“The most beautiful thing about a tree is what you do with it after you cut it down.“
Rush Limbaugh
Barreling toward either the end of the Trump scourge or a dramatic intensification of America’s darkest age there is no let up in the tempo of daily outrages. Whether it’s the purposeful spread of disease he now insists on or unintelligible gibberish he spews from the stage of his super spreader rallies, going to war with US cities or with American allies, Trump is a man unhinged from anything other than his rabid perception of what continued relevance requires. There is no plan, per se, he is following to achieve his shifting goals of remaining the most disruptive human being on Earth, only a continuous series of outbursts that create their own individual set of consequences, always destructive, that the system he is assaulting must address until another bomb is thrown, another inferno started. To paraphrase a WaPo editorial, he doesn’t govern so much as he harasses.
Yet and still, Trump is a moron, a complete imbecile. Granting him the credit for bringing the world’s great superpower to its knees is like saying pneumonia killed my dad, who suffered from late stage pleural lung cancer; what’s on the death certificate hardly tells the full story. The passing of RBG and our collective helplessness in the face of some of the most odious hypocrisy ever displayed on Capitol Hill clarifies what the founders could not conjure: that no democratic institution, no matter how old and established, can withstand a sustained category 5 hurricane of bad faith and criminal intent by both a President and the party who backs him. Nixon never stood a chance, not because the GOP leadership was so honorable, but because they surmised their constituents would take them to task if they weren’t. Those days are obviously over.
Lord knows America never expected its politicians to be perfect; but the contract always stipulated they at least present good faith and a cursory nod toward honor and integrity. The supposition, up until last week, was always that the taint of hypocrisy had to at least be offensive enough to discourage behavior that couldn’t be publicly defended. That is what passed for the honor code of US politics. Like so many other accepted practices and traditions that existed before January, 2017 it is now a fatality. As usual McConnell and company surprised nobody, but the wanton despicability was shocking nonetheless. They’d do better to simply shrug and taunt “sue me.”
Either way, their base, which is to say the MAGA wretched core, now demands dishonor and would surely penalize anything else. Ask Mitt Romney or Chuck Grassley. The chicken or egg question of whether the destruction of our democracy is a GOP scheme, pushed forward behind a nihilist horde they manipulate, or the collateral damage of cowards unwilling to try and put back the nihilist genie they let out of the bottle is fairly meaningless at this point. Whether McConnell is diabolical or merely an invertebrate, or a combo of both hardly matters. The ruinous results surely do. Suffice it to say a sizable minority is getting the governance they have been indoctrinated to revere and couldn’t care less whether it works or not, whether it abides the Constitution or not, or whether it ends the American democratic experiment or not.
The mission statement of Fox/AM starts and ends with creating the circular reasoning necessary to digest any proposition its “personalities” insert. That begins with the tenets that undergird all narratives. Abortion is murder so anyone who supports it is utterly disqualified from making value judgements. Check. Social progress is simply the way liberals keep minorities and other supplicants, like LGBT folks, within their voting bloc. Far from necessary, it only takes from whites and creates entitled classes. Check. Tax cuts always pay for themselves and are at least revenue neutral. Tax hikes are the bread and butter of Democratic theft from the working man. Check. The list goes on and has expanded over the years but these fundamental false premises form the basis of all Fox/AM story telling and the corrosive impact it has on the national discussion. The most paramount axiom of them all? Bipartisanship equals betrayal and is grounds for immediate excommunication. See John McCain.
Over thirty years of constant repetition, relentless application as accepted truths and divine principles, has imbued this reactionary code with a gospel quality and a guiding identity for its political adherents. The Reich had its superior aryan man, Fox/AM has its “true Reagan conservative.” That is, a class of zealots and opportunists wedded to the guidelines Roger Ailes laid out for their political fortunes. This is what the Republican Party has morphed into and must pursue. The fact it is headed by a lawless thug is subordinate to Trump’s willingness to follow the code to the letter, regardless of how much the national interest suffers. “He may be a lawless thug, but he’s our lawless thug.” That’s where we are at right now. It’s nihilist destruction care of the Donald, but in the name of Ditto Heads!
Few doubt Trump’s prime motivation for rushing through RBG’s successor. He has always relied on the courts to do his bidding, or at least muddle things sufficiently for him to exploit the uncertainty. He plans to declare victory November 3, whatever the tally, and sic his legal teams on the American electoral process. Judging from the servile exclamations from Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel, the GOP will back Trump’s accusations all the way. The chaos he is willing to foist will only be as effective as the resources he can depend on to legitimate his false claims; a 6-3 majority at the top can’t hurt.
We now exist as what German political scientist, Ernst Fraenkel, in his study of Nazi rule circa 1932-38 coined a “dual state.” That is, arbitrary power rendered palatable by established institutions and economic interaction. Trump, like Hitler, has nothing but contempt for the system he is supposed to safeguard. The GOP House and Senate caucuses deploy formality and procedure to dispense and legitimate his capricious dictats, both using the power they hold while steadily eroding the institution that grants it to them. Where does it all lead? What does a continuation of the Trump era promise for American governance? History is clear on that score. All roads head to nowhere good. BC
Bill, you write that “no democratic institution, no matter how old and established, can withstand a sustained category 5 hurricane of bad faith and criminal intent by both a President and the party who backs him.” That perfectly catastrophic storm has reached our shores and now sits and shits over all of us across the nation’s length and breadth. And amidst the disaster, you end today’s reflection with a forecast of our nation’s future: “Where does it all lead? What does a continuation of the Trump era promise for American governance? History is clear on that score. All roads head to nowhere good.”
A responsible weather person doesn’t simply warn citizens under hurricane threat that they’re about to be walloped by a Category 5. He informs them of what they can do to safely ride out the maelstrom and reduce its worst possible consequences for their lives. He lists the precautions they need to take and urges that they make all haste to protect themselves, their families, and their communities to the maximum extent possible.
Such assistance is what I and, I’m guessing, more than a few of your other regular readers want from you at this moment, Bill. Perhaps you can begin by sharing what you yourself are planning to do beyond writing superb, compelling essays. Then tell us what others you know, or know of, are planning and implementing. What, for you, will be the public safety precautions you’ll be taking? What will be the actions you and those you know take to come together and build up the protections against storm damage which can minimize destruction and leave you all — us all — alive and able to imagine once again kicking?
I just posted on Facebook this message, concise enough that I could keep the large-type letters and be able to add a visually powerful background: “How will you answer when they ask, ‘What did you do to fight Trump’s fascism?'” I followed that up with a comment: “What all are you doing now to fight that fascism? Is it enough? If not, what else could you be doing? Could it include bringing others onboard and supporting them? What support do you yourself need at this moment to do what must be done?”
Now, Bill, is the time for such statements, considerations, and actions.
I’m happy to see in the days that have proceeded since the latest Report that the bad news of McConnell’s collaboration with Trump’s rushing through a RBG replacement has been accompanied by the good news that most Americans feel strongly that this is unfair and hypocritical. I hope this translates into more votes for Biden and against a Republican Senate. I remain hopeful that our institutions will withstand the widespread attacks and indifference to their health, and that having two branches of the Federal government in Democrat hands will go a long way toward offsetting the imbalance in the courts resulting from Trump and McConnell’s stuffing the judiciary with all-too-often poorly qualified conservative nominees.