Saying Goodbye To Rick Perry at the U.S. Energy Department
It appears that Rick Perry will be stepping down as U.S. Secretary of Energy, perhaps related to his being swept up in the Ukrainian outrage. In all fairness, Perry has had a fairly scandal-free tenure at the DoE, though his allegiance to the fossil fuel industry and his total lack of qualifications for the position in the first place will not stand him in good stead when it comes to history’s evaluation of his term in office.The photo above (for which the photographer was promptly fired) shows Perry hugging Robert Murray, CEO of Murray Energy, this country’s largest privately held coal company.
Perry looks like a saint when compared to other cabinet members who have resigned in disgrace, e.g., Scott Pruitt at the EPA and Ryan Zinke at the Department of the Interior, not to mention other criminals / scummy individuals in and around the Trump administration:
Wilbur Ross, Commerce Secretary, now famous for his violation of conflict-of-interest rules
Michael Flynn, Former national security adviser, pleaded guilty to lying to federal agents
Ben Carson, Housing and Urban Development Secretary, forced to cancel an order for a $31,000 dining set for his Washington office
Betsy DeVos, Education Secretary, conflicts of interest with her debt-collection company and the nation’s largest operator of for-profit charter schools
Paul Manafort, former chairman of Trump’s presidential campaign, serving at least seven and a half years in prison for illegal foreign lobbying, witness tampering, eight felony counts of tax evasion, bank fraud and failure to disclose a foreign bank account
Michael Cohen, former personal lawyer for Trump, serving three years in prison for evading federal income taxes, participating in a scheme to pay hush money to two women on Trump’s behalf before the 2016 election and lying to banks and Congress. “It was my duty to cover up his dirty deeds,” Cohen told the court at his sentencing.
Carl Icahn, former special adviser to Trump on regulatory reform, whose only interest was changing an Environmental Protection Agency rule on ethanol credits he said was costing refineries he owns hundreds of millions of dollars a year
Rick Gates, former deputy campaign manager, pleaded guilty to lying to FBI agents and conspiracy against the U.S.
George Papadopoulos, former Trump campaign foreign policy adviser, pleaded guilty in October 2017 to lying to FBI agents about contacts he had with Russians who claimed to have dirt on Hillary Clinton. Sentenced to 14 days in jail.
Roger Stone, Trump adviser, charged with obstructing Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. election and lying about his communication with WikiLeaks.
Again, in comparison, Perry is a prince.
