~a column by Colleen O’Brien
On the evening of President Obama’s first inauguration, Jan. 20, 2009, leading Republicans spent four hours in a high-end DC restaurant plotting how to waylay anything they could in the new administration’s plans. The dinner was reported by Washington Post reporter Jonathan Capehart on Aug. 10, 2012, and by Frontline on Jan. 15, 2013.
The diners wanted Republican power back at any cost and vowed to one another to show united and persistent opposition to the new president. For the next years, their goal was to let nothing Obama proposed succeed – it was their idea of how to return to power; power having eked into the greedy chamber of their hearts, power being more important than ruling the country for the sake of the country and its diverse citizenry.
Now that another Democrat is being sworn into office, I wonder if similar types, no doubt even some who plotted there 12 years ago, will be holding another such nefarious meeting this January 20.
Some born to money, some working hard to get it – all of these men, once in office, well-dressed in beautifully tailored suits, their polished-dentured smiles dazzling the broadcasts, calling themselves servants of the people . . . well, it is dispiriting to think that these highly educated men in positions critical to all of us would band together to stoop so low.
No wonder politics has a dirty name. It’s too bad, too, because working for one’s country is a high calling, a noble goal: “Ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country,” as another just-sworn-in president said on another January 20 in 1961.
Making the best decisions for fostering the general welfare, domestic tranquility and liberty for us and our posterity – these are what statesmanship is about. These ideals are what those plotting men spouted as they crisscrossed the country making speeches in hopes of getting elected – pretending all the way.
Liars, all.
After the truly tough year of 2020, I’ve been holding high hope for a fresh outlook, stability and goodwill, starting right now. I’m so hoping for it today, this 59th scheduled public inauguration of a U.S. president.
If the opposition once again plans on hanging out in some swanky eatery plotting, let it not be for the doom and failure for the newly elected, but for the good health of the newly elected as well as all of us and our nation, physically and financially. If I were a praying woman, I’d pray for their better angels to direct them. If I were a bewitching woman, I’d put a benign hex on them that prohibited bad ideas and ill will to ever escape their mouths. If I were a powerful woman, I’d spank them all and send them home to bed without their martinis.
