Even Worse Than We Knew

Mark Twain’s axiom that it is easier to lie to people than it is to convince them that they’ve been lied to feels apropos of this moment.

Jeffrey Engel is the director of the Center for Presidential History at Southern Methodist University, “I actually think the American public is dramatically underplaying how significant and dangerous this is,” he said, regarding this fraught moment in our democracy. “Because we cannot process the basic truth of what we are learning about President Trump’s efforts — which is we’ve never had a president before who fundamentally placed his own personal interests above the nation’s.” For the record, SMU is neither a radical liberal hotspot nor partial to Democrats: it’s ranked as the 16th most conservative college in America. Mr. Engel is concerned that these years of Trump’s antics desensitized us to the extent that we don’t even want to know a lot of this.

And now the RNC has completed its trip around the bend by censuring two Republicans on the House committee investigating January 6th by proclaiming in part that “Cheney and Kinzinger are participating in a Democrat-led persecution of ordinary citizens engaged in legitimate political discourse.”

Most of us don’t think a riot that left seven people dead and injured150 police officers as its participants ransacked the Capitol and smeared feces in the Rotunda is “legitimate political discourse.” That phrase has already come back to haunt them and will continue to do so.

The Former Guy would bring down our entire country rather than accept defeat. It’s beyond selfishness, and lives in the realm of sociopathic, malignant narcissism. Here’s something from the Congressional Select Committee investigating events leading up to the January 6th insurrection: “In the days before January 6th, a member of the House Freedom Caucus with knowledge of the President’s planning for that day sent a message to the White House Chief of Staff with this explicit warning: ‘If POTUS [Trump] allows this to occur…we’re driving a stake in the heart of the federal republic….’”

Talk radio and Fox opinion host, Sean Hannity, texted White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany, pleading, “No more stolen election talk...impeachment and 25th Amendment [which contains a provision for the VP and cabinet to declare the sitting president unfit] are real, and many people will quit….” She replied, “Love that. Thank you. That is the playbook. I will help reinforce…” Hannity followed up with, “Key now. No more crazy people,” to which she responded, “Yes 100%.” 

Still freaked out on January 10, Hannity texted Congressman Jim Jordan (R-Shirtsleeves) and White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, “He can’t mention the election again. Ever. I did not have a good call with him today. And worse, I’m not sure what is left to do or say, and I don’t like knowing if it’s truly understood. Ideas?”

Of course Meadows, Hannity, his Fox colleague Laura Ingraham, and Jordan all wore the opposite face in public. How handy it is to have two faces.

We learn now that Trump looked at multiple plans to have federal agencies seize voting machines (fortunately, the military and DOJ refused). He continues to this day to talk about “overturning” the election and says he’d consider pardoning those who were jailed for the Capitol insurrection.

In 1930’s Italy, this was called Fascism, which Websters defines as “a political philosophy, movement, or regime that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader…and forcible suppression of opposition.”

In that light, the insurrection we witnessed on January 6th was not the end, but actually a skirmish in the ongoing war between authoritarianism and democracy.

Of course it’s easier to keep our heads down, staring at our screens, and not admitting that after all the years of Chicken Littles telling us the sky is falling, we are actually at an inflection point where:

•The planet is warming (last summer, the Arctic had temperatures in excess of 100 degrees for the first time), and climate change is creating havoc, with fires and extreme weather threatening lives and livelihoods;

•The pandemic has killed 900,000+ Americans, many, many more on a per-capita basis than other developed countries, all because people like Joe Rogan have a big megaphone and profit from lying to their followers.”;

•And as if the existential threats to our lives and property from climate change and the pandemic are not enough, we have a crisis of democracy right here in River City. Not in some far off third-world country, or in some phony democracy that pedals “soft-fascism” like Hungary—right here, right now.

It is worse than we knew. To paraphrase Jackson Browne, brightly burning bridges light our future.

© 2021 Jon Sinton