Trust II

 

Trust In Me

Trust in me, baby, give me time, gimme time, um gimme time
I heard somebody say, oh, "The older the grape
Sweeter the wine, sweeter the wine"

Whom should you trust?

The least trustworthy politicians during my lifetime have been Barry Goldwater, Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan and Donald Trump. ( with honorable mentions to Newt Gingrich and Henry Kissinger). Yes, I realize that they are all Republicans.  Barry Goldwater dishonestly said that “extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice!” and “moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue!”. Richard Nixon is famously remembered as “Tricky Dick” who resigned as a result of “Watergate”.  Ronald Reagan said that government is the problem and then went on to “prove” this by leading the government that gave us Iran Contra among others.  And Donald Trump?  His misdeeds are too numerous to list.  Newt Gingrich rose to fame speaking on C-SPAN to what on the other, unseen, side of the camera was an empty Congressional chamber.  Henry Kissinger was a proponent of the Realpolitik which proposes that the enemy of my enemy is my fiend, which is a provably false statement. I am not including Warren Harding and others, only because, even though I am 70, they died before I was born.

But Republicans have also given us  Abraham “Honest Abe” Lincoln, and Theodore Roosevelt. Elliot Richardson was  a Republican who opposed Richard Nixon in the Saturday Night Massacre. Gerald Ford and John McCain were exemplary men of integrity.  One of the largest political conflicts in the late 19^th Century was an intra-party fight between traditional Republicans and  Mugwumps, the anti-corruption Republicans .  I include myself among Republicans as well.  While an independent, I was appointed to a political office by a Republican Governor, and I have voted for Massachusetts Republican Governors.  IMO, some Republicans are not worthy of trust, but that does mean that all Republicans are not worthy of trust.  Trust is not a Republican or Democratic characteristic. It is a human characteristic.  However trust is very hard to re-earn once it has been lost. Perhaps our motto should not be “Trust everyone, but always cut the cards", or “Trust everyone, but carry a big stick”, but “Trust everyone, until they lose our trust."