Vanished Senatorial Integrity — Former Senator Gary Hart Warns that the American Republic Is Being Lost — He’s Right, of Course

06 May 2013

Citation

Gary Hart, Weep for the Senate, Huffington Post Politics (05 May 2013)

The American State looks like it has tossed away its once best qualities — in a shift toward embracing unethical baseness

As former Senator Gary Hart put it, yesterday:

Throughout the nation's history the prestige of such [Senatorial] service was second only to the presidency itself, and some preferred the Senate over the White House.

By the time we reach the 2014 election, almost one-third of the current Senate will have resigned in the past three elections. Recent reports indicate that those formerly considered to be virtually automatic candidates are rejecting the opportunity to seek the vacated Senate seats.

[In the Founders’ thinking,] corruption was the greatest threat to the survival of the Republic. That was corruption of the Republican ideal upon which the nation was founded.

And it was consistently defined as placing personal interest or the interest of a special group over the interest of the commonwealth . . . the common interest.

American politics has become -- personal and special interest -- and it threatens our survival as it has every republic that preceded us.

Unlike even 20 or 30 short years ago, it is commonplace, even routine, for former Senator to become lobbyists. This rarely happened in the Senate in which I served and the best Senators, and there were quite a few, would never have even considered it.

Contrary to conservatives, the issue is not the size of government -- the issue is the integrity of government.

For if the confidence of the people in their government is lost, our Republic is lost.

The moral? — An American culture that accepts base behavior from its elected officials needs its political soul examined

Perfection, even could it be defined, is (of course) unattainable.

But when we give up seeking it, electing instead (pun intended) to wallow in humanity’s too characteristic baseness, we have lost the American Beacon. When Liberty’s light winks out, something profound will have died in the world’s hopeful political consciousness.

There was once a time in America, when the most admirable among politicians were vitally useful lubricators of society’s wheels. Now most are merely self-profiting scumbags.

Consider, for example, the limelight-seeking, shirt-sleeve spouting, political Christians, who claim to dominate American religiosity. They use “faith” as a route to profit, rather than toward awareness and societal service.

We seem not to hold these selfish people to account for their sins against the commonweal. Perhaps because we have lost sight of even the concept of admirable behavior in leadership.

Ultimately, the problem is a spiritual one. Reflect on these words:

We hold these truths to be self-evident,

that all men are created equal,

that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights,

that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

The Declaration is a spiritual statement. It posits a goal.

But, in recent decades, the Congress, Presidency and Supreme Court have acted in selfish concert to deny its most rudimentary implications.

PeteFree.com

Vanished Senatorial Integrity — Former Senator Gary Hart Warns that the American Republic Is Being Lost — He’s Right, of Course