Draining The Swamp... Of Trump's Friends

     

     Despite President Trump's election promise, Chester Alan Arthur, the 21st president of the U.S., is a real tough guy when it comes to "draining the swamp." He served from 1881 to 1885, promoted to the office after the assassination of president James A. Garfield. Nobody better represented the broken system of government patronage than he, for he spent nearly a decade controlling the port of New York. Despite doing very little work, he made $1 million a year with salary on top of his personal commissions and his successful law practice. His promotion came for his work with boss Roscoe Conkling, who controlled the Stalwart faction of the Republican Party, for Arthur had led the New York branch of the party. When he became president, however, his former boss's insistence on promotion and the fact that Garfield's assassin was a disgruntled office-seeker led him in 1883 to sign the Pendleton Civil Service Act, and he also made the application of the law exponentially more effective. 

     Donald Trump played on the sexism of Americans and promised to lock up Hillary Clinton, who, in the face of over a dozen investigations, was cleared of any wrongdoing. How Americans thought a billionaire would clean the influence of money from politics I will never understand, but he only created the swamp. 14 of his associates have been indicted on or convicted of felony charges. Campaign chair Paul Manafort and deputy Rick Gates, national security advisor Michael Flynn, two associates of Rudy Giuliani, early and prominent Trump supporters Representatives Chris Collins and Duncan Hunter, Sam Patten, Robert Kraft, George Nader, Michael Cohen, Roger Stone, George Papadopoulos, and others have been convicted of charges ranging from solicitation of prostitution, to child pornography, to electoral fraud, to lying before Congress, and other serious crimes. The Mueller probe alone resulted in 6 convictions, and many more Trump associates remain under investigation. By far one of the most corrupt administrations, it will remain a stain on American history.