NO AMNESTY BY AMNESIA
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When the time comes, moving forward will require more than putting the Trump years behind us. It will require determining what happened, who was responsible, which actions were lawful and which were not—and doing so without abandoning the principles of due process that distinguish accountability from revenge.
Peppered throughout the thousands of comments from just about every corner of America’s multi-media and our semi-catatonic political firmament, is the theme that this era of American self-destruction should not be allowed to slip painlessly into the past under a successor administration. This should not be debatable. Trump’s crimes, corruption, thievery via the imposition of of whimsical tariffs, along with the trashing of civic harmony, of allies and trade agreements have to be addressed.
This malevolent chief executive, a fact of life for another two years, has done incalculable harm to our country in every way possible. The nearly six years of his tenure, and particularly the last eight months of his disastrous second term, have left smoldering in the rubble of the United States’ political and social landscape a recessive series of venomous policies. Together they constitute, broadly speaking, a nesting doll of national backsliding on principles, morality, and the expansion of greedy, oligarchic Pac-Men. The net effect has been to subvert and enfeeble the fabled American Experiment.
Do we allow that to stand, or do we attempt to cauterize and arrest it? And can we find a way to somehow hold those responsible that is consistent with our constitutional values of justice of equal treatment, due process and individual liberty? Will we simply allow these leaders to either fade innocently away and continue to nibble away reproachfully from the sidelines, or will we ensure that they find themselves in court answering charges of dereliction of duty or malfeasance in office? Is our democracy strong enough at this juncture to preserve accountability after a period of alleged or documented misconduct without turning accountability itself into a Trumpian lookalike of political retribution?
Admittedly, such an effort by a successor congress and/or administration would be fraught. But consider the consequences of doing nothing. Philosophers, political scientists and practical men and women are now reflecting more often and more openly on the hazards facing a nation that might choose to stay mute in the face of wrongdoing. There is a noticeable rise in the public’s recognition that to do so would be a mistake of considerable cost to the cause of American Democracy and the ageless striving for ‘a more perfect union’. Acquiescence leads to complicity. Unaddressed evil in a system of government either begets more evil or condones and absorbs the associated shifts in our national DNA.
Many Americans have stated again and again that they believe we are not on the right course. When the American people have a fresh opportunity, would it not be the right thing to do to charge their elected officials with engineering a new set of priorities? To call out the infringements against our way of life, our love of fairness, the foundational rule of law, the sale of the country to a handful of oligarchic political donors, and the infectious greed that defines the Trump years? It will be a trial of ourselves in many respects, but a juncture, a chance to correct our course.
The next president will have much unfinished business; the successor to Trump will inherit a country that needs not merely governing, but institutional repair. If Course Correction is being quietly mandated in the national discourse every day, is it not incumbent upon us to chart the future with firm grounding and clarity about our past?
William R. Piekney served as US Naval officer for four years and served in the CIA for 30 years in Europe, Africa and the Middle East. He was under deep cover early in his career and later was station chief numerous times, including West Africa, Pakistan and Egypt. As a member of the Senior Executive Service he directed the Agency’s African operations and then East Asia operations, traveling extensively to those regions to maintain and develop relations with host intelligence and security services. Overall he has spent nearly fifty years in the U.S. Intelligence Community and in related national security affairs. He is a member of The Steady State.
Founded in 2016, The Steady State is a nonprofit 501(c)(4) organization of more than 400 former senior national security professionals. Our membership includes former officials from the CIA, FBI, Department of State, Department of Defense, and Department of Homeland Security. Drawing on deep expertise across national security disciplines, including intelligence, diplomacy, military affairs, and law, we advocate for constitutional democracy, the rule of law, and the preservation of America’s national security institutions.
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