Donald Trump calls himself the law and order president. That's quite a stretch. Tony Burman writes that 2020 is beginning to look like 1968, when Richard Nixon branded himself the "law and order" president. 1968 was the year
when America’s crucial fault lines — the battle over civil rights, the disastrous Vietnam War, the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert Kennedy, the youth revolution and more — exploded seemingly at once. The aftershocks both in the U.S. and the world at large reverberated for decades afterward.
But 1968 was also a year that carried with it the accumulated burden of a decade of crisis.
Beginning with the shock of John F. Kennedy’s assassination in 1963, these were years of spreading race riots in major American cities, a violent counter-reaction by police and security forces, the growing despair of the Vietnam War and the collapsing presidency of Lyndon Johnson, who was being challenged from within his own Democratic Party.
Now things are different:
As much as [Trump] portrays the protesters in the streets as “left-wing anarchists,” the opposite is proving true. They have been overwhelmingly diverse — and peaceful — and recent polls indicate that two-thirds of Americans support them.
Trump is under increasing attack from quarters that have, until now, been notably mute, such as former defence secretary James Mattis, who said this week that the president was “the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people … Instead, he tries to divide us.”
The crises are piling up on each other:
They include the fallout from a collapsing economy, the urgent need for adequate health care, the cry for racial justice, and the damage from Trump’s policies that have seriously worsened income inequality and the climate crisis.
Nixon was the outsider accusing the government of betraying its citizens. This time, Trump is the government:
Increasingly, polls suggest that Americans believe Biden is far better suited to deal with these problems than the incumbent.
So — assuming, of course, that Americans can keep Trump’s storm troopers off the streets between now and the inauguration of a new president in January — there may be life after Trump.
The end is nigh. And Trump knows it.
Image: treehugger
10 comments:
I still remember that November night four years ago when I went to bed early confident that I would get up the next morning to newscasts struggling to find some angle on the election of America's first woman president.
We've got five months to learn if there'll be a Second Wave of Lunacy among American voters. Will Trump come back to knock off Biden as he did Clinton? This is America 2020 and many Americans are not of right mind. Trump knows a thing or two about dog whistles and stoking the embers of fear and paranoia and the entire range of bigotry.
A Reichstag fire, perhaps, or some electoral Night of the Long Knives? What can Trump engineer between now and voting day? He's a pyro and he has a limitless supply of matches.
If Trump was able to command the Christo-fascist vote and the angry white vote last time why would anyone assume those same voters won't be mobilized by the BLM protests, the pandemic lockdowns, and the constant demographic retreat?
Trump will bellow about election fraud and there will be election fraud aplenty. It comes in the form of gerrymandered districts, voter suppression and the Electoral College. Who knows what Trump can add to that mix?
Trump is both mentally ill and mentally deficient, Mound. But he does know how to command our darker angels. And, therefore, he should not be underestimated. If he manages to suppress votes, he'll win. But, if Americans come out to the polls, he'll face the courts -- and lose.
My guess, Owen, is that Trump will do whatever he can to derail mail-in voting. He has already been making loud noises on how it is rife with fraud (with ample evidence to the contrary, but that has never stopped the Deceiver-in-chief, of course). If he succeeds, his fearless and brainless disciples will turn out in droves at the polling stations, while sane people worry about catching Covid-19 by standing in long queues and opt to stay home.
Like any empty barrel, Lorne, Trump will make a lot of noise between now and election day. We'll soon know how many people take his rants seriously.
The end may be neigh but I don't know if it will be the end of Trump that is neigh. It maybe the end of the U.S.A. as it has been known. We have already seen the end of the rule of law. Now we have seen the ending of democracy for years with voter suppression, bring in Trump's version of the Gestapo and SS and off you go.
I will not be surprised if there is no American federal election, with the military in the streets and a few million heading to Canada and Mexico.
Point well taken, e.a.f. If Trump succeeds, it will be the end of the republic.
two others that included in their speeches
a promise of return to "law and order"
slimy Steve Harper
Adolf Hitler
that screech in your ears is dog whistle
Why doesn't he just leave the choice to use mail balloting alone and give the job of conducting the massive fraud effort that he speaks of to the guys who run their gerrymandering operations? It shouldn't be too hard for them.
A few days ago, lungta, I caught a television interview with an American congressman -- an Iraq war vet. I forget his name, but I remember what he said: "Strength whispers. Weakness screams."
I take your point, John. For Trump, gerrymandering isn't a fraud. It's politics as usual.
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