Carefully Observing the World in and Around Ourselves
But his actions so far, in choosing his cabinet, administrative, and advisory positions and proposing policies might be too disturbing to ignore, hopefully too disturbing to come to fruition. He’s chosen a cabinet aimed to give him total power and undermine legitimate agency functions. People like:
Matt Gaetz, who is a subject of a House Ethics Investigation, for sex-trafficking and other accused crimes, for Attorney General.
Stephen Miller a white nationalist and creator of the policy to take young children from their immigrant parents during DT’s first term of office, as Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy.
Lee Zeldin, who questions the reality of climate change and promises to favor big oil and big business over environmental protection, to head the EPA.
Elon Musk, world’s richest man, a megadonor to DT’s campaign, and as Public Citizen reports, a beneficiary of government contracts while 3 of his companies are under investigation for civil and criminal charges, was picked to co-lead a proposed Department of Government Efficiency, to gut federal regulations and slash spending. His partner would be Vivek Ramaswamy, a biotech billionaire. Shocking.
Heather Cox Richardson reported the DT transition team floated the idea that he could sign an executive order creating a board of retired senior military personnel to review high-ranking officers and recommend removing any they deemed unfit for leadership. Vivian Salama, Nancy A. Youssef, and Lara Seligman reported in the Wall Street Journal that such a board would enable Trump to purge the military of the generals whom he considered insufficiently loyal to him, so he would have total control over the military.
Thankfully, the GOP in the House of Representatives just failed to pass the Stop Terror-Financing and Tax Penalties on American Hostages Act which would have granted the secretary of the Treasury Department unilateral authority to revoke the tax-exempt status of any nonprofit deemed to be a “terrorist supporting organization.” It would have enabled the DT administration to revoke the non-profit status of any organization deemed to be supporting terrorism, even without proof, and stifle dissent in the US. That’s a relief. I will still have to take some time for vacations from the news.
Remember the Shock Doctrine, the economic and political strategy observed by Naomi Klein in her groundbreaking book published in 2008? The doctrine explained what she called “disaster capitalism,” or the exploitation and manipulation of disasters, natural and human-made, so people misperceive their own interests and accept policies they never would have accepted otherwise. It feels like the Shock Doctrine has won⎼ for the moment.
DT has constantly shocked us, by repeatedly inciting fear of illegal immigrants, of crime on the streets when the reality was a historic reduction in crime. Of an economy supposedly in freefall that was actually in recovery. Shocked too many of us to believe those delivering the message, reporting on or trying to prosecute him for his crimes, were the criminals. He accused Democrats of weaponizing the DOJ in order to free up a lane for him to weaponize it, as he tried to do multiple times in his first term, and promises to do in his second⎼ by imprisoning all those who oppose him. He shocked us with outrageous, even bizarre, often misogynist or racist, demented tirades and threats. It appears his motive, besides simply spreading his crazy hate, was to keep us off balance and fearful.
And at the same time, to drive us, or too many of us, toward a togetherness with him of resentment, anger, and hate. Or maybe an old-fashioned patriarchal solidarity but in new clothing? A rage to rescue meaning from a sense of an empty future? John Hendrickson applies this to young men in an article in The Atlantic. DT appeals to their anger over what they feel they’ve lost as men; but the reality of what DT intends to do, as outlined in Project 2025 and the America First Agenda, largely will only make their, and our lives worse. What DT can’t stand are the groups that have united in opposition to him.
And he’s aided in his endeavor by a media wall of disinformation, a control of so many news sources by his allies. And by people willing to observe or distort, digest, base their beliefs and actions solely on one media world of information. Not just FOX, not just The New York Post, Breitbart News, etc., and DT’s own Truth Social, but the recent purchase of the Baltimore Sun by Sinclair Broadcast Group’s billionaire owner David Smith. Sinclair Broadcast Group promotes a clearly right-wing bias in its stations. Then Musk’s X, other social media, podcasts, and on and on. Meanwhile, billionaires, mostly supporters of DT, have just added to their billions with DT’s election victory. The Bloomberg Billionaires Index estimated the world’s 10 wealthiest people gained nearly $64bn on the Wednesday after the election.
Besides the right-wing and billionaires, there’s Russia and other foreign powers acting to influence the election. Russian theorists call it “political technology,” aimed at creating a false narrative to control political debate and undermine democracy.
How else can we explain the victory of a convicted sex offender, who committed fraud, was indicted on attempting a political coup to destroy an election, was twice impeached, who illegally kept and even showed off classified documents? Who was called out for being a dictator in temperament, a fascist who demands obedience, a threat to the US who disrespects our own soldiers, by a General, John Kelly, former chief of staff to DT himself. How else do we explain this?
I have to agree with Heather Cox Richardson and others, that this wall of disinformation strongly contributed to his victory, which so surprised so many of us.
He’s trying to steal our sleep, or the sleep of those who oppose him, while putting to sleep the rational and observing capacity of those who follow him, with incitements to hate, resentment, and disinformation. One of our many big battles in the next few years will be to preserve and expand a reliable free press.
We used to have The Fairness Doctrine, passed in 1949, and ended by Reagan in 1987. As portrayed in the movie Vice, it required holders of broadcast licenses, like tv stations, to present different controversial viewpoints of public interest and in a fair, and more reliably sourced, manner. However, it didn’t apply to cable and wouldn’t have applied to the great diversity of media available today. We need a new, updated fairness doctrine.
The election reveals we clearly need a change in our political and economic systems so more people are included in its riches and power. The problem is, DT is not going to do that.
It can feel like there are too many threats to face at once. I was a bit surprised after the results were announced that I was not a babbling wreck. But these are the times we’re given. Just acknowledging they’re real takes fortitude and courage. Takes discernment and a willingness to look, listen, and care, as much as we can in any one moment. The ability to dig deeper and find strength even when it seems impossible, to dig deeper than fear, is there in us all. So many people have already responded through these last 8 years by becoming more active politically and socially than they ever had before.
Our power is built by joining with others to build supportive communities of opposition. By not only training ourselves to be media literate and to critically study the news as revealed in disparate and reliable sources, but by keeping aware of the news in ourselves. By being kind, loving to ourselves and others and aware of moment-by-moment sensations, feelings, thoughts, and inclinations to act. By looking deeply, we hear the wind of our breath, like the breeze off the ocean or through the leaves on trees, and let go, for even a moment, of what shocks us. As much as we might despair, the earth is still very much here with us.
And then, to quote environmentalist Derek Jensen, “If my love doesn’t cause me to protect those I love, it’s not love.”
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This Post is republished on Medium.
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Photo credit: Flickr
