SEPTEMBER 28, 2018 By Tomas Mendoza
I am a college-educated, suburban, first-generation Latino immigrant. I voted for President Obama in 2008 and 2012. I find President Trump to lack the basic moral character that we should expect in our political leaders and did not consider, even for a moment, voting for him in 2016. After watching how Senate Democrats and the media handled the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh, however, I will be voting Republican in 2018 and for Trump in 2020.
When I came to the United States, I left a country that had recently undergone a military coup. My family experienced first-hand what happens when those in power abandon the rule of law. We saw the devastation that comes to a society when men of power believe their political objectives so justified that they are willing to pursue them by any means necessary. In the eyes of those men of power, we could see the deadening of souls that occurs when a man’s perceived benevolence blinds him to his own tyranny.
During the Kavanaugh hearings I saw that same look in the eyes of Senate Democrats. The hearings made clear that the Democrats on the committee were not interested in pursuing the truth or respecting Christine Blasey Ford’s desire for anonymity. Instead, they simply sought to delay the vote in the hopes of winning the next election.
If Kavanaugh’s reputation and Ford’s privacy had to be sacrificed on the altar of political expediency, the committee Democrats were not going to let basic decency prevent them from using the courts as an alternative path to the political ends they cannot reach through legislation.
I found Ford believable. Although her memory had significant gaps, she has clearly experienced some trauma. She does not come across as politically or financially motivated as some of the other accusers do. I also found Kavanaugh to be believable. He has an impeccable record and strongly denied the accusations. We may never answer the questions of what truly occurred.
But there is a greater question at hand, a question beyond the truthfulness of Ford or Kavanaugh’s testimony. This question will have lasting effects long beyond the tenure of Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy’s replacement. That question is whether the politics of power, the politics by any means demonstrated by Sen. Dianne Feinstein and Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats, will be rewarded.
A mentor once told me, when discussing how to respond to inappropriate sexual conduct in the workplace, “You promote what you permit.” If Democrats are allowed to delay this nomination and the elections in 2018 and 2020 benefit them, both Republicans and Democrats for a generation will have learned that the American people prefer to be ruled by tyrants that punish their enemies instead of representatives in a republic who adhere to the rule of law.
I am a college-educated, suburban, first-generation Latino immigrant. I voted for President Obama in 2008 and 2012. I find President Trump to lack the basic moral character that we should expect in our political leaders and did not consider, even for a moment, voting for him in 2016. After watching how Senate Democrats and the media handled the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh, however, I will be voting Republican in 2018 and for Trump in 2020.
When I came to the United States, I left a country that had recently undergone a military coup. My family experienced first-hand what happens when those in power abandon the rule of law. We saw the devastation that comes to a society when men of power believe their political objectives so justified that they are willing to pursue them by any means necessary. In the eyes of those men of power, we could see the deadening of souls that occurs when a man’s perceived benevolence blinds him to his own tyranny.
During the Kavanaugh hearings I saw that same look in the eyes of Senate Democrats. The hearings made clear that the Democrats on the committee were not interested in pursuing the truth or respecting Christine Blasey Ford’s desire for anonymity. Instead, they simply sought to delay the vote in the hopes of winning the next election.
If Kavanaugh’s reputation and Ford’s privacy had to be sacrificed on the altar of political expediency, the committee Democrats were not going to let basic decency prevent them from using the courts as an alternative path to the political ends they cannot reach through legislation.
I found Ford believable. Although her memory had significant gaps, she has clearly experienced some trauma. She does not come across as politically or financially motivated as some of the other accusers do. I also found Kavanaugh to be believable. He has an impeccable record and strongly denied the accusations. We may never answer the questions of what truly occurred.
But there is a greater question at hand, a question beyond the truthfulness of Ford or Kavanaugh’s testimony. This question will have lasting effects long beyond the tenure of Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy’s replacement. That question is whether the politics of power, the politics by any means demonstrated by Sen. Dianne Feinstein and Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats, will be rewarded.
A mentor once told me, when discussing how to respond to inappropriate sexual conduct in the workplace, “You promote what you permit.” If Democrats are allowed to delay this nomination and the elections in 2018 and 2020 benefit them, both Republicans and Democrats for a generation will have learned that the American people prefer to be ruled by tyrants that punish their enemies instead of representatives in a republic who adhere to the rule of law.
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