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. 

Justice Deferred, Denied & Withheld

 “Classic children’s literature is full of racial, ethnic, class, and gender stereotyping, and the outdated language that goes along with that. Some of that can’t be fixed with a few cuts.” Katha Pollitt, in The Nation

Another young unarmed black man is gunned down by a police officer; his name, Daunte Wright; the officer’s name, Kim Potter. He was 20-years-old. She’s a 26-year veteran, an experienced, trained officer who mistakenly pulled her pistol rather than her taser. To some this fact pattern is incredulous, Potter’s excuse as flimsy as tissue paper. I’ve read that the taser is holstered on the left side, for a right-handed officer, the pistol on the right. After carrying a weapon for 26 years you might assume Potter would instantly feel the difference between her pistol and a taser. The day after the killing, Potter, along with the police chief, resigned. She’s been charged with second-degree manslaughter and is free on bail. Was it premeditated? Hard to say. More likely a mistake in the emotion of the moment. Was it a mistake based on false assumptions? Did Potter assume Wright was armed, that he posed a deadly threat? Will we hear that Wright was “non-compliant,” whatever that means? What, I wonder, is going through Potter’s mind now, and what was going through it when she drew her weapon, pulled the trigger and ended Daunte Wright’s life? Incapacitating force versus deadly force; if Daunte Wright were a 20-year-old white kid would he be alive now? I can’t remember another shooting involving a female officer; it’s usually a male, not that it matters. Daunte Wright is dead. What’s it like to wake up the morning after you ended a human being’s life? A human being who hadn’t posed a threat to your life or committed a serious crime. What does that feel like? And what does it feel like to wake up in the morning and know your son is gone, his life snuffed out?

I don’t know what to think any more other than the pedestrian observation that this country is violent, cruel, and disdainful about the lives of black people and others of darker pigment.  I don’t know if Kim Potter is a racist, but it’s possible she is and has been her entire career. The usual rituals will be performed again: the grieving, distraught family, the protests, the speeches, the social media tributes, the bland official statements and easily forgotten promises of reform from elected officials.Then many Americans will switch over to Fox News and listen to Tucker Carlson riff about The Great Replacement being engineered before our very eyes by Democrats (as if modern Democrats could engineer anything successfully), who are inviting millions of non-white foreigners to become citizens and thereby swell the ranks of Democratic voters. Because, you see, Tucker’s theory is that all brown-skinned immigrants are bleeding heart liberals who will always and forever vote for Democrats. Carlson’s the sort of smug white asshole that makes America hospitable to white supremacy, and he gets plenty of aid from the Murdoch media empire. All those brown-skinned people desperate to cross the border are incapable of thinking for themselves, in Tucker’s estimation, so once safely inside with feet firmly planted on this fruited plain they will do exactly as Democrats say to the detriment of salt-of-the-earth, real, honest-to-Betsy-Ross white Americans. 

White supremacy is out in the open again, promoted by a social media megaphone rather than a politician’s racist dog whistle. The changing demographics of America doesn’t trouble my sleep, it’s disturbed by visions of violent right-wing extremists. Even if they don’t realize it, white folks have more consequential problems to worry about than perceived losses of status and power, like climate change, living-wage jobs, and grotesque, destabilizing wealth inequality. As an idea and organizing principle white supremacy makes no sense to me. My skin is lighter than yours therefore I’m smarter than you, more morally evolved, superior and more deserving. Crock of shit. Power is what it boils down to. 

White folks want black and brown people to stay in their lanes, in their ghettoes, emerging only to mow lawns, mop floors, fold laundry, empty bedpans, and fetch artisanal cocktails at trendy farm-to-table restaurants. 

How long can simple justice be deferred, denied, and withheld?