President Trump, Have You No Sense of Decency?

In 1954, during the Senate’s McCarthy Hearings, Joseph Welsh countered Senator McCarthy with the now-famous retort, “At long last, have you left no sense of decency, sir?”  This confrontation is generally considered to have been the beginning of the end for Senator McCarthy and his infamous hearings.

When will that time arrive when at least one Republican Senator, preferably a group, stands up and speaks those words to President Trump?  The list of instances in which he has acted dishonorably grows with each passing day.

He went after undocumented aliens in a mean, uncharitable, and dishonest way (he said he was only going after criminals, but the net he cast was much broader).  He went after a Muslim soldier who gave his life fighting for the U.S., as well as his parents.  He has made numerous misogynistic comments about women.  He went after transgender servicemen and those who wanted to serve in the military.  He went after the LGBT community by reducing their protection under the law in several ways.  Most recently, he stood by and refused to condemn the white supremacists and neo-Nazis who marched in Charlottesville, even equating them with those who were protesting against them.

These are just the more prominent ways in which the President has shown that he has no morals, he has no ethics, he has no conscience.  In short, he has no decency.  He will do anything it he thinks it will maintain the support of the far-right, which is so far perhaps the most loyal part of his base.

Individual Senators have made comments disagreeing with the President's statements in most of these areas.  Certainly his reaction to the Charlottesville incident has drawn the most criticism from his Republican colleagues.

But even after Charlottesville, even after he under criticism made a clear statement of condemnation but the next day reverted to his previous equivocation, not a single Republican has had the courage to stand up to the President and say, “At long last, have you left no sense of decency, sir?”

This is one of the common themes that runs through the actions of this President.  And he must be held accountable at all times.  Lest we forget, and the American public has a very short memory, the Democratic party should maintain a public chart with this heading, listing all the examples where the President fails this test of moral leadership.

In closing with the following example, I am not equating Trump with Hitler in any way, but the example is still appropriate.  Pastor Niemöller, a well-known German Protestant minister, made the following statement regarding his actions during the Nazi period.  “First they came to get the Communists, and I said nothing.  Then they came to get the Jews, and I said nothing.  Then they came for me, and there was no one left to speak for me.”

If those with morals and ethics do not stand up clearly for what they believe and call on their colleagues to remove the President because he is unfit for office, they will in the end suffer defeat and ignominy.