Benedict Arnold was a well-respected and courageous officer in the American Continental Army during the Revolutionary War. He fought in half a dozen battles and was central to winning the critical Battle of Saratoga in 1777, where he suffered a leg injury that sidelined him for the next two years.
They say
that idle hands are the devil’s workshop, and that appears to apply to legs as
well. Over the next two years, Arnold’s inherent victim complex blossomed.
Others were, he suggested, getting credit for his actions or getting promoted
when he deserved such.
In 1779,
Arnold would take a step that would change his life: He married Peggy Shippen,
a member of a powerful loyalist family in Philadelphia. Eventually, his
jealousy would get the best of him, and he contracted to betray the Americans.
By at least as early as July of that year, he was giving the British
information on American troop strengths, movements, and munition locations.
George
Washington knew none of this and trusted Arnold and put him in charge of West
Point in August 1780. One of the most important posts in the country, it was
the spot from which the Americans commanded the Hudson River. Less than two
weeks after receiving his command, Arnold agreed to a plan, in exchange for
$20,000 ($3,500,000 today), to surrender the post to the British in September.
The
surrender never occurred, however, because Arnold’s British contact, Major John
André, was captured along with the plans for the betrayal. André was hanged,
and Arnold escaped to join the British. The British immediately commissioned
him as a brigadier general in their army, but most soldiers considered him
dishonorable, and many refused to follow him.
Following
the war, Arnold would spend most of the rest of his life in London, where the
king liked him, but many British citizens and military men despised him. In
America, his name has become synonymous with treachery.
Although
Arnold’s ultimate plan never came to fruition, had it done so, it could have
changed the outcome of the war. Washington said of the plan that “Such an event
must have given the American cause a dangerous, if not a fatal wound.”
And that is the crux of why betrayal is so dangerous. It’s one thing to understand that your enemy seeks your destruction. It’s another thing altogether when one of your own, one upon whom you’re counting on to man the ramparts, turns and lets the enemy in. It might not be fatal to your endeavor, but it could be and most certainly will endanger the mission.
Sylvester Stallone recently called Donald Trump the new George Washington. That’s not quite true, but like Washington, Trump is trying to carve out of an enemy-infested wilderness a great nation seeking freedom and prosperity. Also, like Washington, Trump is faced with numerous people who are theoretically on his side while, in reality, aligning with the enemy.
And who
is this enemy? The Swamp. The Borg. Basically, the government that controls
virtually every element of American life, from baby formula to school
curriculum to college funding to healthcare to retirement, not to mention
banking and justice and speech…if you object.
Ostensibly,
Trump should have a mandate given that he won the popular vote and the
Electoral College, gave the GOP a Senate majority, and kept the majority in the
House. The first test of that mandate came recently and it didn’t go
particularly well.
In the
Senate, with Mitch McConnell leaving his leadership role, there were three
competitors to replace him: Rick Scott of Florida, John Thune of South Dakota,
and John Cornyn of Texas. Hardcore MAGA firebrand Mike Lee or bomb-thrower Rand
Paul weren’t even considered. Of the three considered, two are virtual
Democrats, with the Conservative Review giving Cornyn a Liberty Score of 54% and Thune an abysmal 51%, while Scott scored
a respectable 86%.
Both
Cornyn and Thune are, at their core anti-Trump, while Scott has been a staunch
supporter of the president. Thune, who said after January 6, “What former President
Trump did to undermine faith in our election system and disrupt the peaceful
transfer of power is inexcusable,” is seen as K Street’s favorite and
endorsed Tim Scott in the GOP primary. In 2016, the immigration dove and gun
control fan Cornyn ridiculed Trump’s border wall,
was booed at the Texas GOP convention in
2022, and, in 2023 said Trump couldn’t win as
his time had passed.
In a
shameful last act, McConnell set a secret vote, and Thune came out on top. The
fact that the Senate GOP dispatched an aggressively MAGA leader and instead
elected someone who’s basically a Democrat tells you that Senate GOPers don’t
care about what the American people are looking for.
What’s
more, at the same time, in a closely split Senate, Trump’s pick for Attorney
General, Matt Gaetz withdrew after it became clear there would not be 50
Republicans to confirmed.
The
Swamp, of course, is not just the Senate. With Trump’s picks of Pete Hegseth
for Defense, RFK Jr. for HHS, Tuli Gabbard for DNI, and Tom Homan as Border
Czar, larger Washington is reacting with horror and fear. Employees at HHS are
threatening to quit, Justice Department lawyers are lawyering up and “freaking out“ while DoD
employees are “alarmed“ and governors are promising not
to assist in deportations.
But
those fears, which are exactly what are necessary to begin trimming the bloat
from government, only exist because of Trump’s picks, and those picks (and
Trump) will only succeed if the Senate approves his nominees. And that’s a
problem.
During
his first term, Trump’s picks were approved at a rate far slower than
Obama’s or Bush’s. With a McConnell clone running the Senate,
there’s concern of a repeat.
While the Senate is by design supposed to be a check on the tyranny of the
masses, it’s rare that a president must battle his own party to do his job.
Obama
had a similar mandate in 2008, and Democrats gave him everything he wanted and
more. But Democrats are a core part of the Swamp while Trump is seeking to
battle it.
And
there’s the rub…
Democrats
are the Swamp, and so too is the bureaucracy. But sadly, much of the GOP is, as
well.
Trump
has his work cut out for him in this uphill battle he’s taken on. But if
there’s anything to be gleaned from his picks so far, it’s that, unlike in
2016, this time he knows what he’s up against and is planning to take the fight
to the Swamp with bare fists and brass knuckles if necessary, and it will be.
If Trump
continues to assemble a team more interested in solving America’s problems than
in being feted by the elites, he just might triumph over the Benedict Arnolds
who populate the establishment GOP, those whose primary goal in life seems to
be to go along to get along, accumulating ever more power and money along the
way.