PETER VAN BUREN: Are Trump's anonymous critics heroes or cowards?
'Disagreements over policy are not unique to the Trump administration. Nor are questions of competence'
The unnamed insiders who claim to be working clandestinely to resist Donald Trump are not heroes. As a State Department whistleblower who lost his career to tell the truth about the Iraq war, I am burdened by how the interviewees in Bob Woodward’s new book, “Fear,” and the anonymous writer of that New York Times “resistance” Op-Ed are hailed as patriots holding back the U.S. president’s worst impulses through fibs and bureaucratic tricks. Having faced similar choices, I know their approach is neither honorable, nor effective. No one should join the government to do only things they think are personally right; one serves the United States, and takes an oath to a Constitution. There is no addendum saying, “but if you REALLY disagree with the president it’s OK to do what you want.”
This is not to support robotic bureaucrats. But ideas, no matter how vigorously opposed, at some point change from being Trump’s or Barack Obama’s policies to those of the United States. Implementing t...
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