I hate to tell people I’ve told them something before, but I have a point to make. In my book on the Roberts Court and in various other talks and writings I have tried to warn that the disparity between rich and poor in America was going to threaten our way of life, our democracy, our liberty, even our lives by leading to anger that brushed away all rational discourse about how or who would work to deal with it. I was not the only person making that warning. But no one wanted to listen. Americans have the attitude that we can cross whatever bridge when we get there. But that assumes that the bridge has been built. If people don’t take warnings seriously, there will be no bridge to cross.
Now, Trump and his cronies claim that he is the solution to the nation’s economic woes because he wasn’t part of the hated elite, even while he shovels more of the nation’s wealth in fewer and fewer hands.
Similarly, I and others have been warning that the gun rights movement has nothing to do with hunting or self-protection. Indeed, military style weapons are overkill to murder people at concerts and children in schools. Killers don’t need military weapons to murder civilians. But the gun rights leadership has been talking about needing guns to protect liberty from government, like storming the Capital. In other words, they have been preparing for civil war.
Now Trump’s minions are going after private personal records that were supposed to be protected so they could not be used politically. And they have been going after the people whose job it has been to protect those records – attacking everyone doing their jobs honorably according to law because that blocks their efforts to intimidate people who oppose them.
They have been making it harder and harder for voters to vote who might vote against them, continuously making it harder to register and harder to vote even after arriving at the polls. If no one except Trump’s supporters can vote, who could stop him?
Will there be civil war? Will the Court stop him? The more he gets control of the operations of the government, the less need he’ll have to listen to or care about the people. Monarchs and dictators don’t have a good record taking care of citizens – they are more concerned with controlling people than providing for them. Friends of ours left countries of their birth because the dictators in charge made their friends and families disappear instead of taking care of them.
If we can’t vote dictators out of power, the only risk to their power is assassination. Democracy is the peaceful alternative. But when dictators choke it off, they quickly refocus on protecting themselves from anyone who seems like a threat.
So how can we deal with Trump?
Demonstrations will not dissuade him from his misbehavior. He will use them to scoop up license plate and cell phone numbers. If he’s got all that information, we should too. On our side it’s called networking. That’s what demonstrations can promote – getting to know each other. Enlarging the circle of friendship among good people.
Trump’s insistence on ignoring the Constitution is radicalizing me. There are faults with our Constitution but dealing with the likes of Mr. Trump is what this Constitution was designed for.
More, the problem isn’t Trump. It’s us. We have to realize that Trump is eviscerating government of, by and for us, for his own benefit, not ours.
He is fouling our most important trade relationships. He is fouling our most important alliances. He is making nice to America’s enemies. This man is not a friend to America. He is in fact a traitor.
Steve Gottlieb’s latest book is Unfit for Democracy: The Roberts Court and The Breakdown of American Politics. He is the Jay and Ruth Caplan Distinguished Professor Emeritus at Albany Law School, served on the New York Civil Liberties Union board, on the New York Advisory Committee to the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, and as a US Peace Corps Volunteer in Iran.
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