At RealClearPolitics A. B. Stoddard chronicles the last fifty years of tolerating immoral behavior in politicians in the interest of party and/or ideology:
A moral code, standards for ethical conduct, once defined the threshold for viability for elected office. No matter the political party, leaders weren’t just deemed able, but decent, empathetic, optimistic, dignified and honest. That disappeared long ago, with the help of Democrats and Republicans, but until just weeks ago even partisanship was expected to fold its tent in the face of something like alleged pedophilia. That bar for leadership has been invalidated as many voters in Alabama either say they cannot believe the credible and public accusations about Moore, or that what he did to children doesn’t matter since he isn’t a Democrat.
[…]
Yet Democrats who hope despairing Republicans will join energized independents and liberals to push Jones over the top in the race are not the guardians of morality nor do they represent the party of women. They tolerated Sen. Ted Kennedy after Chappaquiddick and through his many years of drunken groping that may have constituted assault. And after Republicans failed to believe Anita Hill and defended and confirmed Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas against her accusations of harassment, Democrats surrendered their credibility on the matter by then tolerating President Bill Clinton after several accusations of assault by Juanita Broderick, Paula Jones and Kathleen Willey. Later they would defend him after he had a sexual relationship with a young intern and lied under oath about it — blaming Republicans who impeached him for their sanctimony and political overreach. It was then, in the 1990s, that Democrats officially severed governance and leadership from good character, laying the groundwork for the election of President Trump. Only now are Democrats, with Hillary Clinton no longer dominating their party, shamelessly revisiting their support for her husband, decades later.
Daniel Patrick Moynihan dubbed it “defining deviancy down”. In honesty I don’t think this is new. I think it goes back to the beginnings of the republic.
What is new is the open immorality and support for those who engage, unrepentantly, in immoral conduct. I don’t believe that the republic can survive such attitudes but I guess we’ll find out.
Sodom and Gomorrah go back to the Bronze Age.
Yes, whatever happened to them?
Sodom is running for mayor of Chicago. Gomorahh has been transferred to 6 different positions in the Catholic Church in the past 10 years. Something about career development…….