Since the Events of January 6, 2021, the cri de cœur for Democrats and various other leftists/liberals/socialists/communists has been to “hold those responsible Accountable!”
But free-speech America is awash in conflict, and many see no good reason to get excited about a few tourists in the Capitol.
The brouhaha, including prime-time Congressional hearings, has dominated talking-head discussions and occasional actual reporting. Complicating the process of arriving at a consensus is that Americans are also frantically sorting through the Fire Sale Table looking for the best (or most fashionable) positions on the latest Supreme Court opinion, nosediving and/or skyrocketing economic indicators, non-stop mass shootings, non-start gun control, midterm elections, Ukraine and the latest on the Kardashians.
Those seeking Accountability! for the January 6 insurrection need look no further than Google, a digital library of history lessons – precedents, if you will – on Accountability! for (alleged) moral, criminal &/or treasonous outrages by past presidents and (alleged) evildoers.
Start with the impeachment dustups involving former President Trump. Accountability score: Trump 2, Congress 0. Followed by covid, monkeypox and Beyonce’s latest album.
Before that was President Clinton’s impeachment for a dalliance with a White House intern culminating in his 1999 TV special for perjury and… uh… tawdry behavior. For details of his accountable acquittal on all counts, Google “Monica Lewinsky”.
Twenty-five years before, a reviled President Richard Nixon was pressured to resign after the Watergate Break-in Affair (no sex involved). Accountability for Nixon included presidential pardon, a prosperous life being regularly consulted by later presidents and praise for his role in establishing relations with “Communist China,” now a vital US trading partner. He wrote best-sellers and upon his death at age 81, President Clinton’s eulogy recited his accomplishments, saying “May the day of judging president Nixon on anything less than his entire life and career come to a close.”
But the first president to face Accountability was Andrew Johnson, a southerner Lincoln had picked as vice president to ‘broaden the appeal’ of his own 1864 presidential campaign; Johnson freed his slaves & supported Lincoln’s emancipation policy. Upon becoming president, Johnson ran afoul of congressional “radicals” determined to end the last vestiges of slavery, such as the rampant hangings of former slaves by defeated Southerners after the Civil War; Johnson couldn’t have cared less.
But he fired Sec’y of War, Edwin Stanton, a deliberate violation of the Tenure of Office Act forbidding him to fire cabinet officers without Congressional OK. He was impeached for “high crimes and misdemeanors,” and Accountably acquitted. Eighty-eight years later, the Tenure of Office Act was declared unconstitutional by – who else? – the Supreme Court.
Of course, if anything in our history begged for Accountability it was the Civil War itself, a massive armed coup/rebellion/insurrection that killed hundreds of thousands on both sides and devastated the nation before the rebels finally surrendered; five days later a Confederate sympathizer assassinated President Lincoln.
Surely, those treasonous rebels were all Accountably hung by the neck, right???
Nope. Various Amnesties, pardons &/or hugs-all-around eventually followed. Only recently have some locales begun hiding statues of Confederate generals and/or the Confederate flag which, like KKK hoods, Nazi swastikas and unlimited corporate political donations, are forms of Constitutionally Protected Free Speech according to (who else?) the Supreme Court.
If history is any guide, Accountability is downright un-American. That’s probably why the Pope only apologized to the Indigenous People of Canada.
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