In America, a country with no memory, Donald Trump and the fascist Republican Party may win in November.
Political leaders and journalists speak of Donald Trump now as if he’s just another candidate.
They assume the population and likely voters remember why there are 91 criminal indictments against Trump, that he has been found guilty of sexual battery amounting to rape in a civil trial (where in a civil trial rape was not charged), that over 60 courts all rejected Republican charges that there was fraud in the 2020 presidential election, that Donald Trump instigated an insurrection that included the invasion of the Capitol causing five deaths and many injuries to policemen–as Trump watched on TV–and also a well-orchestrated attempt to overthrow the November 2020 election results. They may even assume, if they remember themselves, that the population remembers the ten felony cases of obstruction of justice Robert Mueller laid out in great detail in his Report.
But if they are making such assumptions, they are dead wrong.
America has become a country with no memory. America has lost even the memory it once had.
In such a memory void, where truth and actual facts have no weight, or at best a diminishing influence that vanishes after weeks, or even months, a charlatan and accused felon like Donald Trump can appear on television and weave his web of lies and distortions almost without commentary.
We are not living in a rational world, where truth and remembered facts may influence the opinions of voters and the votes actually cast.
In 1985 Neil Postman wrote a prophetic book, Amusing Ourselves to Death, which accurately predicted the situation we presently find ourselves in.
As a fascist takeover in the United States draws nearer, we must in all candor report on the failures of the many political and other leaders who have accelerated the growth of fascism in the United States.
First of all, there are the many Republican leaders who have either surrendered to their fear of Trump and his supporters, have abandoned all principles and their oaths to uphold the Constitution in blind pursuit of personal ambition, or who have succumbed to ideology and beliefs that Trump will be better for the country (and for their companies’ earnings and their own pocketbooks) due to cuts in taxes and other decisions favoring business.
Fear, ambition, and ideology (often at variance with the facts) have all contributed the the growth of the Cult of Trump and of fascism in the United States.
Would-be authoritarians and fascists will always exist. But what has contributed to the extraordinary growth in their numbers in the U.S. in recent years has been the failures of the Democrats and Independents and other “democratic” opponents of Trump to take resolute action to stop Trump and his fascist supporters and enablers.
Foremost among these have been President Joe Biden and Attorney General Merrick Garland who for over two years refused to initiate criminal proceedings against Trump and his accomplices, for the blatant commission of multiple apparent felonies. These crimes ranged from cases of Obstruction of Justice (e.g., as outlined in the Mueller Report) to the many crimes apparently committed in Trump’s many efforts to overthrow the results of the November 3, 2020 election.
For a very long time Nancy Pelosi blocked efforts by Democratic members of the House to launch a full and broad investigation into Trump’s many apparent crimes. Finally, after almost two years, she allowed the Democrats to impeach Trump on two counts related to pressuring Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenski to provide information against Hunter Biden for Trump’s personal political purposes. While the proof was overwhelming, enough Republicans violated their oath of office to prevent Trump’s conviction and removal in the Senate trial.
After the January 6 Insurrection, Pelosi allowed the House Democrats to impeach Trump. Again, though also by a narrower margin, Republicans violating their oath of office blocked Trump’s conviction. He had already left office.
After Biden and Garland took office in January, 2021, they both stalled as Garland refused to publicly initiate an investigation into Trump’s many alleged crimes related to overthrowing the election.
Finally, on ____. 2023, Garland appointed Jack Smith as a Special Prosecutor to undertake that case. So far he has succeeded in obtaining multiple criminal indictments against Trump, both for his attempt to overthrow the election and the Constitution, and for his violation of secrecy laws regarding highly sensitive intelligence information, including that regarding nuclear secrets.
Some of the indictments are for extremely seriously felonies involving the mishandling and revelation of highly sensitive intelligence.
The final shortcoming of the Democrats has been their failure to develop a viable younger candidate who without Biden’s age and foreign policy leadership liabilities, might help Biden run a strong and winning campaign against Trump and his supporters.
With hands folded, they have been passively observing Biden as he drags tho party down to what may be a resounding loss. They should take the polls seriously, which show that Trump has moved from a dead heat with Biden to a widening six-point lead. while the economy continues to improve, they simply don’t get the central point: The majority of voters just don’t like Biden. In a world ruled not by facts but rather by mass political emotions impervious to facts, Biden is losing support.
The polls tell a clear and increasingly devastating tale of Biden’s looming defeat. He is likely to take a lot of Democrats down with him.
Biden is a very weak and defective candidate. Vice President Kamala Harris was a poor choice for VP in 2020, and does nothing to strengthen the Democratic ticket in 2024.
Theoretically, if Biden were to replace Harris on the ticket with a young and dynamic leader with a strong record on foreign policy, he could strengthen the ticket and Democratic chances of winning the presidency in November, 2024.
But because Biden is a stubborn and willful old man, this could only happen if there were a concerted rebellion among the Democratic ranks in the Senate and the House, and possibly among the major contributors in the Democratic donor class.
Given their track record, this is not a likely scenario.
Yet is appears to be the only scenario which might lead to a Democratic victory in November.
Biden and his coterie cling to the belief that the very strong state of the economy, and other Biden successes, will as the campaign progresses convince voters that he is the better
candidate.In a rational world, that scenario might be possible.
In a world where voters had a memory, that scenario might be plausible.
But America, today, has no memory.
We are not living in the United States today, in a world of reason.
Rather, we are living in phantasmagoric times, in a world of Unreason, governed by mass political emotions, as is confirmed by the strength of Trump and the fascist movement represented by the Republican Party.
At no point before 1933, did the outlook for Adolf Hitler and the fascists in Germany look as favorable as it does now for Donald Trump and the fascists in the United States.
Anything is possible, and the worst seems increasingly likely.