02-05-2019, 09:35 PM
An organization from the Cold War that long identified the Good Guys and Bad Guys in the struggle for political freedom and responsible government, Freedom House, now shows concerns about the United States. America could have its swings from Left (Carter) to Right (Reagan), but nobody questioned whether a general respect for the principles of free elections, checks and balances, rule of law, an unfettered press, an independent judiciary, and a rejection of corruption. The difference between freedom and its lack did not imply so much that opposing sides got that they wanted or did not get what they wanted, as that is not the essence of freedom. Only in rare cases does anyone get everything that he wants. We knew that Big Business wanted cheap labor, low taxes, minimal regulation, and a reliance upon profits-first solutions to all economic questions. We knew what liberals wanted. But either way, government was to be clean of corruption and cronyism; government officials were to conduct elections impartially; law was to be left to neutral judges; Constitutional norms were beyond challenge; political language avoided demonization of fellow Americans; rational thought was the norm in decision-making; and news media were treated as honest brokers of information.
This was true even during the most dangerous time that any American can now remember: World War II, when two Great Powers had designs on world conquest with the imposition of slave systems in which most Americans would become serfs, and others would be either enslaved or exterminated. We had elections as unecumbered as ever; we had as free a press as we could get away with (if it was not a military secret it was available). People did not accuse their opponents of having the intention of bringing an Axis victory to America.
In two years Donald Trump has degraded this heritage . It is not slow erosion due to neglect; it looks like design as in Italy under Mussolini. Trump cannot begin the degradation of American democracy as quickly as Hitler did by shutting down the opposition, sending people to political prisons, closing opposition papers, and turning people into helpless pariahs. Political institutions in Italy in the early 1920s were far more robust than those in Germany in the 1930s.
This degradation began earlier with baby steps under such operatives as Lee Atwater and Karl Rove, but America reversed those baby steps quickly under new Presidents and reverted to normal. For decades people who may have know of the seams in our system recognized the wisdom of refusal to exploit them. Trump does not act alone; he has collaborators.
The issue is not tax cuts or bigger spending. It is not lax environmental regulation or rigid protection of the environment. It is not being for or against abortion. It is not for putting profits first or putting service first. It is about tendencies toward dictatorship and tendencies away from it. We will solve the political debates on issues of legislation.
Such is my venting.
This was true even during the most dangerous time that any American can now remember: World War II, when two Great Powers had designs on world conquest with the imposition of slave systems in which most Americans would become serfs, and others would be either enslaved or exterminated. We had elections as unecumbered as ever; we had as free a press as we could get away with (if it was not a military secret it was available). People did not accuse their opponents of having the intention of bringing an Axis victory to America.
In two years Donald Trump has degraded this heritage . It is not slow erosion due to neglect; it looks like design as in Italy under Mussolini. Trump cannot begin the degradation of American democracy as quickly as Hitler did by shutting down the opposition, sending people to political prisons, closing opposition papers, and turning people into helpless pariahs. Political institutions in Italy in the early 1920s were far more robust than those in Germany in the 1930s.
This degradation began earlier with baby steps under such operatives as Lee Atwater and Karl Rove, but America reversed those baby steps quickly under new Presidents and reverted to normal. For decades people who may have know of the seams in our system recognized the wisdom of refusal to exploit them. Trump does not act alone; he has collaborators.
The issue is not tax cuts or bigger spending. It is not lax environmental regulation or rigid protection of the environment. It is not being for or against abortion. It is not for putting profits first or putting service first. It is about tendencies toward dictatorship and tendencies away from it. We will solve the political debates on issues of legislation.
Such is my venting.