Principled Resignations?
One of many disappointments I’ve had during the current administration is the dearth of principled resignations. No small number of Bush appointees have left their posts, but most have wanted “more time with their families” rather than a fire of vitriol.
Two examples are particularly obvious. Christine Todd Whitman was sidelined at EPA, reduced from Republican moderate stardom to whining “it’s my party, too” after playing chief apologist for anti-environment crusades. And Colin Powell’s four years as Secretary of State were an extended exercise in quietly suffering humiliation.
Would that they and others departed with flourish, perhaps even with the words of this brilliant, unsigned Time magazine piece from the pre-Watergate Nixon era channeling Nathan Hale: “I am sorry that I have only one job to give for my country.”
