Tradition

Kevin Drum hits on a point today that I think is central to understanding the damage done to the country by the Bush White House:

One of the great discoveries of the Republican Party over the past decade or two is that an awful lot of the rules we take for granted are, in reality, just traditions. Like redistricting only once a decade, for example, or keeping House votes open for 15 minutes. And what Republicans have found out is that if you have the balls to do it, you can just ignore tradition and no one can stop you. It's that simple.

Alberto Gonzales has learned this lesson well. Normally, cabinet officers who have been caught in multiple obvious lies have to either resign or else seriously try to defend themselves. But Gonzales realizes this is just tradition. Unless House Democrats have the votes to impeach him, he doesn't have to do anything. He can just mock them to their face and there's nothing much they can do about it.

Contempt.

That's at the heart of the Republican party. Lee Atwater invented it and Karl Rove (and many others) have perfected it. It's being perpetuated in young Republicans as I write and will go on for generations unless there is some accountability.

Much of the success of the U.S. has been dependent on the goodwill and beliefs of people in positions of power. There is no way you can legislate or regulate all aspects of liberty in a republic. Those who chose so can do violence to the system by simply refusing to "play by the unwritten rules". Those unwritten rules have been written over several centuries of blood, sweat and tears, but are vulnerable to those of evil intent.

Kevin Drum finishes his post with an apt demonstration of exactly what that contempt looks like:

In Thursday's testimony, Gonzales made it clear that he just doesn't care what anyone thinks. After all, if Democrats don't like it, what are they going to do? Roll their eyes at him?

Exactly. And unless Congress actually puts some teeth behind the current traditions, the Bush administration will simply allow Abu to be the decoy/firewall that protects the real prizes, Rove and Bush. And the precedents will then be available for future leaders .... a new set of traditions.