral Conviction

Attorney General Jeff Sessions, at Tuesday afternoon’s Senate Intelligence Committee hearing, might have emerged only slightly seared had he not on many occasions invoked a heretofore-unheard of version of after-the-fact executive privilege, demurring to an alleged Justice Department policy that appears to have sprung from the Attorney General’s forehead. Whether Mr. Sessions will be vindicated in his defense of such a policy—a policy that suggests that Presidential privilege can be claimed by a surrogate even in the absence the President’s claiming it—remains a question for the Congress and the White House to sort out.

But what Mr. Sessions’ testimony really revealed was a sad and dark reflection of the previous day’s events in the Cabinet Room. On Monday, President Trump assembled his full Cabinet for the first time, and, with camera’s clicking and video broadcasting, he encouraged each Cabinet Secretary to sing his praises for the public’s consumption. It was one of the most awkward, saddening, displays of spineless and morally-deficient behavior I have ever seen.

The Washington Post’s John Wagner wrote in this morning’s edition,

“The effort to buck up the boss drew immediate notice on social media, with some comparing Trump to King Lear. In the opening of the Shakespeare play, the aging king of Britain, having decided to step down from the throne, asks his three daughters to tell him how much they love him.”

There was available to editorialists so much low-hanging fruit of juicy derision and tangy ridicule dangling above the Cabinet table, that no one bite could possibly be enough to sate our desire to consume such easily available Trump-flavored snacks.

So I will defer from taking my bite from the easy fruit of the meeting, and reach a bit higher on that surreal tree to note two things I believe are far more disturbing, though they may not have been as visible:

1. The chilling effect of the transparently-scripted adulation on the existing and potential pool of senior federal officials and staff, and;
2. The sad show of moral decay of men and women who are, outside their government roles, fathers, mothers, sons, daughters, neighbors, friends and community pillars.

As to the first.

The federal government operates on trust—the trust of the citizens in their elected representatives and in the men and women who head the vital services that assure the continuity of our democracy. We trust that these officials will exercise, to the best of their abilities, their sworn duties, forsaking all other influences beyond those authorized within the four corners of the Constitution. This is the most legally-binding trust that exists in our democracy. 

I swore to uphold that trust many times over my 35 years of federal service. I know that my son, a former federal employee, swore to it in his federal service. My father and my father-in-law, military officers, swore the same oath when they promised to protect and defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic.

So, too, do the members of the President’s Cabinet swear that oath; and by doing so, they are Constitutionally-bound to recuse themselves from the direct influence of the President if that influence runs counter to the moral, ethical, and legal duties of their offices. And, I will add, if such influence runs counter to their own moral and ethical values.

What we saw on Monday—that morally-corrupt show of obsequiousness and bile-in-the-throat fealty—served as a wicked-bright flash across the universe of government. It illuminated this truth: To any and all current or future candidates for high federal office, the price of attaining such office will be more than a pound of flesh—it will be your very soul. 

From the Secretary of State, to the Attorney General, and on down the list, the members of Trump's Cabinet prostrated themselves before a false and evil god, whose aims for America are calculatingly disruptive and ultimately disastrous. His deceit and deceptions will entangle us with our enemies, and separate us from our friends.

For every Cabinet Secretary who uttered those words of loyalty yesterday—thereby confirming the President’s power over them—I can only hope that thousands of men and women considering federal service for all the right reasons, turn away from that blinding light, and devote themselves instead to defeating the corruption that is seeping out of the White House with the stink of backed-up sewage.

As to the second.

I cannot comprehend how any member of the Cabinet could go home Monday night and face their families, their neighbors, their communities, their country—their own religions—having given up whatever moral fabric they had left with which to cover themselves. 

Had my children, my wife, my friends, and those members of my community who have any good feelings toward me, witnessed me uttering such blatantly-forced words of adoration to the very face of a man who has proven himself unworthy of trust (personal and public) over and over again, their estimation of my character would suffer almost beyond repair. They would have good reason to question my moral and ethical judgment from that point on.

How do we tell our children to stand up against a bully when they see examples of moral turpitude and fear of reprisal from grown men and women—who should know better—writ large across every news and cable channel? 

Not that the President’s Cabinet is entirely populated by saints-turned-sinners—there are a number of Secretaries at that table whose incoming credentials were questionable to begin with, and what they did on Monday was totally in character. 

But in the main, the display of twisted loyalty, clearly intended to send a message to Trump’s base that James Comey was an administration traitor, looked only like the sham play it was, and as the curtain came down and the press ushered out, Americans of conscience were left with an image that cannot be un-seen…an image of moral decay, ethical failure, and craven cowardice.