Breaking news!!!! Unprecedented!!!!
In our current media and political environment, these phrases ricochet across our TVs and social media feeds with such frequency that their currency and impact has been hopelessly devalued. But make no mistake, these sentiments (and many more colorful forms of commentary) are fully justified in processing the news of Paul Manafort’s guilty plea and agreement to cooperate with the Mueller investigation. As the details emerge, it seems ever more likely that the steel-eyed prosecutor is moving his pawns and bishops towards a very dramatic form of checkmate. Whether the final piece to fall will be the president who would be king we still don’t know.
Like the fable of the frog slowly being boiled alive, there has long been a sense that because we have been drifting into an uncharted sea of malfeasance at a steady pace that the storyline for just how profoundly critical the crisis is and how unmoored we are from the anchors of democracy is being obscured. To step back and to see the Trump campaign now read like a rogues’ gallery of convicted felons is to constantly pick the jaw up from the floor. I search in vain for words, historical measures, or even fantastical analogies that do this state of reality justice.
And as we contend with existential threats coming from many directions, we must not lose sight of the forces hard at work to protect this President from the sunshine of accountability, as well as the aiders and abettors who peddle their narrow self-interests in the shadow of a corrupt autocracy. On this landscape, the confirmation hearings of Judge Kavanaugh, who may prove the deciding vote on justice and the rule of law in regards to President Trump, is particularly disturbing. His answers and non-answers make pretty clear that he was likely chosen not for his beliefs in any aspect of constitutional law aside from presidential prerogative.
But while I have never seen anything like a drama of this nature play out before, I have seen many times when a scandal comes into sharp focus in the public consciousness. I have seen people who look like they will escape the grip of justice suddenly feel the full power of the law. I have seen politicians and whole political parties and movements succumb to the realities of public will. If the polls are to believed, even if you treat them with a healthy dose of skepticism, millions upon millions of Americans are angry. They are demanding accountability. And honesty. And facts. And justice. And they have one of the great lawmen of the age carrying the banner. And that man now has applied his pressure points to get a very big fish to start singing. That’s breaking news. And all of this is truly unprecedented.
