What a shame! Shameless politicians get away with shameful shenanigans | Opinion

Once upon a time, we lived in a political universe where behaviors outside the norm of what we expected of candidates for public office would disqualify them from serving. They would be shamed, sometimes by self-governing standards, and they would return to private life, never again offering themselves for public office.

Some of those moments strike us as downright bizarre by today’s more refined and tolerant norms of behavior. In my home state of Missouri, Sen. Mark Eagleton stepped down as a candidate for vice president in 1972 when it was disclosed he was treated for depression. In the same year, Sen. Edmund Muskie of Maine, accused of tearing up at the podium during his 1972 run for the presidency, was ruled out as a presidential candidate, apparently too emotional for the office. Another presidential candidate, the father of Sen. Mitt Romney, George Romney, found his 1968 presidential ambitions quashed when he proclaimed he was “brainwashed” by generals into supporting U.S. involvement in Vietnam.

Somewhere along the highways and byways of politics, things changed. Suddenly it didn’t seem to matter what went wrong or who was at fault; public officials just plowed ahead and lived for another day of public life.

Perhaps we should have seen it coming when in 1969, Sen. Ted Kennedy’s car plunged into a pond off a bridge, and Mary Jo Kopechne, his aide in the car with him, drowned. Kennedy survived the crash but managed to dodge questions about the details of the accident, serving the people of Massachusetts in the U.S. Senate for many years thereafter.

Today, candidates for public office and public officials have moved even further beyond the days that delivered public officials like Kennedy from some form of accountability. Today, there seems no shame for scandal, chicanery or deliberate violation of the laws.

Even Sen. Joe McCarthy who ruined the lives and careers of many Americans with his anti-Communist witch-hunt in the ’50s, had his day of comeuppance. At one of McCarthy’s hearings where he accused the U.S. Army of being pro-communist, its legal representative, Joseph Welch, faced down McCarthy’s sinister tactics with a simple question that was one for the history books: “Have you no sense of decency, sir? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?” McCarthy was later censured by his Senate colleagues, and his “Red Scare” died with him a few years later. Can you imagine if that’s all it took today?

Had Joseph Welch been around for Donald Trump’s 2016 run for office and four years in office, he would have gone nowhere with that decency line as Republicans in the U.S. Senate failed twice to convict President Trump on impeachment charges the House of Representatives approved. If Republicans couldn’t vote for impeachment on grounds that Trump incited an insurrection, then he would go free to live out his tarnished presidency, whether abusing the power of his office or simply degrading debate and deliberation in the public square.

Trump’s history of guttural pronouncements at his rallies and in the Oval Office trashed political discourse. He hurled insults and belittled his opponents, even innocent bystanders. He stooped so low that he mocked a disabled reporter covering his speech. With Trump descending to new lows of incivility, crude behavior spiraled out of control in the Republican Party as candidates and officeholders mimicked their chosen leader. In Idaho, Congressman Mike Simpson, in his crass effort to appeal to right-wing jerks who thought it was cute, capped off his speech to a Republican gathering with “Let’s Go Brandon,” a stand-in for a foul word directed at the president of the United States.

Whether it’s Trump’s blatant dishonesty, his many failings as a businessman or the disgusting trash that regularly poured from his mouth, like the moment he told an associate he could grab a woman by her private parts and get away with it, Trump was the North Star for incivility and crude behavior.

His lies and distortions became a model for those who came after him. George Santos, the newly elected congressman from New York, bamboozled his way to office by running on a bio of fictional accomplishments worthy of a Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist’s most inventive fiction. No surprise here: He had Trump’s support.

Apparently, only one local media outlet picked up on Santos’ fabricated bio. The Democratic Party was asleep at the switch by not discovering the inconsistent and invented resume and sharing the facts with the voters. Santos should face ethics and legal consequences if the new Republican majority doesn’t gut ethics oversight. Regardless of whether any penalties ever come of his behavior, on its face, it is further evidence how our politics have crashed through the guardrails of honesty and integrity.

Former Sen. Al Franken resigned from office after sexual misconduct allegations, but Trump’s behavior and that of others have few consequences. As for George Santos, he has no shame as he travels the far-right media circus describing his mountain of lies as slight embellishments supposedly common today. His lack of shame lowers the bar for what is acceptable behavior by public officials.

Last week, Santos was tidying up his new congressional office, knowing full well that Kevin McCarthy has no shame in ignoring Santos’ lies to win office so McCarthy can count on Santos’ vote for speaker.

The only way to deal with such contempt for the truth is to refuse to seat him, conduct ethics and campaign finance investigations and then submit his sorry self to a floor vote for expulsion. If the new Republican-controlled House cannot muster the courage to do the right thing in this case, then let’s hope he is shamed out of office at the next general election.

With all the focus on election integrity, it would be a pox on our democracy if we allowed candidates to make things up as they go along the campaign trail. Elections are meaningless without the enforcement of the integrity and the honesty of those who contest for public office.

Bob Kustra served as president of Boise State University from 2003 to 2018. He is host of Reader’s Corner on Boise State Public Radio and is a regular columnist for the Idaho Statesman. He served two terms as Illinois lieutenant governor and 10 years as a state legislator.