Recent Accountability Commentaries

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Who Will Stand Up for Truth?
“As long as the world shall last there will be wrongs, and if no man objected and no man rebelled, those wrongs would last forever.” – Clarence Darrow This is a case about truth and lies; right and wrong. At the conclusion of the White House defense team’s arguments on behalf of President Trump, the revelations by former National Security...
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January 29, 2020
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Now We Know
After all the denials and a White House dream team of TV star lawyers who have stated in their opening arguments on Saturday that President Trump’s purpose in withholding aid to Ukraine had not been conditioned on an investigation into former Vice-President Joe Biden, his son Hunter and other Democrats, The New York Times reports (Jan. 26) that the president...
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January 27, 2020
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Interview with U.S. Congressman Salud Carbajal – Part II
Yesterday, I posted the first of a two-part interview, conducted on January 3, with U.S. Rep. (D) Salud Carbajal who represents California’s 24th District. Along with his committee assignments in congress, Carbajal is part of another vital group in our nation’s capital. You’re part of the Problem Solvers Caucus, a group of bipartisan members who are committed to working together...
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January 24, 2020
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Sign of the Times
I beg your indulgence. Due to my watching the opening impeachment arguments in the Senate — to be used in a future commentary — I am postponing my interview with a U.S. congressman until Thursday. Discussing sign stealing in college football, Miami University coach Chuck Martin said, “ ‘I don’t like stealing signals being part of the game, but it...
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January 20, 2020
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The Most Important Question Before Senators
As I write this commentary, I’m watching Chief Justice John Roberts ask all 100 Senators to stand and take a special oath for the Impeachment Trial of President Trump. “Do you solemnly swear that in all things appertaining to the trial of the impeachment of Donald John Trump, president of the United States, now pending, you will do impartial justice according...
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January 17, 2020
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Two Presidents on the Brink of War
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”   — George Santayana, Spanish philosopher At the most critical juncture of the Cuban Missile Crisis, President Kennedy was facing the very real possibility of nuclear war with Russia. In a speech to the American people, Kennedy details the crisis and expresses his desire for full and complete denuclearization....
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January 13, 2020
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Fast and Loose
As a New York Times editorial (Jan. 3), cogently puts it: “The real question to ask about the American drone attack that killed Major General Qassim Suleimani was not whether it was justified, but whether it was wise.” Several years ago at Christmas time, I gave some money to a homeless man sitting in front of the local post office....
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January 6, 2020
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One Quality That the People of This Country Have Always Respected
We’re all looking for positive stories. This editorial — from The New York Times, Sunday March 7, 1954, under the title, “The ‘Positive’ Story” — is more a warning to President Eisenhower, and offers many parallels to today’s headlines. What many were unaware at the time, Eisenhower had already begun a stealth campaign against the demagogic Senator Joseph R. McCarthy,...
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December 23, 2019
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Moral Courage
In my 2005 book, What Do You Stand for? – Stories About Principles That Matter, I began tobacco insider Jeffrey Wigand’s story with these words: What do you do when you discover something wrong? What do you do with what you know? Do you remain silent or come forward? Do you remain loyal to the company or expose the truth?...
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December 18, 2019
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One Leader Who Should Not Be Ignored
“When you are a leader and every week you have young people demonstrating with such a message, you cannot remain neutral… They helped me change.” – Emmanuel Macron, president of France At 16, climate activist Greta Thunberg is the youngest to ever have been selected as TIME magazine’s “Person of the Year.” “We cannot just continue living as if there...
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December 16, 2019