Sadly I don't think we have the immediate power to renounce Smith but if any reasonably sane person in the federal government has anything good on her, I am willing to suspend my usual distaste for blackmail.
Thank you doesn't seem to cut it, but thank you for your work Emmett. I am concerned Canadian media is falling into the same traps as U.S. election coverage. "framing stories as if journalistic objectivity requires presenting ‘two sides’, even if one side comprises nothing but baseless lies"
I’ve made this comment before. A surprising % of Americans believe there are 2 kinds of people in the world. Americans and those who want to be American. Trump has normalized this belief and the ultranationalism that comes along with it.
Trump is only the frontman in this attack on the American mind.
The attack is really coming from the anti-democracy movement: JD Vance; and Vance’s and Peter Thiel convinced Trump to make Vance vice president; and from Thiel’s early business partner, Elon Musk. https://www.alternet.org/behind-trump...
American democracy was doomed by design. The two-party system amplifies division over time, each cycle more extreme than the last. The system already precipitated one civil war, will we sleepwalk into the next?
We can declare democracy dead if there ever comes a time when we don't have free elections. In the meantime, I don't think the author knows what "democracy" is, but calling it "dead" makes for good ragebait.
So in your view, democracy isn't defined by the ability to choose leaders through elections, but by other attributes of liberalism and human rights? That's an eccentric and, I would argue, unhelpful definition.
I did. He claimed democracy was dead, and then cited a bunch of illiberal things that the Trump administration has done that don't really bear on whether a country is a democracy.
Is Trump awful? Yes. That doesn't mean US democracy is dead. Far from it.
If the Administration is acting at will, there are no checks and balances, the courts are essentially broken, the media isn't doing its job and a huge number of people didn't vote - how is it a democracy?
And he said that it can be a democracy again but that simply voting in a new administration won't be enough to recreate a democracy. There be much that needs to be done over time to get there.
A democracy, by definition, is a country where leaders are selected by voting. I can't tell how he's defining "democracy" except as a list of desirable attributes of liberal countries—many of which, like checks and balances, many democracies lack (e.g., the UK).
I certainly think there's more than a chance. Trump has done terrible violence to US foreign policy and to the federal administrative state, but our states run our elections.
Respectfully, from your other comments it seems like you are not as well informed and up to date as you could be. I am not well informed re; state politics but how do you propose a state functions democratically within a fascist confederacy?
I agree in theory, but at least as of now, America has freedom of speech and the opposition can tell its message. (The opposition is not currently very good at messaging, but that's a different problem.)
Under your definition, the point is free speech, right?
Except people with the legal right to exercise free speech are being investigated, intimidated, arrested, and many are deported without a hearing.
Not just opposition leaders are being shut down, but universities, law firms, random people
Millions were denied the right to vote in the last election, because they didn’t have drivers licenses, or couldn’t afford passports….people born in the US, never broken a law, many who served their country, who didn’t have govt issued picture ID.
Loads of other ID, just not that kind.
Understanding that the rule of law is not a threat, but a balance of holding everyone accountable for their actions. When this is equally applied, acted upon and enforced it is the "check" on power.
The equal application of these laws is what is key. The lack of application of law and order, equally, loosens the support of these walls, holding the ceiling of limits, under the roof of the structure of the constitution in place.
The limits of power of the government are written and approved by the legislative branch, signed into law by the executive branch and enforced by the judicial branch.
The biggest balance of the feather to the weight of law is acting in good faith. By enforcement and obeying these controls keeps us from living in chaos and tyranny. If the head of the executive branch perverts "good faith" promise of disobeying the controls of power as a legal, rule of law is gone
That's where acting in"good faith" to act on the laws by the legislative branch is equally important. If they don't check the abuse of power by the executive branch it is a dereliction of duty under the rules they swore to up hold.
Agree. America is now in shock of what apathy, focus on money, and hate does. The one positive thing it has done for the majority of people is get them active in the process of American democracy. Those that have chose not to live in wilful ignorance are actively learning how our democracy works.
Can you please start offering asylum to Americans who are against this regime? Or at least trans people (I’m not but am very worried about people I care about who are.)
Thank-you, Emmett, for an excellent article that lays out the reality of the US situation plainly. If every American who cared about democracy were to read it, they would realize they are nowhere close to fighting hard enough for their country.
Comments
The attack is really coming from the anti-democracy movement: JD Vance; and Vance’s and Peter Thiel convinced Trump to make Vance vice president; and from Thiel’s early business partner, Elon Musk.
https://www.alternet.org/behind-trump...
Is Trump awful? Yes. That doesn't mean US democracy is dead. Far from it.
This is getting silly.
In a nation with no freedom of speech you could have perfectly fair elections. It wouldn't be a democracy if the opposition couldn't tell its message
Except people with the legal right to exercise free speech are being investigated, intimidated, arrested, and many are deported without a hearing.
Not just opposition leaders are being shut down, but universities, law firms, random people
Loads of other ID, just not that kind.
(That's not a good definition.)