Ethics is Trumped by Politics in Obama Administration

It seems to be endless –

 

• The former Secretary of Veteran Affairs Eric Shinseki of the past 5+ years oversees the scandalous treatment of veterans in VA hospitals where veterans where left to die without proper follow-up treatment.

 

• The former Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius of the false promises and ill-started Affordable Care Act was cited by the U.S. Office of Special Counsel for violating the Hatch Act, as she improperly campaigned for Obama’s re-election while serving as a Cabinet secretary.

 

• Former IRS official Lois Lerner used the federal tax-collection agency to go after groups deemed too conservative.  She invoked the 5th Amendment to avoid telling Congress the whole truth.

 

• Susan Rice, the former U.N. Ambassador (now National Security Advisor) flat out deceived the public on 5-television appearances about the Benghazi catastrophe.  She insisted that the deaths of 4-Americans were due to a spontaneous riot induced by a video even though she had access to intelligence fingering al-Qaeda-affiliated terrorists as the culprits.

 

• Former Secretary of the State Department Hillary Clinton left office with American foreign policy in shambles.  She has been unable to make the argument for a single initiative that was made with success.  Clinton infamously dismissed the lingering mysteries surrounding the Benghazi deaths with, “What difference at this point does it make?”  She also refused to place the now-infamous Nigerian terrorist group Boko Haram on a State Department terrorist watch list.

 

• Eric Holder (who should be former) Attorney General is the first attorney general to have been held in contempt of Congress.  Aside from his divisive language (calling America “a nation of cowards” and referring to African-Americans as “my people”), Holder always seems to find himself at the center of scandals.  He permitted the federal monitoring of the Associated Press journalists.  He green-lighted the Fast and Furious gun-running scam.  He has failed to bring to account rogue IRS officials.

 

• Do we remember former EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson?  She fabricated for herself an alternate identity as a mid-level EPA employee.  In communications, she used a fake e-mail address and name, and then honored her own alter ego as a “scholar of ethical behavior.”

 

• Former Secretary of the Department of Energy Steven Chu left under a cloud of controversy involving crony capitalists getting millions of dollars in green loans that produced nothing but failed companies.

 

• Former Labor Secretary Hilda Solis slipped out of office, battling accusations of Hatch Act violations and freebie rides on private jets from insider union friends.

 

• Former top officials such as Timothy Geithner, Peter Orszag and Larry Summers have given new meaning to the revolving door between Wall Street and the White House.

 

So what’s the common denominator?  In all of these cases, politics trumped ethics.

 

The question is not whether some Obama Administration officials were incompetent or unethical (or both), but whether there are any left who are not.

 

Rev. Dr. Kenneth L. Beale, Jr.

Chaplain (Colonel-Ret), U.S. Army

Pastor, Ft. Snelling Memorial Chapel