It’s been just days since James Comey went before the Senate Intelligence Committee.  We learned many things from the well-considered and presented testimony on Thursday, June 8.  The news reports at the time summarized many of the individual points that Comey made, and several listed similar high points as the important “lessons learned.”  For example, most news reports seemed most taken with Comey accusing Trump of lying.  Of equal importance, although mentioned much less was Trump’s lack of interest in finding out more information about the Russian interference.  Few articles focused on Comey’s actual intention of using this highly visible opportunity to help Special Counsel Mueller construct the obstruction of justice argument.   

​While the Constitution clearly gives the Congress the responsibility to oversee the conduct of the President, the Republican House and Senate have not addressed the issue of potentially illegal payments received by Trump; reviewed Trump’s mismanagement of foreign policy and executive agencies; and only reluctantly moved to have its intelligence committees investigate Russian interference and its ties to the Trump campaign.  The reluctance of both the House and the Senate to exercise its constitutionally mandated oversight duties of Trump stands in stark contrast to its previous eagerness to oversee the Obama administration.
 
The GOP reluctance is all the more surprising because Trump is someone who many of the GOP do not consider a “true” Republican.  As a businessman and during his campaign for President, not only did he fail to espouse many of the policies Republicans consider sacred, but he openly supported antithetical policies.  And, although since winning office, he has pledged his support to the Republican agenda, one might reasonably suspect him to be viewed with enough suspicion to loosen the ties that would usually bind the Republican Congress to their party’s president.  Of course, one would only be surprised at the behavior of Republicans if one expected them to be principled. 

​The Trump protest marches (Women’s March, Muslim March, Tax March, Science March, Climate March, Immigration March, and March for Truth) in Washington DC, wind through the Capitol streets, formless, like an amoeba.  The people in the streets appear as the caricature of American before 2016: diverse, well intended, optimistic and engaged.   Now, marchers yell chants in unison, but with little conversation, except occasional comments about the sad strangeness that we need to march to express fundamental wishes.  Demands for truth, advancement of science, and freedom of the press reinforce how quickly we’re losing fundamental rights and values – too basic to actively cherish.  They were simply our gifts as Americans.  The marches are remarkable for the “spirit” shown, but there are few signs of actions being taken or planned that will keep us from losing our fundamental rights and values. We wonder if or how the resistance will develop from a movement that expresses our feelings about what has happened to one that is instrumental in changing what has happened?