What Do We Really Want?
Photo credit: Peter D. Freeman
Many (most, all?) of us who are not red MAGA-emblazoned hat-wearers have come to a pretty firm conclusion that the Trump Administration has been and continues to be one unmitigated disaster after another. The growing list of instances of Mr. Trump’s arrogance, ineptitude, insensitivity, intransigence, etc., etc., etc., threatens to become completely overwhelming. How many mornings have you opened your eyes and your first cogent brain activity centers around wondering what new national embarrassment Mr. Trump has perpetrated overnight?
So far, there has been little to nothing remotely redeemable to the vast majority of us from the current administration. That is something upon which most of us can agree. We read article after article, watch report after report, have conversation after conversation about just how aberrant and bad the Trump Administration is. In response and retaliation, Mr. Trump and his minions refute the negative press with allegations of “fake news,” poor treatment and threats to investigate and suspend broadcast licenses. This situation is morphing into a national Groundhog Day nightmare, kind of like the Bill Murray movie. Instead of hearing Sonny and Cher’s “I Got You Babe” blaring on the clock radio every day, we hear about how Mr. Trump has further degraded our Constitutional rights, made sport of another country’s leader or inanely Tweeted something that can be easily disproven.
These are things we see and understand and lament. Here’s the thing, though. We can be outraged. We can be scandalized. We can gnash our teeth, wear sackcloth and cover ourselves in ashes in protest. But what is that going to do? We see the wholesale roll-back of regulations that protect us from the predatory nature of our ascendant capitalist “betters.” We see the continuing trend of inequality as the wealthiest continue to amass huge fortunes as the income of the poor, working poor and the middle class is transferred upwards. But what do we do?
We can keep impotently focusing on the flow of rightwing libertarian excrement flowing from the GOP and its benefactors in an attempt to reestablish the status quo of the past 30 years or we can start thinking about what we want in an egalitarian society and pursue it. What would that be? What do we want to see? In what direction do we want our country to go? Instead of just reacting to the horrendous actions of Mr. Trump, the Executive Branch millionaires and billionaires and the GOP-controlled Congress, when can we really begin to examine what We the People want for ourselves and our fellow Americans and the world as a whole?
There have been some movements that have attempted to address specific instances of this assault on the power of the people. Occupy Wall Street, the Dakota Access Pipeline protest, the Women’s March, Black Lives Matter, among others, were important. Are important. I believe that non-violent protest is the way to achieve change. What has proven to render these movements more-or-less non-starters is that they are siloed. Each movement has its own agenda, its own leadership, its own course of action, its own plan of attack. There is little coordination. Not much has been done to educate the public that so many of the ills we see in our present situation have common roots. The neoliberal agenda has sought and continues to seek to divide the people, sow chaos, keep us reeling and then harvest the rewards. As long as we are caught up in our own movements and causes du jour, we make it easier for those at the top to continue to exploit us socially, emotionally and economically. The last section of Naomi Klein’s “No Is Not Enough” sheds some light on this.
As long as the movements remain separate and siloed, they are seen as being inconsequential. They will be left alone to flare up and burn out. Sure, there may be some excitement and some arrests, especially if any of the gatherings and protests look like they are going to threaten private property. But what if common cause could be achieved amidst all of these groups? What would it do to the establishment if enough people took up the cause for change—real change—and opted to act? Or choose to take sustained action, more along the lines of the Dakota Access Pipeline protests, but against the stripping away of our rights in lieu of corporate rights? A mass movement would most definitely make those in power take notice.
The message of Dr. King’s final campaign still rings loud and clear, that, in Dr. King’s words “it is necessary for us to realize that we have moved from the era of civil rights to the era of human rights…when we see that there must be a radical redistribution of economic and political power.” Getting rid of President Trump will not be a panacea to the ills of U.S. society. The roots of the inequalities in wealth and power run deep. Mr. Trump and his administration are simply the current crop of gilded pansies in bloom. His removal from office, by impeachment, enactment of the 25th Amendment or resignation, will not achieve a night and day reversal, especially with the holy-rolling ideologue, Koch-purchased Mike Pence waiting in the wings.
We are facing a reckoning. We are dealing with existential questions about the nature of what it means to be the United States and citizens thereof. I, for one, want to live in a place where the welfare of the citizens is paramount and that of corporate power is negligible, where the basic components of survival are easily accessible and not dangled above the heads of the people as being luxuries served only to those deemed as deserving. I want to live in a place where the precepts of “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness” are truly believed and lived and are not dependent on one’s pedigree and generational wealth. The great experiment of Americanism has been corrupted by the few who see themselves as the rightful rulers over the many based on their bank accounts.
We the People must exert our voices and let our wishes be known and not allow ourselves to be drowned out by those with the moneyed megaphone.
