The Article That I Had Hoped to Never Have to Write

The election to a second term of Donald J. Trump has proven that if a lie is told often enough and convincingly enough it can be perceived to be Truth. Throw in the fact that the prices for eggs and bread are higher than they were several years ago and America has decided to disregard the voices of its ‘better Angels’ and elect a twice impeached former President convicted of 34 felonies, a sexual crime that will cost him millions of dollars in punishment, a man convicted of corporate fraud and penalized close to $400 million, and a man charged with a conspiracy to defraud the United States of America from the transference of power to the new President that legitimately defeated him–and in the process incited thousands to ‘sack’ the United States Capitol, an action that resulted in several deaths and the injuries to more than 140 police officers. Matthew Graves, the US attorney for the District of Columbia had said at the time that it was likely the “largest single day , mass assault of law enforcement officers in our nations history.”

Yes, America has given an enormous electoral victory–one of landslide proportions–Trump won every single battle ground state and the popular vote–to a man filled with the language of retribution, hatred, misogyny, and the identification of dissent with the the fascist ideology that there are “enemies within the country that need to be rooted out, jailed or worse.

Indeed, America either did not take seriously enough or really did not care that Trump had accused Haitian immigrants of eating the pets of their neighbors-accusations that resulted in bomb threats and school closures throughout the town of Springfield Illinois. America either bought or did not care that Trump was accusing immigrants of poisoning or contaminating the ‘pure blood’ of Americans–language popularized by Adolph Hitler in his book Mein Kampf that eventually resulted in the deportation and murder of Six Million Jews and others deemed to be a threat to the State–some for their sexual orientation. America did not care that Donald Trump would invoke the language of violent retribution when he suggested for whatever reason that his Republican critic, Liz Cheney, should face a firing squad of guns ‘trained upon her’. He actually used that language against a critic because he did not like her criticisms or her strong foreign policy ideas.

America must now look in the mirror and realize that it has become Donald J. Trump. I find it tragic that a master ‘con man’ has manipulated enough people with lies, fear and hatred that we have rejected leadership–perhaps in part due to misogyny and racism– that would have optimistically allowed for a multiplicity of ideas to have a “seat at the table”. Leadership that would have employed democracy in the best sense of the word to go forward toward social progress that uses the best ideas from the total market place of ideas– deriving from ideologies sometimes opposed, sometimes not, ideas representing the broad diversity of what constitutes the American experiment and democracy.

Kamala Harris had chanted ‘we’re not going back”. Sadly it was a false prophecy.

Instead we have become the lowest incarnation of ourselves–just steps away from tyranny, repression and enslavement to powers whose agenda is corrosive and destructive.

I am not optimistic and not convinced that Donald J.Trump will not in tyrannical fashion endeavor to remake the justice department as his own police force–going after dissent and political opposition in media and otherwise as part of a clearly stated goal of attacking the enemy within. I take him at his word.

If we take Donald J. Trump at his word–and we should of course–trade wars are about to ensue that will considerably drive up prices for consumer goods, cost America jobs as a result of reduced trade and retaliatory trade practices by our adversaries such as China and our friends in Europe or even Canada, and balloon the deficit causing interest rates to rise as he repays his billion dollar donors with massive tax cuts–cuts that will not help but rather hurt the middle class.

I fully expect–as Elon Musk ( put in charge of efficiency to trim the deficit to compensate for the massive tax cuts) has warned–that America will undergo a period of economic stress as medicare, social security, Affordable Care are studied as prime sources for making the budget lean. Clearly America has a great deal to fear as a result of Musks proclamations or his intentions.

Democracy has made a massive mistake. I expect white supremacists and far right nationalists to to be empowered to continue their hate crimes–they love Trump’s Nazi rhetoric.

Women will have an extreme fight on their hands in various states. They will be fighting against the states that want to control their bodies and jail doctors that give them any reproductive advice. And if ones skin color is dark brown in various neighborhoods–especially the border states–they had better be prepared to carry a few forms of identification because Donald J.Trump has threatened mass deportation and Musk will find the billions to implement this. There is the very real possibility that families will be torn asunder as immigration police forces search for the undocumented aliens, but in the process scare and threaten the documented. And if one happens to be Brown and has settled into a community–contributing to the welfare of their communities and are awaiting citizenship or are in the process of applying for it–no matter how long they have been in their neighborhoods or if their kids are in school or if their parents are deeply engrained within the families and the society–they are going to be afraid that they will be uprooted and resettled in a detention center before being returned to their countries of origin. This is what Donald J. Trump has threatened, and we must take him at his word.

Sir Winston Churchill once stated in a message to Parliament in 1947 that ‘Democracy is the worst form of government ever invented, except for all the forms that have been tried from time to time.” It is a statement that recognizes human flaws and the possibility that ‘democracy may not always get it right.’

American democracy has failed America in 2024. We’ve abandoned our ‘better angels’. We didn’t listen to their whispered words of the the difference between truth and lies, right and wrong.

The American economy is the envy world and Donald J. Trump convinced the multitudes that we were on the edge of depression. Inflation ,after the dislocations caused by the supply chain disruptions of Covid, has returned to the 2.00% range. Unemployment is exceptionally low–in the 4.10% range–and the Federal Reserve is in the process of cutting interest rates because they believe they can bring down the cost of money once again–the result of a very soft economic landing.

America elected Donald J. Trump at a time of superb economic variables. Consumers are keeping the economy growing at a healthy pace, with Gross Domestic Product growing at a desirable 2.8% and inflation declining. The Trump administration will reap the benefits of this economy before they begin to wreak havoc on it. It is sad, quite sad that Kamala Harris will not benefit from an economy her administration suffered to create.

In her seminal book the Origins of Totalitarianism, Hannah Arendt discussed that when lies are told so frequently and effectively they can become perceived as Truth. And when that happens at the feet of authoritarian dictator there is a serious danger that a subjugated people will not be able to tell right from wrong.
That happened in Nazi Germany and became known as a Banality of Evil.
America in the 2024 election has not only been intrigued by the Totalitarian Temptation, it has succumbed to it.

I am not optimistic about what is to come. In four years there will be another Presidential election. I can only pray and hope with all my heart and soul that the American experiment has not been so corrupted to never really regain itself again.

Bruce Farrell Rosen
San Francisco