Scandal fatigue be Damned

Your elected leaders are encouraging you to lower your expectations on their ethical practices. There is no reason they should invite scrutiny of their behaviour, equally there is no valid reason for you to cease your vigilance of, and your outrage at corruption of public institutions.
Corruption, in all its manifestations, is spreading like a rash across the planet. The odd thing is, just like each generation believes they invented sex, there is a conviction we have just invented corruption.
For what its worth, the first laws aimed at mitigating public corruption date back to the Code of Hammurabi, circa 1780 B.C. The Babylonians were well aware of public scandal.
Societies require rules if they are to function in an orderly way. As soon as we have rules we have a basis, a definition of expected behaviour, which can be corrupted.
Most of the time we can ignore, or ‘tut tut’ revelations of corruption. We all know how scandalous behaviour is manipulated for political reasons, resonant of the ‘boy who cried wolf’. So the temptation is to revel in, or ignore completely, the game playing.
Periodically, the sheer magnitude of a ‘scandal’ forces us to pay attention. Generally, before there is any real resolution, various gambits and stalls take the heat and immediacy out of allegations. A few scapegoats are sacrificed, ‘mea culpas’ are issued, life returns to normal and corruption continues.
What those at the heart of corruption scandals rely on, why they are so deft with obfuscation and stalling tactics is they know that ‘scandal fatigue’ will soon set in. As soon as the media sense that their readership is no longer fascinated, that a story has lost its selling power, the news feeds stop.

This latest rash of scandal, breaking out like boils across the globe, could well go the same way. There is already talk of the UN’s Volker report being little more than a whitewash, for all its dramatic revelations.
Indeed, the games are evident in the comments of Leaders like Australia’s Prime Minister, John Howard on the allegations against that country’s monopoly wheat exporter. Howard told the Australian Parliament, this week:
"…there is no proof the AWB was involved in giving kickbacks" to Saddam Hussein's regime.” And "It has not been established AWB paid any kickbacks."
Howard’s concern is not for the company executives, who he would happily sacrifice on the issue. His concern is to head off the implication that his own government, ministers and departments will be caught up in the affair.
His response: Set up a whitewash inquiry, skate awfully close to outright lying then stall and stretch until everyone is thoroughly sick of the discussion - scandal fatigue. It’s worked for him before.

The US administration and Congress heavies are working the same kind of tactics. The danger there is that the disease has gone rampant through the body politic. The boils and ulcers of scandal are erupting in so many places at once; it will take a deft hand to control the infectious spread.
That is, of course, unless scandal fatigue swamps the whole mess, with the people simply turning away and losing interest.
To be sure, there will still be those out their fighting for justice to be done, for those who have corrupted the intuitions of government to be brought to book. It is to be seen if their outrage and perseverance can prevail over wider apathy.


At the root of the current outbreak of this disease, corruption, ravaging the US and its allies, is that obscene military action, the Iraq war, and the political culture which spawned it.
As much as Bush, Blair or Howard deny the fact, the war was based on false premise; lies! One of the fiercest advocates, and after the fact, beneficiaries of the war is the shady Dr. Ahmed Chalabi of the Iraqi National Congress (INC), now a deputy prime minister of Iraq. Unlike his patrons, he makes no bones about the basis of the adventure:
"We are heroes in error. As far as we're concerned, we've been entirely successful. That tyrant Saddam is gone and the Americans are in Baghdad. What was said before is not important."
But it is Dr Chalabi, it is vitally important to the health and vitality of our democratic institutions. We invest these people with the authority to govern on our behalf, which is the nature of democracy.
If those leaders choose to lead us with lies and distortions in something as crucial as prosecuting a war, why should they concern themselves about any other ethical considerations?
To be sure, it is an underlying culture of greed which set the scene for this war. It is that culture which made lies, apparently, acceptable. It is that culture which decreed; ‘win at any cost’, leading to the excesses of the kind for which Tom DeLay has been indicted.
It is the culture which seduced the previously honoured, Randy ‘Duke’ Cunningham, to become the ‘most corrupt member of Congress in the history of the institution’.  

By succumbing to scandal fatigue, tiring of the whole mess, we become implicated in the corruption of our democratic institutions. The sad part is, we are not really asked to do anything other than be outraged, and to express that outrage.
While people show interest, and at least a level of emotional involvement, media will continue to cover these issues. While the media reflect the public interest investigators and prosecutors are encouraged to keep digging to uncover the truth.
While you are expressing outrage, jurists are more inclined to recognise and respond to the standards demanded by the public at large. It is a self feeding cycle. Fail to feed it and it dies, the crooked public officials win and you can start to kiss the fundamentals of democracy goodbye.
Develop and maintain the outrage. Lift the bar of acceptable public sector, ethical behaviour high, and keep it there. The disease of corruption can only spread in a disinterested society.