The above picture was censored for years. What would the public have thought if it knew that thousands of people were being herded up on the West Coast and sent to prison camps without due process of law? The United States Government had considered these pictures too inflammatory for public viewing until they were unearthed from the National Archives in 2006.
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Most people don't know that Japanese food was as common as Chinese food in the USA (at least on the West Coast) until World War 2. But, after Pearl Harbor Day, our government had a ready made excuse to strip everything of value from law abiding people and deny them their basic human rights.
Could this happen again? Of course!
We now have a president elect (at the time this blog entry was written) who has expressed a desire to force Muslims to register themselves with the Federal Government, so that the government could do what it wants after the next terrorist disaster. This is dangerous. This is the same president elect wants to put limits on 1st Amendment freedoms for the rest of us. Can you imagine what would happen if Alec Baldwin did a Saturday Night Live sketch that offended someone who had the power to incarcerate people without due process of law?
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We live in a culture where people live in fear. They pick and chose their news sources to conform to the way they imagine the world as being, and not as it really is. So their biases are confirmed and strengthened. Recently, one self appointed "examiner" went to a pizzeria to examine reports of a Child Abuse ring in the Pizza Parlor, associated with some high level Democrats. The problem, is that this jerk opened fire on people, triggered by fake news. This person acted as a self appointed police force without any hard facts, and put people's lives at risk.
Of course, I have posted the BBC links to the real story, and have shown only the tip of an iceberg. Fake news is being disseminated, and people believe it. Although this was not done by OUR government this time, it has happened in the past, and will happen in the future. Thankfully, services such as Google and Facebook recognize the need to use Artificial Intelligence to filter out this misinformation. But it's not enough. People inclined to believe in conspiracy theories will do so no matter what facts are presented to them. They can't afford to challenge their beliefs. As the Archie Bunker character noted, "My dad was this way. How could this man be wrong?" When one is taught that right is wrong and wrong is right, how can a person come to a rational interpretation of the facts?
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The other night, I started to have a conversation with a woman I consider a moderate. I had posed the idea that Liberals should give up opposition to 2nd Amendment rights. Instead of opposition, Liberals should advocate that every law abiding person be required to own a gun AND to practice using it on a regular basis. My idea was to make it possible for people living in Blue States to resist being intimidated by those living in Red States, if we came close to having a second Civil War. She was horrified, as she realizes that we need gun regulation based on population density, and not arbitrary geographic boundaries. So this line of thought ("Should we increase the risk of violence in cities, so that we can protect ourselves in a war between rural and urban areas?") got shut down for a while, as it triggers great intellectual discomfort among liberals and moderates who live near big cities.
This is a big problem. How does one fight back against an armed opponent? Should we be taking butter knives to gun fights? This is an issue that Liberals must tackle, both as a metaphor, and as a literal statement. Liberals have to become serious in defending their rights - even if that defense has to use tactics which Liberals find abhorrent.
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Life is all about risk management. People (by instinct) want to eliminate each and every risk in their lives. When they can't cope with what life puts before them, they give up hope then make big mistakes. Sadly, enough people gave up hope and chose someone who could be a tyrant. They have put their faith in the wrong things, and now the piper will be paid. These will not be pleasant times for most of us, and I hope we finally learn to see through the fog and act a little more rationally 2 and 4 years down the road.
The closer we come to Trump's presidency, the more we see that conflicts of interest will rule the day. Yes, there are quite a few cabinet appointees who are likely to oppose the goals and purposes of the departments which are supposed to head. But this pales when one thinks of how much business will be done with the Trump Organization while the Trump family has access to the White House and the powers of the sitting president.
Are people upset? Yes, including many in the GOP. But party loyalty is getting in the way of eliminating this problem. The GOP is getting drunk on the power they expect to have as of January 20th. Big business will get everything it wants for the next 4 years, and very little will get in the way. People who voted for Trump to drain the swamp will again be disappointed. And that leads to the question: Can anything be done to stop this mess?
At the time I write this, there is a movement to have 37 "faithless electors" deny Trump the presidency and force the election to the House. This movement of "Hamilton Electors" is trying to get 37 electors to vote for a Republican like Kasich, giving the House the chance to restore sanity to the presidency before anyone takes office. Although I doubt this movement will change things, it would be nice to see the election go to the House, and it would be nice to see the GOP toss Trump out. Even though they would likely keep Pence as the VP in
this scenario, we would avoid even larger problems from a man (Trump) who believes that
Or, in English:
"I AM THE STATE!"
If we look at French History, shortly after the American Revolution ended, the French Revolution started as a response to the corruption of France's elites. Eventually, it resulted in an end to France's monarchy (vive la Guillotine!) and prepared the way for Napoleon and his destructive behaviors. Can America afford to go down this path? No. But we will know if it is more likely than not depending on whether the Hamilton Elector movement succeeds or not. And by the time you read this entry, we will have the answer to this question....
