"Kavanaugh is Just Another Brick in the Wall"
The Kavanaugh nomination is just another brick in the wall. The final moves in the long game of the right wing corporatists to reverse the New Deal and all progressive initiatives are being made. The power of the people is waning and the unchecked hegemony of the authoritarian monied class is on the rise. The Enlightenment ideals upon which our country was founded and bolstered by the New Deal have been replaced with a toxic blend of the objectivism of Ayn Rand, the neoliberalism of Milton Friedman and the Mont Pelerin Society and the public choice theory of James M. Buchanan with the recipe being provided by Lewis Powell in his 1971 memo and the ingredients being purchased by reactionary dark money such as the Koch Brothers, the Walton family, the Bradley, Olin and Coors Foundations, Sheldon Adelson, and others.
The Trump Administration, though detestable, isn't the cause, but merely another vehicle by which the coterie of the uber-wealthy can advance their agenda. It may sound delusional, paranoid and crazy, but the long trail of evidence is there. The policy initiatives and deregulation of the Trump Administration verifies this. The contempt of the upper class towards the poor, working and middle classes is apparent. The dehumanization of the "other" makes it easier to gain support for and justify previously unheard of actions. The jingoism spewed constantly across the right wing mediaverse keeps its purveyors in a constant state of heightened hyper-masculine militarism, ready to rabidly attack anything contrary to what is bouncing around their echo chambers. Much of anything pertaining to the common good is being derided and liquidated to private interests. The slow-motion coup is nearing its completion.
If we want to avoid devolving into the Hobbesian dystopia of our lives being "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short," we need to seriously question the basis of the U.S. social contract status quo. What do we want our country to be? Should our elected officials and government serve We the People or the interests of the corporations, campaign-funders and those who donate to think tanks? Do we continue to disparage those we see as below us, trample them and blame them and, instead, worship those who live in the high castles, feeding on the myth of "perhaps one day that will be me living there?" Should the preponderance of our tax dollars go to funding American Empire in endless wars and padding the ludicrously huge personal wealth of defense contractor CEOs and shareholders or should the money we hand over to the government in good faith be used to help build our own country and make the lives of people better?
We are moving nearer and nearer to the edge of a dark chasm. Those who are protesting against these successive steps towards authoritarian rule have been urged to assume the posture of civility and desist from criticizing the ringleaders. Of course those seeking change are instructed to be civil for they pose a danger to those in power. If protest, one of our Constitutionally-guaranteed rights, were to be silenced, it would be far easier for the coup to continue.
Let us not be civil nor silent. Let us be raucous and loud. Let us not sit by and hope that somehow things will just get better. Let us stand up and demand that they do. Let us not be deterred by the derision of those opposing us. Let us rise up with confidence and proudly claim the mantle of We the People.
