The Gathering Storm

“What do you do when a big swath of Americans believe things that are demonstrably false and have already led to events like the January 6 insurrection?” Katha Pollitt, The Nation

Are you as tired of the spectacle of American politics as I am? I hate to be defeatist and cynical, but I don’t see a path out of the box canyon we’ve hiked into over the past twenty years. When I look at the scene I am reminded of a line from Yuval Noah Harari’s book,  21 Lessons for the 21st Century: never underestimate human stupidity. Look at Mike Pence, for instance, a man as full of ambition as he is devoid of substance, who now blames the media for the January 6 assault on the capitol. This is the same man who was rushed to safety by Secret Service agents as the Trump mob chanted, “Hang Mike Pence.” Who knows what may have happened if the mob had seized Pence, but now Mike has developed amnesia and is back to kissing Trump’s ass with the servility he displayed for four years. Mikey is apparently convinced that God wants him to be president one day, and his penance in the meantime is to suffer humiliation and degradation at the tiny, corrupt hands of Donald J. Trump. 

Nine months on and none of the architects of the attempted coup have been held accountable. With the notable exceptions of authorizing military actions, gifting billions to the military-industrial-surveillance complex, and enacting tax breaks for the wealthy, the gears of Washington D.C. grind and squeal but the wheels barely turn. I assume the efforts of the House committee investigating the coup will come to naught, zero, nada. Let’s see what the committee does when Trump’s aides and toadies refuse to comply with subpoenas, as they almost certainly will. Steve Bannon thinks he’s untouchable. When all is done and dusted, the likely outcome is a voluminous report that will garner media attention for a day or two and then be forgotten without any significant remedial action taken. We’ve seen this movie many times. Iran-Contra. The 2008 financial meltdown. The Mueller Report. I will also not be surprised if Biden decides to shield Trump’s Oval Office actions and communications from scrutiny under the convenient guise of “Executive Privilege.” Political elites rarely hold each other accountable because it sets a bad precedent. As I’ve written on this blog many times, accountability is reserved for those of us without wealth or connections. When the law or the government comes for us, we have no place to run or hide. We can’t ignore Congressional subpoenas or stash ill-gotten gains in offshore tax havens. One country, two sets of rules. It’s good to be King or Queen, lousy to be a serf. 

Life goes on as it has always gone on, through fire, flood, famine, drought, pestilence, war, revolution, insurrection and disaster. The poor scrape and scramble for their living while the wealthy party in high style in gilded palaces. As in the past, so in the present. 

The battle for Truth is in jeopardy of being forfeited. And then what? An America ruled by the Trump family? Will we suffer Big Daddy Donald until he draws his final breath, then watch Junior ascend to the throne, and after him Ivanka, and finally, Eric. Is that what the future holds? Camelot is dead, long live Mar-A-Lago. You think I’m crazy? Perhaps so, but the scenario doesn’t seem that outlandish to me given the chicanery happening in state legislatures and in the chambers of the radical Supreme Court. Add the fact that millions of Americans believe whatever Donald Trump spews or the latest QANON fantasies rather than what they see with their own eyes. The fix is in the process of being hard-wired. Once the Truth and the Law are totally debased what remains? Will Americans come to expect that every politician and public servant is on the take, amenable to bribes, as most Russians do? Possibly. What’s to prevent it from happening, appeals to decency, morality, or ethics? Fat chance. America isn’t immune to the endemic corruption that has sundered other nations. We’re on the slippery downslope.