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Trump's attacks on public servants undermine the Constitution--and his own office.
President Trump has raised the stakes in the impeachment drama by questioning the integrity and motives of civil servants who have chosen to testify at the congressional hearings.
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Public servants are not mere bureaucrats who only slow things down. They are a positive good. They do not comprise a “deep state” opposed to the government but in fact are doing the work of the government. Their expertise is not always highly regarded in a political system that attributes special value to outsiders, but it is vital to the functioning of our government. Unfortunately, career civil servants, who could generally demand much higher compensation in the private sector, are never more appreciated than when they are gone, replaced by those with more ideological fervor than practical knowledge.
Mr. Trump, who places a high value on personal loyalty, appears to believe that any member of the executive branch testifying in the impeachment inquiry has thereby betrayed his trust. But Mr. Trump himself has laid the groundwork for this rupture, forcing nonpartisan professionals into an impossible choice between keeping faith with what they perceive to be the self-interested use of his office or fulfilling their duty to the Constitution, the Congress and the American people.
A president deserves to employ trustworthy executive branch officials—but such trust is owed to the president as the chief executive, not to the president personally, and it relies on an even greater trust, that which the American people place in the president to faithfully discharge his constitutional duties. - American - The Jesuit Review
<snip>
Public servants are not mere bureaucrats who only slow things down. They are a positive good. They do not comprise a “deep state” opposed to the government but in fact are doing the work of the government. Their expertise is not always highly regarded in a political system that attributes special value to outsiders, but it is vital to the functioning of our government. Unfortunately, career civil servants, who could generally demand much higher compensation in the private sector, are never more appreciated than when they are gone, replaced by those with more ideological fervor than practical knowledge.
Mr. Trump, who places a high value on personal loyalty, appears to believe that any member of the executive branch testifying in the impeachment inquiry has thereby betrayed his trust. But Mr. Trump himself has laid the groundwork for this rupture, forcing nonpartisan professionals into an impossible choice between keeping faith with what they perceive to be the self-interested use of his office or fulfilling their duty to the Constitution, the Congress and the American people.
A president deserves to employ trustworthy executive branch officials—but such trust is owed to the president as the chief executive, not to the president personally, and it relies on an even greater trust, that which the American people place in the president to faithfully discharge his constitutional duties. - American - The Jesuit Review
Blam! Enough people will read this to sway many to see it as it should be seen, the president has turned the WH into his personal business shop, instead of the office of the president.
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