A Crisis of Moral Inertia

I knew a man (“Bob,” not his real name) who claimed that on June 17, 1972, he was part of a small group on Virginia Ave about to enter the Howard Johnson’s hotel across from the Watergate and said, “Boys, it doesn’t take an army to plant a bug.” He thought the plan badly designed. The closest thing to corroboration I knew of was in 1990 when I witnessed two FBI agents at the bar in the Hawk & Dove on Capitol Hill buy him a drink and toast “the one that got away.”

Bob had a few unusual professional experiences. He had been an FBI plant in KKK chapters in North Carolina and eastern Maryland. He remarked that at the end of those assignments, it seemed like the number of plants, informants and actual government agents outnumbered the remaining active klansmen. He grew less cynical in his old age, sought to advance positive causes (though often in questionable ways, naturally), and was increasingly critical of the amorality and incompetence of government. I never knew his source of income or the funding for his diverse ventures.

In retrospect, it is astounding that highly-placed men in the White House would have knowingly signed off on the Watergate stunt. But, to offer a limited defense, they probably knew how previous administrations and the nascent deep state had operated and assumed they were not doing anything abnormal or likely to result in discovery or blowback.

The use of the “plumbers,” men outside the formal structure of federal law enforcement or intelligence, was at least a token nod of respect for law and the integrity of federal agencies. Obama and Biden haven’t needed as much use of outside “plumbers” because the leadership in our critical agencies is now more openly willing to do the sorts of things once delegated to the likes of Gordon Liddy.

Where once the deep state justified stepping outside the law to combat communism and curtail domestic forces working to advance communism, they currently rationalize that Donald Trump’s threat to “our democracy” and the tide of “white supremacy” justifies abuse of power. The targets and rationalizations are different but the lack of honor, and the absence of faith in and respect for democracy and lawful process, are quite similar. In the case of the current offenders, there is a circular logic in that the more they undermine and pervert the legal process, the more their lack of faith in the system is rational, and the more they fear letting their targets come to power and control the same tools with the rule of law so diminished.

When we learn of atrocities by an allegedly “rogue” FBI office to focus on the threat posed by practicing Catholics or parent groups at school board meetings, the problem is less the sophomoric ideological turn behind the policy as it is the moral inertia that prevents others from within the agency to instantly and loudly object. It should not be left to lone whistleblowers to object to brain-dead, unlawful, unprincipled policies and actions.

The eternal need for good men to step forward and not remain silent must be satisfied to prevent societal implosion and the rise of evil. The sheer moral inertia within our intelligence and law enforcement agencies during the “Russiagate” scandal, J6 prosecutorial overkill, and the setup of the Mar-a-Lago raid should be more troubling than the overt partisanship.