Journal of the Plague Years

       As we sit poised on the edge of a new year and a new decade, former President Barack Obama’s annual list of his favorite films, television shows, books, and music landed like a missive from an alien civilization.  It was a painful reminder that less than a decade ago, we had a president whose leadership was informed by a genuine love of people and enthusiasm for what we create, rather than the intemperate Philistine squatting in the Oval Office today.

      We should contemplate what we missed over the past decade while we were busy congratulating ourselves for having elected such an urbane Black man. The portents of our present were all around us, if we’d been willing to look. They were there in the emergence of the “Tea Party,” an Astroturf operation that mobilized malcontents acting as if we’d elected H. Rap Brown instead of a center-left Democrat whose signature healthcare legislation shared key aspects with the Heritage Foundation plan first rolled out by Massachusetts’ Republican Governor, Mitt Romney, (Source: “Obamacare:  The Republican Waterloo,” by David Frum, TheAtlantic.com, 3/24/17).  It was there in the “Obama in the watermelon patch,” and “Michelle Obama as a gorilla” memes that proliferated.  It was there in the “birther” conspiracies of people who literally couldn’t believe that a Black man could legitimately be president.  It was evident in the Republicans who jettisoned decades of customs and practice to block any legislation Obama proposed and every person he nominated, in order to deny a democratically elected President the powers to which he was Constitutionally entitled (Source: “Senate obstructionism handed a raft of judicial vacancies to Trump—what has he done with them?” by Russell Wheeler, Brookings.edu, 6/4/18).  It was there when Chief Justice Roberts neutered the Voting Rights Act by decreeing that preclearance was unconstitutional on the theory that the existence of a Black President was proof it wasn’t needed, (Source:  Shelby Cty. v.Holder, 570 U.S. ____ (2013)). Continue reading “The lessons of the last decade”

December 20, 2019

     After three years of continually engaging in blatant abuses of power, rampant corruption and shocking acts of cruelty, Trump was finally impeached by the House of Representatives on Wednesday night.  To soothe his fragile ego, Trump scheduled another of his Klan rallies in Michigan to coincide with the House debate, in order to bask in the adoration of his cult like followers. Because he is pathetic and petty, he taunted Congresswoman Debbie Dingell, by stating that her husband, the late Congressman John Dingell was “looking up” from Hell.  Even for Trump it was a reprehensible display of vindictive cruelty.

     This is the man to whom recent turncoat Congressman, Jeff Van Drew, pledged his “undying loyalty.”  This is the person who Republican after Republican defended in unhinged sycophantic rants during Wednesday’s debate.  Instead of engaging in somber and serious consideration of the articles of impeachment, Congressional Republicans treated it like a circus, with one dimwitted backbencher, Barry Loudermilk, comparing Trump to Jesus Christ himself, (Source:  “GOP Congressman Compares Trump to Jesus: ‘Pontius Pilate Was Fairer Than Democrats,’” by Justin Baragona, TheDailyBeast.com, 12/18/19). Continue reading “Impeachment blues”

December 13, 2019

     Something in us is broken.  We have long known that Trump has weaponized whiteness, inciting Americans to cling to their fading sense of superiority and defend it with violence, if necessary. It is a source of political power for him. He has trained those chasing the chimera of white supremacy to disdain democracy and ignore his corrupt criminality.  What we haven’t realized is what it has done to the rest of us.

     By targeting every marginalized group and relentlessly demonizing us, he has put the nation on edge.  We have transformed from a country that at least gave lip service to celebrating our differences, to one where any deviation from the artificial norm of a straight, Christian, white man, is cause for suspicion and revulsion.

     Those of us who inhabit even one disfavored identity, be it Black or Jewish or Queer, have grown wary and weary.  We view our fellow citizens with distrust, waiting to be attacked in the middle of a quotidian task or targeted and killed while praying.

     Living with the heightened adrenaline of constant vigilance can warp us in ways we do not realize.  We internalize the drumbeat of division and regard each other warily, thinking that, “perhaps these people are all anti-Semitic,” or “perhaps these people are racist.”  Acting on fears we never verbalize, we shun the “other.” Consumed by mistrust, we deny them the same thing that Trump denies us— their individuality and essential humanity.

      It is easier, of course, to retreat to stereotypes, to react to a perceived threat by treating groups of people as a monolith, to preserve a false and fragile sense of safety by othering our allies.  Yet that way lies destruction. We are more than our lizard brains, doomed to toggle back and forth between aggression and fear.

     The beautiful mess that is America has always contained multitudes.  The paradox of our legacy is that the same Founding Fathers who exalted democracy and individual liberty, forged a nation through subjugation and genocide.  We can’t cherry pick our history, but we can choose what part of our legacy lives on.

     We can win if we can remember that what unites us really is stronger than what divides us.  We can defeat the ascendant forces of hatred, but only if we remember who we are.

