The Enlightenment Salon
Yet again the Trump Administration manages to generate enough news in a week to overwhelm us all.
On Tuesday, Democratic member of the House Intelligence Committee Joaquin Castro was asked about the Trump campaign colluding with Russia to influence the Presidential election. One of his responses was that “My impression is that people will probably be charged and I think people will probably go to jail.” Also on MSNBC, Rep. Denny Heck (D-WA) “discussed news that the FBI was creating a special unit to investigate Russian interference in the election”.
Most news was overshadowed by Trump launching 59 Tomahawk cruise missiles at a Syrian airbase used to bomb civilians with chemical weapons. Trump’s Secretary of State, former Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson, may well have convinced Syria’s President Assad that he could do this impunity. U.S. policy has long been that Assad, who has waged a vicious civil war against his people (causing millions to flee Syria), cannot remain as the leader of Syria. Tillerson, though, last week announced a change in that policy, saying that the “longer-term status of President Assad will be decided by the Syrian people." He was joined by Trump’s Ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, who said "Our priority is no longer to sit and focus on getting Assad out." A few days later, Assad used the chemical weapons.
Trump seemed outraged by that and let fly the cruise missiles. It was satisfying to see a stand taken against chemical weapons, but there were issues. In attacking a sovereign nation without UN approval, which is an act of war, Trump violated international law. He also did not obtain permission from Congress, which is the only branch of our government that can declare war. In addition, after an Assad gas attack in Syria in 2013, Trump had argued strongly for the U.S. not to attack Syria. Trump also has banned Syrian refugees from the U.S. One wonders whether the cruise-missile attack on the Syrian airbase was due to a change of heart for Trump – or was yet another opportunity to distract from the ongoing Russian investigation.
Almost lost in the fog was the news that the U.S. Senate confirmed far-right judge Neil Gorsuch to the U.S. Supreme Court, where he will remain a blight on the legal system for decades. Gorsuch is at least as far right as justices Scalia, Alito and Thomas. Among other things, he ruled in an appellate case that a truck driver whose rig had broken down at night in the snow could be fired for leaving the truck against his employer’s instructions in order to keep from freezing to death. Gorsuch also voted in favor of the Hobby Lobby case finding that corporations can have religious beliefs (!), and argued in a dissent “that the court should overturn a Department of Labor fine against a company whose failure to train a worker caused his death”. To get Gorsuch approved, Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell had to “nuke” the traditional rule requiring at least 60 Senate votes to approve a Supreme Court nominee because there were not enough votes in Gorsuch’s favor. This was after McConnell refused during President Obama’s last year in office to even allow hearings (much less a vote) on well-respected centrist jurist Merrick Garland.
We have to hope that no further Supreme Court justices retire or die and that the Democrats take control of the Senate in the 2018 elections.
Bruce