The Isolation Diaries No. 32

“If we didn’t do any testing we would have very few cases.” Donald J. Trump

Yeah, the sitting president of the United States is as ignorant as the quote above indicates. A moron, or, as Rex Tillerson famously said, “a fucking moron.” Tillerson was a corporate weasel, but he picked up on Trump’s vibe right away. Other administration figures must have felt -- and at least one or two must secretly feel -- the same way about Trump, but most of them have taken a vow of silence, afraid, I guess, of being disparaged on Twitter and FOX News. 

Tyrants, whether the real deal like Putin or a faux model like Trump, rise to power with the silent complicity of people who know better. 

Yesterday I finished reading a book by historian Jeff Forret titled Williams’ Gang: A Notorious Slave Trader and his Cargo of Black Convicts. After the United States prohibited the African slave trade, the internal demand for enslaved labor in the sugar and cotton producing southern states drove a furious forced relocation of black people from the Chesapeake region to the lower south. Forret meticulously documents the business and legal structures that made this trade possible and enormously profitable for many slave traders, buyers, boat captains, bankers, lawyers, speculators, and owners of private slave jails or pens. 

In the Epilogue Forret draws a line from the antebellum era, through the Civil War and Reconstruction, creation of black codes and  convict-leasing, all the way to mass incarceration in our time. Here’s a short passage:

“As with the slave trade, prisons engage in a form of economic speculation grounded in African-American bodies and the shipment of captive workforces to locations where the demand for labor is high. The modern-day exploitation of black inmates’ labor remains a thriving business in which the law has again been complicit.”

There were many interesting aspects to Williams’ Gang, but one that struck me was how fearful white people were of slave revolts. The memory of what happened in Haiti and many smaller domestic slave insurrections was never far from the mind of slave owners. Blacks who had been convicted of crimes were not welcome in many states because citizens feared that even by mere presence they might unduly influence enslaved people. 

Again the weather is sublime, blue skies, warm sunshine, the beauty of Santa Barbara on full display. The vibe is that of a city soon to be freed from constraint, able once again to open its arms and welcome the world. 

I’ve read a few reviews of books coming out that compare the contemporary polarized American political scene to that of the decade before the Civil War. It’s an interesting comparison. Whether slavery would be curtailed or allowed into new swaths of American territory was a central question, as was the fate of fugitive slaves, and whether or not the authorities in a free state had to take a hand in the return to their owners of enslaved runaways. These were divisive issues that turned the nation against itself. Local skirmishes and vitriol pointed to a cataclysmic confrontation.  

“Tell me some good news about the pandemic,” my daughter says. I tell her the cities and states where new cases seem to be on the decline, but add a cautionary note about states that might be tempting the Virus God by trying to reopen prematurely. “Not helpful,” she says. Then she sing-songs a line about wanting to hold her boyfriend’s hand. This pandemic has been inconvenient for young lovers. 

We walked from our apartment to the CVS in the 1100 block of State Street. There were definitely more people out and about, gathered in small groups on the Courthouse lawn; a family of Chinese people were taking photographs of each other on Figueroa. CVS was quiet, as many employees as customers. 

Again the weather is sublime, blue skies, warm sunshine, the beauty of Santa Barbara on full display. The vibe is that of a city soon to be freed from constraint, able once again to open its arms and welcome the world. 

I’m not that optimistic. Fits and starts is what I see. Covid-19 still has the country on the backfoot. When defensive soccer teams come out of their block too soon against superior opposition, lose the shape, recklessly commit too many players forward, they are usually punished on the counter-attack. 

Gone Team

“Brilliant, gifted, energetic, yes, but also anxious, greedy, bland, and risk-averse, with no courage and no vision -- that is our elite today.” William Deresiewicz

Imagine the person in the White House whose job it is to update the staff directory, produce stationery, business cards and signage for the offices and the Cabinet. During a “normal” administration, where the key players are largely static for a few years, at least, the gig isn’t too hectic. But we now live in Trump World where chaos and incoherence is the norm, and people come and go in droves. Rex Tillerson, the Secretary of State from Exxon-Mobil, is gone; Hope Hicks, gone; Sean Spicer, gone; Gary Cohn, gone; Steve Bannon, gone; Mike Flynn, gone; Tom Price, gone. A host of lesser people have also been escorted out the revolving door of the White House. Trump, who lives in his own fantasy world of made up facts, claims to be close to having the Cabinet he really wants, which means, most likely, a Cabinet and advisors who will not contradict him or make him feel intellectually inferior, but who will constantly tell Trump that he is the greatest president of all time.

A Cabinet and White House staff populated with mediocrities loyal to Trump no matter how outrageous or dangerous his behavior.

It’s no surprise that Trump is making madness ordinary, just as he is making conflicts of interest ordinary, hardly worthy of notice. The corporate media reacts to every Trump tweet but fails to see and acknowledge the rot and gangrene at the heart of the system, and by “system” I mean predatory capitalism at home, and imperial designs abroad. As long as Trump occupies the national stage I’m going to keep saying this: he’s only a symptom, not the disease. If Trump were to keel over and expire tomorrow, the system -- in all its heartless cruelty, stupidity, and disregard for the common good -- would continue to function.

As a society we can’t agree about facts, even when the evidence is compelling and visible. America has lost its vision, its boldness, and its confidence. When polled most citizens express a desire for  government to provide services that will make their lives easier, less precarious; single-payer health care, free tuition at public colleges and universities, affordable housing, retirement security, clean air and water, safe roads and bridges, but the political class consistently, and blatantly, ignores the will of the people, claiming that such social benefits are too costly and a drag on the country’s “producers” and “job creators.” It was once accepted that creating a broad middle-class was a worthy objective, but that was before Ayn Rand and neoliberal economic ideas infected the policy stance of both parties.

This nation’s priorities emerge in stark relief when we look at what is always affordable: weapons of war, military invasions and occupations, tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy, subsidies for energy extractors, and bailouts when the elites overreach and crash the economy. Owners and investors are afforded a cushioned landing, no matter the cost, workers and the poor foot the bill.

This is a sobering date in American history, the 50th anniversary of the My Lai massacre, when US soldiers murdered some 500 Vietnamese women, children and elderly villagers. The My Lai carnage lasted four hours. These days the US kills civilians with drones, a more sophisticated method, but one no less savage and immoral.