My Political Thoughts

This blog was first published last year, the exact date is not currently known.

Trump is leading America into a Dictatorship

Donald Trump is the largest existential threat to American democracy since the controversy over slavery that led the American states into the Civil War.  His tendency to befriend the world’s most notorious violators of human rights, presidents like Xi Jinping of China, al-Sisi of Egypt, Putin of Russia, the new prince of Saudi Arabia, Kim Jong-un of North Korea, and Erdogan of Turkey, while creating animosity with our traditional allies clearly demonstrates his admiration of totalitarianism.  These growing relationships with totalitarian leaders who have shown very little regard to human rights and the recent announcement that Trump has begun the process of removing the USA from the UN Commission on Human Rights simply add to the very strong inference of Trump’s obvious ambition. These apparent signs of Trump’s affinity for power and his inability to confront Putin for Russia’s blatant attack on US democracy allow for few other options.

I want to briefly elaborate on several events and conclusions that lead me to believe that Trump has joined Putin in an attempt to weaken American democracy as well as America’s world-wide leadership. 1. The voting irregularities of the last general election were not common electoral screwups.  The GOP attempts to restrain voting among the minority classes were attempts to reduce Democratic votes in many states and districts.  The many districts that had gerrymandered voter districts were aimed at dividing the minority votes and pushing them into overwhelmingly Republican districts where the black and brown votes were squashed.  Now when Russian meddling into American elections with the intent to aid Trump and weaken HRC are combined with GOP voter restrictions, America becomes vulnerable to the whelms of an illegitimate president and the wishes of the Russian bear.

These political indications of Trump’s ultimate goal and the Republican Party’s lack of courage to confront the president who has stolen their party is most concerning.  Adding to this concern are the white evangelicals who raged at Obama’s alleged attack on Christianity while throwing a love-fest for the most immoral president to ever enter the oval office seems to create a blindness to history, or even a capitulation of traditional Christian values to Trump’s unchristian and nondemocratic policies. At least the vast majority of African American evangelicals exhibit Christian character. These evangelicals know through their historical experiences with bigots, racists, and other antidemocratic (voting restrictions for instance) events that Trump´s white nationalist policies will eventually relegate them back to the pre-1964 demeaning conditions of the Jim Crow era. Shame on those evangelicals whose ambition for power and prestige outweigh their need to follow our Lord´s mandate for justice. We must not allow the voting irregularities of the past years to prevent every voter´s presence at the ballot box.

The second event is, on its own merit, just as despicable as Russian interference. Trump’s attempt to weaken our American free press, is a major offense and threat to democracy. Trump is so fearful that the Mueller investigation will provide clear evidence of collusion and obstruction of justice that he is concentrating enormous efforts to create in his supporters a strong distrust of the news media.  And he is having some success in these efforts.  His supporters are so ill-informed that they will accept whatever the trumpster dishes out. For instance, I had a FB conversation with a Trump supporter who still contends that Trump’s lies about Obama’s birth were the truth although his proofs had ben debunked months ago. People are going to believe what they want to believe regardless of logic or valid research. Trump’s lies are now legendary, yet his supporters are willing to scrap a major democratic institution (a consequence of pure ignorance plus tribal support) just to prevent a true revelation of Trump’s and Putin’s goal to destroy American democracy.  The Washington Post´s tag line is so very apropos to this situation; Democracy Dies in Darkness.  Any president (including Nixon and Johnson) who had rather lie to American citizens rather than intellectually confront the truth is weak and shallow. Without a strong and vibrant media, democracy will dissipate leaving our citizen to the chaotic whelms of despots and dictators like Trump and Putin.

A third event that Trump has acerbated and boosted is the erosion of civil liberties and human rights.  As early as the 1970’s Trump’s actions taken against black renters demonstrated evidence of Trump’s biasness.  Trump’s support of white nationalist organizations such as the pro-Nazi meeting in Charlottesville last year was a clear indication of his disdain for civil liberties.  As Sherrilyn Ifill, President and Director-Counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc stated “If Charlottesville gave the public a glimpse into the president’s moral failure in the face of white supremacy, his administration has, by word and deed, made it plain that it has no interest in advancing racial justice and pushing America toward the more perfect Union that our Constitution envisioned.” With other actions taken by his administration and along with Trump’s choice of Session as the Attorney General signaled a swift 180˚ turn-about from the previous administration’s focus on civil rights. This history and tendency toward white nationalism added with this week’s reaction to America’s rejection of his unconstitutional border policies make it abundantly clear that his goal is to socially divide America.   Once this action is achieved, totalitarianism will reign in America.

The fourth event that is permitting Trump to destroy our American traditional way of life is the lack of civil responsibility demonstrated by American citizens.  Trump did not cause this phenomenon; American laziness and loss of a sense of civil responsibility are the causes.  However, Trump and Putin are taking advantage of this American characteristic.  In recent general elections, voter participation ranged from 23% to 65% of registered voters, depending on individual states. In recent local elections, turnout was as low as 6% of registered voters.  Privileges enjoyed by American citizens will be lost forever if not exercised. With restrictions now placed on many minority voters, it is difficult for many African-Americans and Hispanics to vote.  Voting must not become a mere option, if America is to survive, voters must get to the polls or America will became just another totalitarian Russian state with Trump as the dictator.

In summary, the events and actions described above and Trump´s obvious admiration for strong men, especially Putin, leads one to the conclusion that Donald Trump´s silent but discernible goal is to become the West´s omnipotent ruler. Anyone who has read the history of the Cold War and the contentions that have existed between Russia and the USA since 1948, can easily see that Russia´s primary drive has been the challenge of western democracy.  Since 2015, Trump´s narcissistic drive has been to weaken every previous American presidency, every major democratic institution, and weaken every major political bond among the western world, and thusly in his mind, become the only savior of the western world.  Trump´s savage behavior at our southern border, the kidnapping of 3000 children, has as its primary purpose the introduction of Trump as the strongman of the west, one to be feared and respected, one to whom no western democratic institution would dare resist. The inability of the Republican Party to slow down Trump´s assault on western norms and traditions make the GOP a complicit partner in this conspiracy to turn American in a dictatorship. .