Just how bad are our memories?

Those of us who keep up with current and world affairs; have we forgotten the Obama era scandal (yes, there were plenty and very serious) involving corruption by Joe Biden’s son in the Ukraine, by the Clinton campaign with the Ukrainian government and then, Vice President Joe Biden’s successful derailment of related criminal investigations by the Ukrainian government using threats of negative formal actions by the United States government?

I haven’t!

If many have forgotten, or never heard of them, it’s understandable. Even then the United States’ “mainstream” media was busy hiding blatant evidence of Clinton – Obama era corruption like the Clinton Foundation scam, and of course, while hysterically engaging in apparently fraudulent hyperbolic hysteria over “Russiagate”, minimizing, if reporting at all, over the former vice president’s abuse of political power and of the United States’ “international relations” for personal and partisan purposes. That was terrible and in its epoch, certainly justified consideration of impeachment of a number of Obama administration principals but what is happening now is even more ludicrous and reprehensible. The “mainstream” media, the Democratic Party and even good old Hillary are orchestrating a new fantasy production entitled, “Silk Purses, Sow’s Ears and Other Fractured Fairy Tales”, or, “how to turn malfeasant disasters into political capital”.

The Clinton-Obama-Biden Ukrainian scandal is being repackaged and presented to us all, hysterically and hyperbolically, of course, that is de rigueur, as an inverse scandal; i.e., encouraging investigation of the Clinton-Obama-Biden Ukrainian scandal and enforcement of related anticorruption laws is the scandal and constitutes grounds for impeachment of current President Donald Trump.

Mr. Trump is not my idea of an excellent president, he is insufferably arrogant and bombastic, fickle and not all that concerned with reality if alternative realities serve immediate negotiating postures, but as to policies and ethics, he is certainly not worse than the Clinton-Obama-Biden crowd that preceded him, or the Bush crowd that preceded them, or the Clinton crowd that preceded them, … on and on and on and on. But for all his many and varied faults and policy positions with which I disagree, his every move, action and reaction does not constitute either real scandals or grounds for a coup d’état, soft, hard or in between. I can imagine next week’s shouted hyperbolically, hysterical headlines when nothing else is available, – “Trump Defecates in Private White House Hideaway: calls for impeachment reach unheard of crescendos”.

The truth is that investigations in both the Ukraine and the United States are long overdue concerning the Clinton-Obama-Biden machinations in the Ukraine on a host of issues, not least of all orchestration of a coup d’état against a democratically elected president, then participation in criminal activities helping loot the Ukraine by a cabal of Ukrainian traitors and United States carpetbaggers including Joe Biden’s son, and of course (since “meddling” in United States elections has apparently been criminalized, despite its virtual legitimate omnipresence by most foreign governments of all ilks, seeking to protect their legitimate interests in the hegemony the world was fast becoming, e.g., think Israel), the “Clinton campaign – Ukrainian” interactions during the 2016 presidential elections. But the lid is being desperately held tight on all of those real scandals, with furious counterattacks even George Orwell might have found surprising. Chutzpah is not in short supply among the Clinton-Obama-Biden “mainstream” media cast of players. Truth, of course, is totally excluded in the hopes that this is one of those moments to which the late Abraham Lincoln alluded in his statement on the ability to “fool all of the people some of the time”.

Will it work? Are we that forgetful? Are we that manipulable? Does psychological objectivism really work that efficiently?

Stay tuned, perhaps the coming 2020 elections may provide answers. Will many of us dare ditch both the GOP and Democratic double headed hydra in favor of say, …. hmmmm, Tulsi Gabbard?
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© Guillermo Calvo Mahé; Manizales, 2019; all rights reserved. Please feel free to share with appropriate attribution.
Guillermo Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia although he has primarily lived in the United States of America (of which he is a citizen). Until recently he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales. He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies). He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at http://www.guillermocalvo.com.