In the March 1st issue of Webb Weekly, I wrote an article referencing a quote from Henry Ford, “Sorry, Henry, History is Not Bunk.” I used a poll of the “greatest athlete of all time” to prove how weak our country has become in understanding our history. To quote myself, “History is not ours to change or destroy. It is there for us to learn from. Failure to do so is a prescription for failure.”
Unfortunately for all of us, we are living in historic times whether we realize it or not. Unless there is a major shift, future historians will identify these years right now as the beginning of the death of democracy in the United States. There are many examples, but two that pop out quickly are autocratic (not democratic) government and election manipulation.
We can trace the current voting troubles to the 2000 election between Al Gore and George W. Bush. The vote was incredibly close, coming down to Florida, where Bush only led by 537 votes. A recount was required, which went on for weeks and lowered Bush’s majority to 154 votes. But the December 18th certification deadline was not going to be met, so the United States Supreme Court made the decision by a 5-4 decision to reverse the Florida Supreme Court’s recount order, effectively awarding the presidency to George W. Bush.
The Democrats learned from this lesson and tagged President Bush with the disparaging moniker “selected, not elected.” From that time on, the 21st century has seen controversies in every one of the presidential elections since then. John Kerry called for hearings after his defeat in 2004. Barack Obama’s victories in 2008 and 2012 were continually challenged by Republicans who claimed Obama was not a United States citizen. Donald Trump’s victory over Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election was attributed to Russian interference known as the Steele dossier, which in truth, was actually traced back to Clinton’s campaign itself! This, of course, did not deter the Democratic Party from impeaching President Trump twice for ‘tampering’ with the election. And do we have to mention the 2020 election? It even hit our own Lycoming Country, which had a petition signed by 5,000 people to audit the results.
Oh yes, that 2020 election controversy also led to the “insurrection” on January 6th, 2021. Karine Jean-Pierre quoted at the White House Press Conference on March 7th of this year that “the President has been very clear: January 6th was the worst attack on our democracy since the Civil War.” Considering that Pearl Harbor and the 9/11 attacks were certainly more damaging to our nation than a few hours of ruckus, it also ignores the turbulent times of protest in the 1960s and 70s, such as the bomb explosion in the Capitol Building on May 1st (Mayday), 1971 by the Weather Underground. The following day’s New York Times noted that the bomb resulted in “wide damage.” Since 1969, this radical left group had already bombed several police targets, banks, and courthouses around the country, acts they hoped would instigate an uprising against the government.
But since we are talking about “the worst attack on our democracy,” how do we navigate the first-ever criminal indictment of a former United States president, Donald Trump? History can help us here. President Ford took amazing heat in 1974 for pardoning Richard Nixon. Yet, over time, even the Washington Post, which conducted a panel in July of 2014 hosted by Bob Woodward himself, recognized the wisdom in that decision. Even Senator Ted Kennedy and Richard Ben-Veniste, a former Watergate prosecutor and a Democrat, also acknowledged that President Ford spared the country greatly by his actions.
But now, back to Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s ‘history-making’ precedent, which the April 4th issue of Newsweek described as “Trump’s Indictment is a Blunder of Historic Proportions.” Pandora’s box is now open for any DA to conduct a grand jury against any president for past offenses, no matter how far-fetched. Don’t roll your eyes; this is already being imagined. The New York Times ran a story on April 1st stating, “Mr. Bragg may have been the first local prosecutor to do it, but he will probably not be the last. Every local prosecutor in the country will now feel that he or she has free rein to criminally investigate and prosecute presidents after they leave office.”
Our country has survived for two and a half centuries because our leaders, even poor ones, kept their eye on the future and fate of the country. Richard Nixon probably won the election against John F. Kennedy in 1960, but he chose not to challenge the result because he feared its impact on the country. President Ford pardoned Nixon because he realized the negative consequences to our nation were he not to pardon him. Both these men acted nobly yet suffered personally in those historical moments; our country was better for it. Today we might be witnessing our government leaders acting ignobly, and rest assured, history is taking note. Sow the wind, reap the whirlwind.
