Your Independent Journal from the Heartland
If Sinclair Lewis were alive today, its easy to believe that the title of his book, “It Can’t Happen Here,” would change to “It Has Happened Here”: If this isn’t a dictatorship, it sure walks and talks like one. That term is used intentionally, because it describes the current “cult of personality” style of authoritarianism; after the demise of Trump, no spring chicken, we can talk about oligarchy, plutocracy, or even, God help us, a Trump dynasty.
Quoting the historian Enzo Collotti, “On 24 March 1933, with only the Social Democratic representatives still present to oppose the motion, the Reichstag voted for its own political suicide by handing over full powers to Hitler.” (i.e., the Enabling Act) Combined with the earlier Supreme Court ruling to grant Trump presidential immunity for virtually anything he does while in office, the Republican Senate’s mindless approval of all the Trump nominees for Cabinet posts is a giant goose-step in the same direction. What a rogue’s gallery is now in place! The kind of people you might expect a convicted criminal to choose: poorly qualified ideologues determined, like their boss, not to guide the ship of state around an iceberg, but to crash directly into it for blocking the way. As others have noted, the only credentials that matter to Trump are unquestioned fealty and obedience; a willingness to cross legal and ethical lines as required; being filthy rich helps, too – witness Elon Musk, shadow President. How screwed we are.
Too early to impeach Trump, for the third time? Mere weeks into his Presidency, he’s already violated his oath of office to “faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States,” in both letter and spirit, in ways that should be obvious to anyone with a pulse (and a brain). Political reality means that a new impeachment effort is doomed from the start, at present, but it’s arguably necessary for the Democrats to make such a demonstration of resistance before it’s too late; to educate the uniformed about what is really happening to their country. Forget bipartisanship: The Democratic Party is the opposition party and needs to oppose in a loud, vigorous way to give concerned citizens something to rally around.
The Americans who participated in World War II to preserve democracy, among other things, are often referred to as the Greatest Generation: what is posterity going to call our own, who allowed such a disreputable, unscrupulous lunatic to ascend to the Presidency and proceed to end our democracy, imperfect as it is?
MICHAEL McCARTY, Nashua, NH