#Epluribusunum

December 9, 2019

       The past week has been a sobering portrait of a nation in crisis.  For the fourth time in history, we are in the process of impeaching an American president and we have understandably been consumed by the drama.  In rapid succession last week, the House Intelligence Committee issued its report, the House Speaker announced that the House would be drafting formal articles of impeachment and Trump announced that he would not appear at the Judiciary Committee hearings or participate in the process, (Source: “White House rejects House Judiciary’s invitation to participate in the impeachment hearings,” by Rebecca Shabad, NBCNews.com, 12/6/19).  From the outset, Trump and his chorus of enablers have treated the impeachment inquiry like a circus and attacked its legitimacy, because they know there is no legitimate defense for the mountain of malfeasance it has uncovered.

      Yet, as disturbing as this entire spectacle has been, it is far from the starkest evidence that many of those in power have abandoned any pretense that this is a nation of laws, not men, or that all Americans have an equal right to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” Continue reading “Casual cruelty”

December 4, 2019

     After three years of Trump, we have grown accustomed to experiencing the news as a series of body blows, so it was only a slight aberration to absorb not one, but two, major news stories that broke within hours of each other yesterday.  First, Senator Kamala Harris announced that she was suspending her presidential bid. With low poll numbers hindering her ability to raise enough money to field a competitive race, Harris confessed that she didn’t see a viable path forward (Source:  “Kamala Harris Says She’s Still ‘in This Fight,’ but Out of the 2020 Race,” by Astead W. Herndon, Shane Goldmacher and Jonathan Martin, The New York Times, 12/3/19).  While it is legitimate to criticize Senator Harris for failing to articulate a clear rationale for her candidacy, the role of the media in shaping the narrative cannot be discounted. Continue reading “Twice as good”

11-28-19

       Thanksgiving has always been my favorite holiday.  It is a day focused on food, family and football, without the baggage of religiosity or crass materialism that can sully Christmas.   Yet Thanksgiving has a messy history. The first Thanksgiving in 1621 was more a moment of detente between temporary allies, than a celebration of beloved community.  Far from being a prelude to the establishment of a new society marked by multicultural democracy, it was the comma before the continuation of a campaign of colonization and genocide, (Source:  “The Invention of Thanksgiving,” by Phillip Deloria, The New Yorker, 11/18/19, h/t Marcia Smith).

      We have papered over that messy history with a comforting myth, pretending that we have absorbed all of our differences into a beautiful mosaic. We avert our eyes from the violence and subjugation in our history in our pathological need to cling to unearned innocence.  Our steadfast refusal to grapple with the truth of our history has brought us to this frightening precipice. Continue reading “Happy Thanksgiving!”

11/21/19

       E.U. Ambassador Gordon Sondland’s Congressional testimony landed like a grenade yesterday, piercing the torpor of official Beltway punditry.   Although a steady parade of career diplomats had soberly laid out the case that the Trump administration had engaged in a sleazy and illegal bribery scheme to force the Ukraine to announce investigations into the Bidens in exchange for military aid and a White House visit, it took Sondland’s smirking betrayal to shake the cynical belief that nothing in the hearings would fundamentally affect the outcome. Continue reading “Barbarians at the gate”

November 12, 2019

      On Friday, the news broke that former NYC mayor, Mike Bloomberg, was again toying with a presidential run.  Apparently, Bloomberg is concerned that the current moderate frontrunner, former Vice President Joe Biden, is losing steam and that if one of the other leading Democratic candidates, Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren, wins the primary, they will be unable to defeat Donald Trump (Source: “Analysis:  Bloomberg’s Move a Slam on Biden, 2020 Democrats,” by Steve Peoples, AssociatedPress.com, 11/8/19).  On one level, Bloomberg’s fear is understandable.  He is hardly alone in being panicked at the thought of four more years of Trump.  That is the existential dread underlying the entire Democratic primary. Continue reading “Okay, Boomer”

November 8, 2019

     Tuesday’s election results gave us reason for guarded optimism.  In Virginia, Democrats gained full control of state government for the first time in 26 years (Source:  “Democrats Gain Full Control of State Government in Virginia for First Time in Decades,” by Anna Kaplan, TheDailyBeast.com, 11/5/19).  The impact of that victory cannot be overstated.  Virginia Democrats have pledged to undo Republican gerrymandering and draw fairer districts; to pass gun control measures in the home state of the NRA and to pass legislation ending felon disenfranchisement (Source: “The Blue Wave Hasn’t Crested,” by Russell Berman, TheAtlantic.com, 11/6/2019).   Continue reading “Victory lap”

October 31, 2019

       The impeachment inquiry has taken on the flavor of a serialized drama, with each day bringing a new bombshell revelation that leaves no doubt as to Trump’s criminality.  Every day adds a new hero to the cast who calmly indicts Trump through their simple recitation of the facts. We have forgotten what it’s like to see people willing to risk their careers for the good of the country.  Last week, Ambassador Bill Taylor, a West Point graduate who has dedicated his life to public service, soberly detailed the contours of the shadow foreign policy being conducted in the Ukraine by Rudy Giuliani and Gordon Sondland. Continue reading “Groundhog Day”