Missouri, Kansas Republicans mum on George Santos’ lies. Shame is truly dead in politics

College dropout, charlatan and bold-faced liar George Santos is now a U.S. congressman-elect. Several of our members of Congress don’t have college degrees. Nothing wrong with that. Basically, a college degree means your parents had some money. Thus, it shows the New York Republican has a certain scrappiness to have gotten elected to the House of Representatives without a diploma.

So why “embellish” — no, scratch that — so why lie that he did? That’s not being scrappy. That’s being a liar. You can’t claim you worked for such titans of finance as Goldman Sachs or Citigroup just because the little boiler room brokerage firm where you worked had those companies execute your trades. That’s like me saying I’m on the board of Walmart because I bought my Christmas lights there.

Santos’ most despicable lie was to claim he had grandparents who survived the horrors of the Holocaust. That kind of falsehood is a direct slap in the face to those who perished and the loved ones they left behind. These are not “embellishments” as Santos claims, but lies.

Most troubling is the silence from GOP leadership in Congress. By my count, not one Republican senator or representative from Kansas or Missouri has spoken out against Santos. They are dutifully following House speaker hopeful Kevin McCarthy’s lead and saying nothing. And let’s not kid ourselves, either: If Santos were a Democrat, that side of the aisle would likely be mum too while trying to figure out what to do.

Our country seems to have lost its sense of shame. Being elected to Congress is a high honor, yet the collective ethos of that body is to stay in power at any cost. Thus, those our elected officials represent and the Constitution they swore an oath to protect and defend — and most important, to execute their duties — get shunted off to the side. That there is any pause at all from doing what is right as members do their political calculus is a clear sign our system of government is broken — possibly to the point of being irreparable.

Way back in late 1970s as a skinny, goofy high school senior, I received a Naval ROTC scholarship, which meant that upon graduation from college, I’d be commissioned as an officer of Marines. On the day I accepted the scholarship, and four-plus years later when I finally graduated and was commissioned as a second lieutenant, I took the following oath:

“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So, help me God.”

I took that oath each time I was promoted. When one of my Marines added a new stripe or rocker to his or her uniform, I had that person swear the oath again. The oath was part of our DNA. The line that always stood out to me was that I took the oath without any “purpose of evasion.” In other words, when things got rough, or if there was a chance I could lose my life doing my duty, that’s the price I was willing to pay to serve my country. It was a price my Marines were willing to pay as well.

This is the same oath taken by members of Congress. Members of the current Republican leadership are purposely evading that oath by staying silent and allowing Santos to take a seat. This lack of moral courage is troubling when Congress is the body that can declare war and send our daughters and sons off to risk their lives in defense of country. That is not a decision to be left to sniveling cowards.

There are 77 members of Congress who have served in the military. All of them served honorably and some were severely wounded. I am hoping they will stand up to their leaders and shame them into doing what is right.

This story was originally published December 29, 2022 at 10:40 AM.