Corrupt Christian govt

Over the past few weeks, scandal after scandal have reached various culminations. The main one is the indictment of Lewis "Scooter" Libby, vice-president Dick Cheney’s chief of staff, on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice. Former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay is under indictment for violating campaign finance laws, while the present Majority Leader, Republican Senator Bill Frist, is the subject of an insider trading investigation. All this comes right after White House counsel Harriet Miers withdrew herself as a candidate for the Supreme Court — a nomination she got only because she is Mr Bush’s personal lawyer and friend.

This type of nepotistic practice is a habit with Mr Bush, and one which has had dire consequences — the appointment of his friend Mr Michael Brown to head that country’s national disaster management agency, even though Mr Brown had no experience in that arena, was widely seen as a key factor in the mishandling of the New Orleans disaster after Hurricane Katrina devastated that city. But those consequences were at least confined to the US itself. Not so the appointment of Mr Cheney as vice-president and Donald Rumsfeld as Defence Secretary, whose private agendas have affected the entire world.

In an interview carried in the New Yorker magazine last week, General Colin Powell’s ex-chief of staff virtually accused these two men of manipulating President Bush into the invasion of Iraq. This could happen because, according to various White House sources, Mr Bush himself has no real interest in foreign policy.

It must be worrying to other world leaders when the leader of the world’s only superpower and largest economy is apparently leaving overseas issues, not merely to advisers, but to advisers who have very narrow and self-interested agendas. Moreover, because of America’s power, even domestic issues can negatively affect other nations. For example, the Bush administration has been portrayed as anti-science, and its funding and policies have not pleased the scientific establishment in America. To this has been added the perennial debate about whether "Intelligent Design" (ID) should be taught alongside evolutionary theory in the nation’s schools.

Mr Bush has declared himself in favour of this option, even as spokespersons for the scientific community argue that such a policy would undermine the bases of science teaching since ID does not meet the criteria to be called a scientific theory. And there can be little doubt that any undermining of scientific expertise and research in the US would, in time, affect the world’s economic prosperity and progress, which are largely based on scientific and technological advances. So, whether the issue is as large as the so-called "war against terror" or as small as the promulgation of abstinence-only policies by America, other countries have to be concerned.

A central irony in all this is that the Republican Party has successfully portrayed itself as the party which occupies a higher moral ground. Because of the leadership’s opposition to abortion rights and same-sex marriages, and because of Mr Bush’s self-promotion as a devout Christian, the Republicans have strengthened their support among the religious right. But the various scandals show what voters should always know about politicians — the louder the moral rhetoric is, the more likely the ethical shortcomings will be.