Controversy, scandal, lying, criminals. These are not the words that come to mind when discussing our nation’s government, yet these words dominate the public discourse. News lines are filled with politicians’ names and accusations of federal offenses and sexual harassment far too often. People with dark histories are allowed to run the country and citizens turn a blind eye when someone is accused of yet another misdeed. People have to realize what is going on, right? Apparently not.

Picture the government as a boat. If there are holes in it, you either fix the holes or the boat sinks. So, if President Donald Trump and the current administration is breaking holes in the boat and no one fixes them, the government goes under. It should never get to that point, but it is becoming dangerously close.

The National Broadcasting Company reported that during the 2017-18 year alone, there have been 12 political sex-scandals involving the Trump administration and judiciary branch alone. If you think that is an excessive amount, during that same period, there have been 50 allegations of sexual assault against state-representatives in 27 states. More recently, Brett Kavanagh and Roy Moore, both conservative politicians, have been accused by numerous women of sexual assault. Although they are only allegations, one must wonder why they would come forward with these accusations if nothing happened. In this day and age, allegations like these are thought of as political schemes before they are considered to be actual crimes. That is not right.

Sex scandals are just the start of it. In the past two years, many of President Trump’s advisors and cabinet have been let go. Former Federal Bureau of Investigation director James Comey believes he was fired to “change the way the Russia investigation was conducted.” The fact that they are being fired due to corruption or scandal seems hypocritical seeing as President Trump has certainly had his fair share of accusations and general unlawfulness. I thought the purpose of the government was to find these kinds of people and punish them, not to become them. Instead, we constantly see Cable News Network reports of high-ranking officials talking to the Russian government, lying to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, evading taxes, accepting illegal campaign contributions and committing sexual harassment.

Time and time again, our nation is lied to by our “trusted” leader. Claims of criminal activity are bluntly shut down regardless of ample evidence against the “amazing” people he appoints. The sources that try to inform the public of our government’s wrong-doing are dubbed fake news by prejudiced right-wing supporters, and people are buying it.

There is no denying the fact that the people who are running for positions in our government are not qualified for their positions. If we continue to allow these people to keep the power handed to them while ignoring the horrible acts they have committed, we are simply saying that it is acceptable to harass women and take bribes from foreign governments.

The only way to fix this is to fight it. A wall can’t keep out corruption, but decent people can.