Our House Divided Will Not Stand

 

Our House Divided Will Not Stand

“And I think I came into this moment maybe understanding better than some other people how angry and anxious this country is and how many people are in a truly revolutionary mood…And so for me, it made sense that there were a lot of folks in this country who were really willing to entertain the idea of throwing out 240 years of democracy. Now, that's not the majority of the country, but it's a strong, powerful minority movement… If you actually think that we are months away from the destruction of democracy such that it is irreversible — man, that requires a different level of energy when you wake up every morning, a different level of urgency that, frankly, not everybody has inside the Democratic political infrastructure.” 

Senator Chris Murphy (D-CT) in a February 18th interview.

Democrats and Republicans have redefined our political discourse. Yet the guardrails have been redefined by only one man: Donald John Trump. Michelle Obama’s refrain – “when they go low, we go high” – is now ancient history. Perhaps this is a natural reaction from a Democratic Party now marginalized by its own “we will not budge” extreme at the edge of the Progressive movement. They don’t even remotely know what to do as MAGA vectors – even more extreme but with many more voters – set the agenda for the nation. The MAGA trifecta of power: Congress, the entire executive branch and the majority of the Supreme Court.

Donald Trump’s March 4th address to Congress and the Nation can be summarized thus: Donald Trump is responsible for everything good, Joe Biden caused everything bad … all to raging cheers from Republicans and depressed reactions from the Dems. Many believe the Dems have given up, instead are simply waiting for Trump to self-destruct. But can strategy work? Relying only on courts to rule and expecting Trump to obey? If neither of these occur, is it over for democracy?

Instead of striving for national unity, President Trump was reveling in deriding and marginalizing Dems further. He goaded and taunted the Democratic Party mercilessly, as the Dem constituency responded with boos (often drowned by MAGA screams and applause), pink protest clothing and real-time fact checking reflected in signs. Trump squirmed in delight at the Democratic discomfit, taunting them with his vision that very much negated their agenda (if a unified agenda can be articulated) and obvious accomplishments. He sneered, noting that the tariffs he was imposing would serve the dual purpose of protecting American interests while raising revenue to reduce the deficit. He introduced a litany of individuals he had benefited, a folksy touch. Trump even ceded the point, currently legally contested, that Elon Musk was indeed the head of DOGE.

While global stock markets crashed (very much including ours), fires raged in North and South Carolina (an ugly reminder of the perils of ignoring climate change), border crossings were already low (which began in the Biden era), as our allies were circling their wagons against a truly unreliable United States, as Russian state agencies cheered, critical federal agencies were defunded and their missions forever compromised, House MAGA representatives were lambasted in local town hall meetings (blamed on “paid outside agitators”), once extinguished diseases returned to our shores in serious numbers… and even a fatality based on the Trump administrations wink-wink nod to anti-vaxx conspiracy theorists now dominating HHS, consumer fundamentals continue to experience price increases… the economy was teetering in an era of international distrust of US policy-making… Yet with the help of studied fabrications, Trump extolled his amazing “progress” in his initial days of his second term presidency. You could see the winces from the Democrats (at least the ones who showed and stayed) as he promised that all of the above were just “the beginning” of his reworking of “America.”

The deer-in-the-headlights Democratic Party mounted pitiful signs of resistance; the thought of mobilizing a unified party seemed elusive as the above quote from Senator Chris Murphy reflects, also accompanied by a warning that we are at inflection point (Murphy: the most “serious” challenge to the most fundamental American commitment to Democracy since the Civil War). While a post-speech CNN poll showed a slightly more favorable domestic response to Trump’s speech, outside of the Russian orbit, there were signs from “allies” that much of what Trump/Musk have already “accomplished” may be impossible to reverse.

Trump 2.0 proved that Trump 1.0 was not an aberration. Free trade in North America was now dead, even if the Mexican and Canadian tariffs are reversed, because the world has additional proof that the United States could never be trusted again; MAGA America has no trepidations against breaching international commitments, attacking our closest allies with harsh sanctions, withdrawing from essential international accords and treaties and switching our most fundamental commitments to our Western allies to join with one of the most brutal autocratic nations on earth: Putin’s Russia. We showed that we are willing to defy hard science in favor of conspiracy theories and once laughable extremist views. MAGA cheered; our allies cried.

Real-time fact-checking by NBC and ABC news revealed a plethora of clearly false statements in Trump’s presentation, but fabricating facts is now acceptable to MAGA constituents, hardly relegated to Donald Trump or Elon Musk (the latter whose summary of his “cost savings” was not remotely accurate, often by billions in individual numbers). Hours before that congressional presentation, for example, “United States Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) is facing criticism after making false claims about transgender athletes in women’s sports. Speaking on Fox News, he said that girls’ and women’s sports are ‘getting ready to be extinct’ because of transgender athletes. Many people quickly pointed out that his statement was not true…

“The senator claimed on social media that transgender women had won over 900 women’s sports trophies in the last four years. No data supports this claim. In fact, NCAA President Charlie Baker recently told a Senate panel that fewer than ten transgender athletes currently compete in U.S. school sports…

“A 2023 report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found that only about 3% of high school students identify as transgender, and an even smaller number play organized sports. A study in the British Journal of Sports Medicine also found that transgender women lose any major strength advantage after two years of hormone therapy… Tommy Tuberville has a history of exaggerating facts. Before the Super Bowl, former President Donald Trump falsely claimed Tuberville had coached star quarterback Patrick Mahomes in college. Tuberville later said he had recruited Mahomes, but Mahomes denied it.” Total Pro Sports, March 4th. I picked Tuberville, not as an isolated example of MAGA mendacity, but as an example of pernicious MAGA legitimization of extreme political lying by senior lawmakers… everywhere!

As Trump/Musk defy logic and international standards by relying on conspiracy theories in lieu of facts, those allied with our previous values are striking out in defiance of the new American values. For example, in contrast to Trump’s “drill baby drill” embrace of fossil fuels, the UK government announced new climate goals at COP29, including reducing emissions by 81% by 2035, as their Prime Minister called on other countries to bring forward ambitious targets. We are creating international distrust, sowing the seeds of horrendous economic destabilization that is so clearly reflected in the global stock market collapse as Trump imposed harsh tariffs and sanctions on our closest allies… stuff no one really believed he would actually do.

I’m Peter Dekom, and I suggest you re-read Senator Chris Murphy’s quote above… and ask yourself if you believe we are that close to the end of democracy... and ask yourself if you were a European ally, would you ever trust any legal commitments that Trump might make in the future.