."
The internet "Wayback Machine". It is an invaluable resource housed in a server farm in California, and is used by news outlets from both sides of the aisle to extract an objective truth of what was publicly available on the internet at any given time. I have used it myself for more mundane issues, such as retrieving web pages for a defunct "Church of Elvis" site which has been down for about 15 years. And with the election of President to be Trump, they consider the prospect of government interference enough to announce that they will clone their entire server farm in Canada to preserve their essential data.
I am not a fan of Trump, and I think worse things could happen than if a GOP congress were to impeach him, and let VP Pence take the reins of the executive branch of government. But this is far from ideal. As I write this, the Electoral College hasn't voted, and enough "faithless electors" could potentially change their allegiances to affect this election. But I strongly doubt this will happen. For the first time in my memory, we will see a president elected who openly claimed that the election was rigged - even after he won the election!
What does this mean to America?
Sometime in January, President Obama will hand over the reins of government to the new President Trump. We will have a man in power who has no respect for legal precedent, no respect for the rights of citizens to protest the government, and has no respect for previously negotiated contracts. His administration will be known for promises not kept, and conflicts of interest that will only serve to make this man and his family richer than they are now. It will also be known for the political extremists who joined his cabinet, as political payback to extremist groups who supported him during his campaign.
Over time, I expect to see attacks on hard won labor rights and hard won civil rights. Look at Trump's position on labor issues - he recently said that wages as a whole are too high. Yes, he has flip flopped on this issue several times in regard to the minimum wage. But can we trust labor rights to a man who discriminates against American labor? In addition, with a vice president who ignored the AIDS crisis and supported Gay Conversion Therapy, can we expect someone like that to protect the rights of this community?
Trump has said that he'd nominate a man like Antonin Scalia for the vacant Supreme Court seat. And recently, he has said that he would take away American Citizenship AND put a person in jail for at least a year, if convicted of burning an American flag. Can we say that he will respect any constitutional right when Scalia himself said that flag burning is a constitutionally protected right?
How do we deal with the potential threats of a Trump presidency?
In an op-ed piece in the New York Times, Luigi Zingales says that the Democratic party should work with Trump when he wants to do something that helps the party achieve some of its goals, and strongly oppose him when he goes the other way. The Democrats should resist having another Clinton dynasty come in the persona of Chelsea, but should grow new leaders from their ranks. Opposition to Trump should be modeled on Italy's opposition to Silvio Berlusconi, as they were able to remove him from office using issues instead of personality hatred as their means of motivating the electorate.
The above only covers resistance at a macro level. What about the little people who could get in Trump's way? For me, I believe that if one could get a second passport, that one should do so now. Money can slowly moved outside the country and invested elsewhere. This could be done legally, without records, if the amounts are small and the resulting foreign investments were not interest bearing. (I'll let my readers figure this out for themselves. There are legal issues involved in the movement of money across our border that I don't want to discuss here, lest I am charged with giving information on how to commit a financial crime.) Ideally, one would have a skill that is in hot demand AND would make it possible for a quick exit to Canada. Americans with skills on this list will likely be welcomed North of our border. But what about the rest of us? The New York Review of Books published Rules for Survival in an Autocracy. And they are:
- Rule #1: Believe the autocrat. He means what he says.
- Rule #2: Do not be taken in by small signs of normality. Consider the financial markets this week, which, having tanked overnight, rebounded following the Clinton and Obama speeches.
- Rule #3: Institutions will not save you. It took Putin a year to take over the Russian media and four years to dismantle its electoral system; the judiciary collapsed unnoticed.
- Rule #4: Be outraged. If you follow Rule #1 and believe what the autocrat-elect is saying, you will not be surprised.
- Rule #5: Don’t make compromises. Like Ted Cruz, who made the journey from calling Trump “utterly amoral” and a “pathological liar” to endorsing him in late September to praising his win as an “amazing victory for the American worker,” Republican politicians have fallen into line. Conservative pundits who broke ranks during the campaign will return to the fold.
- Rule #6: Remember the future. Nothing lasts forever. Donald Trump certainly will not, and Trumpism, to the extent that it is centered on Trump’s persona, will not either.
I don't know exactly what will happen over the next few years. But I do think these will be trying times, and it will be our duty to protect America from its own delusions of greatness.
As I write this, I've just digested the news that Donald Trump has made a $25 million settlement for the Trump University swindle, without admitting any fault for the problem. On the same night, his VP was at "Hamilton" and a cast member stuck up a challenging conversation with Pence. To distract people from Trump's paying off on a settlement, Trump accused the cast member of harassing the VP elect. Again, we're seeing business as usual from Trump - when you have to pay for your sins, distract others from the confession, and certainly don't admit any fault or responsibility.
No one ever expects Trump to ever expose his tax returns to public scrutiny. If they were public, they would expose the many intricate layers of international deals with people who are less than honorable. Couple this with not divesting Trump's holdings into a blind trust and disconnecting the family from the family business, we have great potentials for conflicts of interest which I have no trust that Trump will handle honorably.
