An American Fears for His Country



CNN analyst, Bill Carter, like many of his countrymen, sees his United States broken, perhaps irreparably.

Carter has seen America bruised and battered from the Kennedy assassination to the Viet Nam war, Watergate, the decades of school shootings, to the 9/11 attacks.

Nothing can diminish the staggering impact of these events, and their ripple effects through the consciousness of Americans.

But the moment we are at right now feels different, eerie almost, like the stillness that presages a coming storm of a magnitude we can't yet measure.

...Maybe only two events before my time, the Civil War and World War II, are legitimate rivals to our current crisis in terms of potential destructive impact. In both those earlier cases, our democracy also came under mortal threat, once from internal forces, once external. Both encompassed authoritarianism, violent threats to opponents, popular appeal based on rage and grievances, a cult following and very big lies. And, in both those past crises, our democracy still survived.

The triumph of division.

For the first time, a group trying to unravel democracy has its own media megaphone to blast out propagandistic disinformation about the 2020 election, falsely claiming that it was stolen, despite an utter lack of evidence.

Lies about the election have been thoroughly discredited already, in courts and endless "audits." But pro-Trump Republicans continue to believe the fabrications, and worse, use them to install biased election officials and to enact laws that pave the way for them to overturn vote totals they don't like — all accompanied by unceasing efforts to suppress or deny the vote to people who oppose them.

That utterly unjustified and nefarious activity is the fuel stoking the drive to see the American experiment in a government of the people, for the people and by the people perish from the earth.

This isn't a case of over-the-top partisan politics gone a bit too far, where one side pushes this way and the other side pushes back. It's a slowly unfolding horror movie; and yes, unless something changes the scary ending, it will certainly be the biggest news story of my lifetime.

This is a thoroughly engineered coup. It is an attack from within. It is powerful and very well funded. As for Canada, we'll probably end up as collateral damage.

Comments

  1. LorneDecember 30, 2021 at 2:57 PM

    Canada as collateral damage is the thing I fear the most, Mound. Were it not for that, I would say let (human) nature take its course in that bastion of freedom south of us.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The Disaffected LibDecember 30, 2021 at 7:01 PM

      If the US destabilizes to any significant degree, its economy will be hit hard and, in turn, so will ours. Political instability will likewise be difficult to keep from crossing our common border. Yet, as dire and as urgent as this threat appears, we dare not discuss it lest it provoke an angry response from Ground Zero.

      Delete
  2. TrailblazerDecember 30, 2021 at 4:17 PM

    We, Canada, has to distance itself from the US particularly on foreign policy.
    I fear dying US could strike out at make believe enemies more so than it already has.
    Please no more Afghanistan's or Libya's..
    The US is not only disintegrating but favours authoritarian wannabe dictators ; where have we seen that before?
    Canada has to watch it's back for our home grown Jason Kenny and his ilk cater to a similar base that Trump does.
    Canada missed chance to make a statement when it went on board for the F35 programme instead of European alternatives.
    Perhaps if we subsidised our aircraft industry to the degree the US and Europe does we could become more independent ?

    TB



    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The Disaffected LibDecember 30, 2021 at 7:03 PM

      I wasn't aware that SAAB was no longer in contention for the fighter contract. I can't find any reference to that online. What have you heard, TB?

      Delete
    2. Northern PoVDecember 31, 2021 at 7:37 AM

      "Canada, has to distance itself from the US particularly on foreign policy"

      S. Dion tried to pull Canada back to a Pearson-ian worldview.
      Jr (and his sidekick Chrystia) fired him (during the tRump ascension) and entrenched the Harper nonsense.

      After 15 years, the service is likely riddled with toadies.

      Delete
  3. TrailblazerDecember 31, 2021 at 7:29 AM

    Canada is financially involved with the F35 programme which suggests , to me, that it is the favoured aircrft.
    However the latest news I have found is this link.
    https://www.aviacionline.com/2021/12/canadian-cf-18-replacement-f-35-and-gripen-to-the-the-final-showdown/

    The comments in this article take the lid off the F35's 5 th generation BS.

    https://www.19fortyfive.com/2021/12/stealth-f-35-vs-gripen-e-which-new-fighter-jet-will-canada-choose/

    TB

    ReplyDelete
  4. TrailblazerDecember 31, 2021 at 12:11 PM

    Ultimately the replacement fighter will be judged on Canada's long range trade and foreign policies not our defence requirements!

    TB

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Navigating the Minefield of Short-Termism

Image
Its disappearance went largely unnoticed. There was no post mortem, no eulogy, no deep sighs for what had been lost. Posterity slipped from our consciousness as we ushered in the neoliberal era 40 years ago. Populations would now be administered, not led. Grand vision was a quaint artifact of generations past. Besides, the invisible hand of the marketplace would see to all our needs today, tomorrow, forever. Politicians grew smaller and smaller until they shrunk to fit the mold of technocracy.  Like sheep being dipped we were plunged into a world of supply-side economics in which lower taxation and deregulation would deliver manna from heaven. We focused on skinning the economy, and society, right to the bone. Everything would be maximized, nothing would be wasted, not even the offal.  We were surrendered to a world of short-termism. We elected governments of technocrats - grey suits stuffed with wet cardboard - whose horizons were measured in electoral cycles. They would do what they
Read more

The Gun We Point at Our Own Heads

Image
  If you're sitting at a table and there's a loaded pistol in front of you, do you pick it up and point it at your own head?  Probably not, unless something has gone terribly, terribly wrong. How would you feel if someone else was holding that pistol to your head? But there is a pistol pointed at our heads and, unless we do something about it, we're goners. It's not a Glock. It's fossil fuels and the industry is slowly squeezing the trigger. Proven fossil fuel reserves are sufficient to generate 3.5 trillion tons of greenhouse gas emissions .  Russia and the United States each have massive reserves of fossil energy sufficient to push humanity through the 1.5C heating limit, sometimes called the "carbon budget."  I have it on reliable authority that Washington and the Kremlin aren't getting along very well these days. After all, if you won't hold the line on nuclear proliferation, you might not be inclined to voluntarily give up a major source of na
Read more

The Cognoscenti Syndrome

  There is a group of people I think of as the Cognoscenti, people who are well educated, very informed and of rapidly diminishing relevance. Their ranks include writers such as Chris Hedges and Glen Greenwald. These are people who have honed an almost Puritanical value system, readily finding fault in any direction. They are scathing in their attacks on Republicans and Democrats alike to the point where they become nihilists. They don't endorse. They prescribe. This is where they fail. They're unable to advocate for anything that might resonate with the public whose interests they argue are being trammeled. Donald Trump was bad but Joe Biden is scarcely better. This is where their elitism comes in.  74 million may have voted for Trump but, hey, they didn't know any better. The mob that stormed the Capitol. They were just victims of the system venting their frustrations. All the racism, bigotry, xenophobia, misogyny, white nationalism - inevitable side effects of their oppr
Read more