The threats to democracy in this country are great, and these threats are generally coming from the far-right, if not from the “right” in general. So enamored with an authoritarian desire for maintain power, Republican governors and legislatures have sought to suppress the right to vote, claiming “evidence” of election fraud to justify this. In Florida, Ron DeSantis held a press conference in which he announced that after a year and millions of dollars spent, his election fraud commission came up with 20-count-them-20 voters who voted “illegally,” showing photos of two scary-looking black ex-felons who didn’t know (or the people who registered them) that the Florida initiative that gave former felons the right to vote had to go through a “process.” DeSantis has also sought to pass laws stifling freedom of assembly and speech that opposes him and his fascist regime. Will this be enough to “save” him in the upcoming gubernatorial election, or will this backfire on him? We can only hope the latter.
There are plenty of other threats to democracy. Donald Trump is an idiot, but a dangerous one. What the hell is he doing taking nuclear secrets to Mar-a-Lago? Why are not Republicans concerned about this, given Trump's buddy-buddy relationship with Vladimir Putin, as well as the pro-Russia slant of those in Trump’s orbit? Why is nobody asking the question of why he has these documents in his possession at all? What rational reason can there be with this plainly irrational man who could do anything with such documents on a whim?
And yet the greatest threat Trump poses is the fact that his narcissistic idiocy and his desire to surround himself with people who willing spread the "gospel" has unleashed an infestation of mindless fanatics upon the landscape that even “old school” Republicans seem incapable of getting control of, or want to. Now, the mid-term elections are always dangerous for the party in the White House, but this should be different; is it that difficult for people to understand that it isn’t “bad” when things actually get done to help population in general and not just the rich, and to forget why we have a Supreme Court that is out-of-step with the opinion of a majority of Americans.
Of course one of the rodents that Trump unleashed upon the mainstream world is Steve Bannon, who any sensible person can see has no real “agenda” save being a walking self-promotion machine. Bannon has tried his hand at a number things, none of which he lasted in for long, whether it be a naval officer, investment banking, that Biosphere 2 thing—regarded by most scientists as a “colossal failure”—a “Hollywood” film producer producing two box office bombs (The Indian Runner and Titus had a combined $25 million budget, and $2.1 million in box office);
But with the help of residuals he still receives from owning a piece of Seinfeld, Bannon briefly served on the board of some made-up political “analysis” outfits before co-founding Breitbart News, a white nationalist “news” service that coined the term “alt-right,” and known principally for providing similar “coverage” of the “news” as Alex Jones’ Infowars—conspiracy theories, misrepresentations and outright falsehoods, i.e. “alt-facts.” Bannon claimed that after 9-11, he soured on George Bush and “mainstream” Republicanism, so a “fresh” perspective was deemed “necessary.”
Bannon and Breitbart immediately jumped onto the Trump bandwagon, and Bannon first came involved in the Trump campaign and then as a presidential “counselor.” Bannon vowed an “endless battle” to “deconstruct the administrative state,” which we can speculate he meant by as creating a neo-Fascist state in which the cult leader at the top (Trump) allowed his underlings a free hand to do as they wished as long as it pleased him, without being troubled by whether what they were doing was legal or not.
Bannon didn’t last long in the administration as he turned-off many people with his arrogance, sarcasm and egotism. After he left the White House he still tried to take advantage of residual good graces with Trump by starting a GoFundMe page in which gullible people with anti-Hispanic issues sent in their money to help build the wall. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at his antics) hardly any of the money went to wall-building, but into the pockets of Bannon and his partners using a shell company. Bannon was charged with fraud and was about to go on trial before Trump issued him a pardon. State charges were being considered, but a judge dropped the charges against Bannon not because he wasn’t guilty, but because the presidential pardon made continuing the case moot.
Bannon obviously hasn’t been able to keep himself out of trouble since. He was forced to resign from Breitbart because of his “attention-seeking antics,” and in a webcast he proclaimed that Dr. Anthony Fauci and FBI Director Christopher Wray should be beheaded and their heads mounted on pikes in front of the White House as a “warning” to those who opposed Trump; he was promptly banned from Twitter and the video deleted from other platforms. The January 6 committee subpoenaed him for testimony and documents relating to his involvement in instigating the insurrection, which he refused. A grand jury indicted him for contempt, and last month a jury only took a few hours over lunch to find him guilty. Bannon is scheduled for sentencing in October, but apparently he is seeking a delay of a few years, probably in the hope that Trump is elected in 2024 and pardon him a second time. And Republicans call themselves the “law and order” party.
Of course he hasn’t been able to shut up since his conviction. Bannon is calling for the defunding of—and even outright abolishing—of the FBI in the wake of the raid on Mar-a-Lago, and even claims that blacks and Latinos are joining his “movement” to defeat the Biden “regime.” Well, if these "liberal" and "inclusive" ESPN-owning Disney people in the office building I work in are going to kick their only Latino "representative"--this poster board--into the trash...
...who is to blame them to look elsewhere for "inclusion"? Well, I'm under no illusions about the world I live in to believe Bannon's garbage, either.
As Salon recently noted, like Trump Bannon is loath to put the particulars of the crimes he is accused of into words, preferring to make make such outlandish claims and defend himself by attacking the messenger. “Instead, the strategy is focused on this outside-the-court intimidation play. Bannon regularly held press conferences that are a mix of bravado-laced threats and whining about alleged persecution.”
Bannon also somehow twisted a Vox piece into “supporting” his contention that he is only advocating insurrection against the “American state,” not the “American nation.” I doubt that Vox was making any kind of distinction when it wrote “What we are seeing is shocking, but it’s part of an established pattern. Trump engages in some kind of egregious misbehavior, prompting official scrutiny and condemnation of his actions. He treats these actions as unjustified persecution, proof that the ‘deep state’ is out to get him, a claim that the Republican Party and conservative press dutifully echo. His most radical supporters become even more radical, even contemplating violence.”
Inciting violence in the name of what in reality is authoritarianism “principles” shouldn’t be seen as something to “help” the “people”; it is only to use them. The alt-right and far-right is backed by billionaires who want to divide the population, and conquer. Since they have plenty of money, their attitude is that they can buy the “freedom” to do whatever they wish with untaxed money that is all theirs and they owe no one at the bottom who helped make that money for them. Of course most are not open about this; they do not court attention to their unpopular opinions or goals in regard to social programs, for example. But because politically conservative entities own large media corporations, they can pay people like Bannon and Tucker Carlson to “speak” for them.
Of course those billionaires who actually do talk for themselves say thing that are truly “enlightening.” Take Trump for example (if he is actually a "billionaire") for whom "democracy" only "works" if he wins, or tech billionaire Peter Thiel, who has exclaimed that “freedom and democracy are incompatible” and that the destructiveness of uncontrolled by politics “capitalism” into the 1920s was the last time one could be “optimistic about politics.” Thiel also suggests that women given the right to vote and what he calls “welfare”—Social Security and Medicare—have been a thorn in the side of those who believe in the law of the capitalist jungle.
Robert Reich writes in The Guardian that “If we want to guard what is left of our freedom, we will need to meet today’s anti-democracy movement with a bold pro-democracy movement that protects the institutions of self-government from authoritarian strongmen like Trump and his wannabes, and from big money like Peter Thiel’s.” It would help that “the people”—especially those mesmerized by the likes Trump. DeSantis and toadies like Bannon and Carlson—finally come to the realization that they don’t really give a damn about you. This is about money and their own megalomania. But as they say, “hate" is a much stronger emotion than “love.”
No comments:
Post a Comment