Everyone I speak to in my bubble of friends is horrified about what this presidency means. To me, I expect to see a lot of scandals, with a president trying to scuttle freedoms enumerated in the 1st amendment and upheld by over 200 years of legal precedent. His election has unleashed conservatives who want to shred the social safety net. The Speaker of the House is now floating proposals to scuttle Medicare, and replace it with a voucher program. We have never had a decent marketplace solution to healthcare issues in this country, and the Speaker only will make things worse. He wants to subsidize the wrong side of the Supply/Demand curves with his voucher based proposal, and this will only raise prices. If he were to subsidize supply, he'd reduce prices - but politicians never have a clue on how to make markets work to solve problems and not make them worse.
I see a major attack on Gay Rights coming, and the GLBT communities have much to fear. It's amazing how many people are killed around the world because they do not fit the molds of traditionalist sexual identities and/or practices. With a VP such as Pence, Trump has signaled that he doesn't give a damn about social rights or safety to marginalized groups. He is a bully, and only respects bullies - and despises anyone who could be a victim. Hopefully, more gay people will join groups such as the "Pink Pistols", and signal that they will not allow themselves to be pushed around.
But it is not just the Gays who are at risk. I go to a Muslim doctor for treatment. He has always treated me with respect, and we have always had the chance to talk a little about social affairs on my visits. He has been a valuable member of my community for generations. Why should he be called on to register with the government because of his religion - as posed by Trump before and after his election? How does one choose who is good and bad from any religion? Should Christians get a free pass? We see religious terrorism from some people from our religious right, and no one demands that Christians register with the government. And what about the Jews? They should always remember the yellow stars sewed on to their clothes. They must always remember the numbers tattooed on their arms during the Nazi years. They must start standing up to say NO - this should never happen to any group, not even our professed opponents, ever again!
What about the rhetoric of rebuilding our military? We're the only nation in the world that can fight a war in two theaters of operation at the same time. We spend as much on our military as the next 5 nations in the world combined. The biggest problem with our military is that it is too big! Much of our spending takes place because we have grown addicted to the jobs that building unneeded equipment brings to communities across the nation. It is an inefficient way of keeping people employed, as once bullets are shot and bombs are dropped, we have nothing to show for this spending. No new bridges are built. No roads are constructed. No houses are erected. No children are educated. No sick are healed. I could go on and on about the things we don't have because we have chosen to fight "forever wars" instead of preparing ourselves for a future of prosperity we could
have earned.
We do have problems. For example, we have alienated people in both rural and urban areas. They are not well educated, and live where good jobs are not available to them. In rural areas, the mills have closed down, and the people can't move to places where plentiful jobs are. In urban areas, the high paying jobs require educations that people can't afford to get. And when people fail to achieve to a reasonable potential, they often fall into despair and escape into drugs and alcohol. No amount of moral and legal punishment can help these people. Only opportunity can help them. Sadly, structural unemployment is becoming a greater problem every day, and the elites have at best neglected the worse off in our society. And at worst, they have warehoused these people in a prison industrial complex geared to keep them out of sight and out of mind.
There is a tendency for those who are alienated to follow authoritarian leaders when they don't feel like they are getting their fair share from the system. They look towards a messianic figure to deliver them from the injustices they perceive are being inflicted on them without delving deeper into their problems. For example, many people voted for Trump because he promised to eliminate environmental regulations which made the coal mines unprofitable. Sadly, he can't make people use coal who don't want to buy it. As such, the people are going to get screwed again, because the false messiah made promises which could not be kept. If these people saved their money when times were good, they could have left their one horse towns at the first sign of decline. The unions could have negotiated phased shutdowns of plants, with safety nets in place to help people transition to skills currently in demand - and provided relocation assistance so these retrained workers could go to where the new jobs were. Instead, the former workers blame the wrong "others" for their problems, and keep sowing the seeds for future disappointments.
The election of Trump was a signal by the masses that they wanted change. They did not care much about the nature of the change - they wanted to riot using ballot boxes as weapons. Trump can not and will not deliver the changes the people want. He has too many conflicts of interest for him to even govern honorably. All he can and will do is push this country towards an authoritarian government - if we don't resist it. Resistance can be peaceful - mobs of people can block movement of traffic in a city. Mobs of people can protest at key locations and get the press needed to show that the government lacks critical public support. But mostly, they can slow things to a halt until a new and more honest leader can come through the ranks, and truly push for healthy change. Until then, I pray that the decent people in the GOP will reach across the aisle to the Democrats and use the legislative branch of government to check and balance the power of this Sociopath who will be in charge of the executive branch of government.
The conservatives won this election. Now they have a duty to govern responsibly. Only time will tell if they handle their responsibilities honorably in spite of having a dishonorable man in charge of the executive branch of government....
