Dispatches From An Empire In Decline: Sliding Into Oblivion
The universe has a sense for the dramatic that politics can capture, focus, and intensify to harmful degrees.
This week we are seeing so many years of stories and tragedies and missteps and craven power grabs culminate with new beginnings that portend so much existential dread it hurts the heart to put it into words.
Of course, on Monday, the Iowa Caucuses got off on a calamitous stumbling, the entire process plagued by technological failure, human error, and the particular blend of vapidity and irresponsibility that has come to define American media. Humans have enjoyed variations of democracy since our days as hunter-gatherers, and yet we can’t stop screwing it up for trying to change it, to perfect it, to adding a wrinkle here, a wrinkle there. This time it was an app because we live in the digital age. That a tech firm failed to deliver and hurt democracy, at this point, is less than a surprise.
Then, of course, on Tuesday came word that a portion of the results would arrive as the nation braced itself for President Donald Trump’s State of the Union Address. This installment was always going to be painful. It’s the kickoff of his reelection campaign (as if he ever stopped running, that is) and with a certain acquittal in the Senate scheduled for Wednesday, Trump was feeling himself. What happened in the House of Representatives should shocked everyone though. Trump blatantly lied throughout the speech, pandered to every possible demographic, painted the Democratic Party as treasonous, awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Rush Limbaugh, who has done more to sow division and endanger women and minorities than nearly any human in American history, and made a spectacle of surprising a military wife with the return of her husband, as if he could grant wishes as the Emperor-King. While the wife seemed shocked, Republicans chanted USA-USA-USA as the world forgot that they had created the war he had gone to fight in the first place under false pretenses.
The night was punctuated by Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi tearing the speech in half as Trump ended his remarks. It was a symbolic gesture, as much for history and fundraising as anything else, but of course our media fell for the bait as Republicans played a mock-outrage gambit that used political correctness and fear of a breach of decorum against liberals. It’s a full-proof plan that’s been in place for years and it uses the media’s ridiculous insecurities against them. They are biased, after all, or at least so much as there is any bias anymore in a world gone out of its head. To hide that fact, they overcompensate and dive deeper into the madness.
Today the Senate will acquit Donald Trump despite several Republicans admitting he broke the law. It’ll be historic in the sense that they’ll hand Trump a presidency that is beyond reproach. Trump’s lawyer Alan Dershowitz made the case for a dictatorial presidency and the acquittal, even if Republicans would deny this, makes the argument precedent. From here on out, any attempt to rein in the presidency, especially an outlaw presidency, will include this impeachment trial as part of the defense. Future executives can rest easy knowing they can carry out public displays of treason and undermine our elections, all while enriching and empowering themselves in broad daylight, because of this farce.
But those fears are for the future, and we have to get there first. Trump is emboldened. Already we’ve seen what that does. When he beat Robert Mueller’s rap he shook down the new president of Ukraine and betrayed the country. What happens now is anyone’s guess, but the right answer is bound to be more and more crimes of an escalating nature. And there’s not going to be as much push to hold him accountable after this long and demoralizing battle. The impeachment farce has taken a toll and I’m not sure most people realize it yet. We’ve normalized a criminal presidency and with that comes numbing and apathy.
Authoritarianism is not a lonely rider. It doesn’t swoop into a society and crush from the top down. It infects. It spreads. It kills the victim by eating away at the diseased tissue and worming its way to the heart, where it will feast until the heart dies. Survivors of authoritarian dictatorships tell the story of how outrage turns to resignation. How shock turns to resignation. We’re watching our systems crumble because they have weak or weakened foundations. We’re watching the turn.
Today is a new beginning. History books, if there will be history books, will note the date.
February 5th, 2020.
The day Republicans voted to acquit their president despite his crimes being proven.
It’s the dawning of a dangerous era. The law is not just malleable, it’s a weapon in the hands of the injustice. Democracy is being discarded as democracy is the first things authoritarians dispose of. The lead up to the re-election of an authoritarian is a time of strife and violence and the assault on basic human decency. We need to be ready for that. We need to steel ourselves.
This is a day that will be written about in history books.
If there will be history books.