In one week: From highs to lows in Washington

The moving memorial tribute to McCain was followed by the partisan Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing for US Supreme Court nominee and an anonymous article deriding Trump

During this past week in Washington, the political ideals to which we Americans aspire ran head-on into the reality of the people we have become. It began with the memorial tribute to the late Senator John McCain, whose life was described as being motivated by bipartisan civility and commitment to the higher calling of service to country and fellow man. It ended with unsettling revelations of what an administration official described as a dysfunctional White House headed by a “petty”, “vindictive”, “off the rails” president. The rest of the week was filled with the partisan and profoundly disturbing Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing for President Donald Trump’s nominee to serve on the Supreme Court.

I must admit that I watched the McCain service with mixed emotions. As an American, it was impossible not to feel inspired by his life story and his commitment to service. McCain was too young to be part of what is called the “greatest generation” — those who lived through the Great Depression and then went on to fight in the Second World War. Nevertheless, he embodied that generation’s ideals. I had deep differences with McCain’s approach to foreign policy and argued with him about his stubborn refusal to recognise the abuses endured by Palestinians as a result of Israeli policies. I also took issue with his penchant, as I once put it, “to never see a conflict that he didn’t want to bomb”. I disagreed with McCain’s conservative domestic policies, as well.

At the same time, I recall his bipartisan efforts in the 1990s to pass meaningful campaign finance reform and immigration reform and his strong stand against the George W. Bush administration’s torture policy. On a personal note, I cannot forget how, after 9/11, when McCain heard that my life had been threatened, he called and asked what he could do to support and protect me and my family. And when some of his Republican colleagues were attacking Hillary Clinton’s aide, Huma Abedin, accusing her of ties to Muslim extremism, I knew we could count on McCain to defend her. He issued a strong denunciation of these attacks and he and I spoke of the need to purge our country of this bigotry.

Sure enough, when Congress came back in session last Tuesday, the Senate confirmation hearings opened on a decidedly rancorous partisan note. The Republicans, who are in the majority, appeared to see the entire process as a mere pro forma exercise. They have the votes to push through Trump’s Supreme Court nomination and they have made it clear that they will do it on their terms. The Democrats complained that they have not been given access to all of the nominee’s files, especially those dealing with opinions he wrote when he served in George W. Bush’s White House. Many of these address issues that may very well come before the Supreme Court. Democrats requested these files and their requests were denied on the grounds that those which could be made public had been classified as “Confidential”. To make the situation worse, it was revealed that the person the Republicans had assigned to review the files and determine which should be marked “Confidential” and withheld from public view was a former employee of the nominee.

In the midst of all of this rancour, we were hit midweek, by two separate but related bombshells. The first was the release of excerpts of a soon to be published book, Fear, by Pulitzer Prizewinning author Bob Woodward. Based on interviews with scores of current and former administration officials, Fear is a look at the inner workings of this White House. The book quotes senior administration figures who describe the president as “unhinged” and “ill-informed” with these same senior officials asserting that they often find ways to circumvent the president’s orders in order to protect the country from his dangerous impulses.

‘Petty and ineffective’

A day later, the New York Times published an opinion column written by an unnamed “senior official in the Trump administration”, which reinforces the thrust of the Woodward book. In the article, the writer asserts that he agrees with some of the “bright spots” of the president’s successes, but notes that, “Despite — not because of the president’s leadership style, which is impetuous, adversarial, petty and ineffective ... senior officials will privately admit their daily disbelief at the commander-inchief’s comments and actions.”

The reactions to Woodward’s book and the Times’ piece were fascinating. Trump termed the op-ed “Treason” and demanded that the newspaper turn the writer “over to the government”. Most senior White house officials immediately stepped forward to say that they didn’t write it and the quotes attributed to them by Woodward were not true. A number of Republican Senators have shrugged off the book and the column, acknowledging that “this is nothing new. We’ve known this from the beginning”. While many Democrats and media commentators appeared to agree with the White House that the writer of the column was a coward, denouncing the “Faustian bargain” some Republicans have made to work for and to support a president they claimed was “unfit to lead” in order to get the tax cuts, deregulation and the conservative Supreme Court they wanted.

So the week that began on a high note came crashing down all around us. By the week’s end Americans found themselves confronting the chaos, partisanship and paranoid dysfunction that have come to define the real Washington.

■ Dr James J. Zogby is the president of Arab American Institute, a non-profit, non-partisan national leadership organisation.