How America Ends

[Newest Reality]

A tectonic demographic shift is under way. Can the country hold together?

Democracy depends on the consent of the losers. For most of the 20th century, parties and candidates in the United States have competed in elections with the understanding that electoral defeats are neither permanent nor intolerable. The losers could accept the result, adjust their ideas and coalitions, and move on to fight in the next election. Ideas and policies would be contested, sometimes viciously, but however heated the rhetoric got, defeat was not generally equated with political annihilation. The stakes could feel high, but rarely existential. In recent years, however, beginning before the election of Donald Trump and accelerating since, that has changed.

“Our radical Democrat opponents are driven by hatred, prejudice, and rage,” Trump told the crowd at his reelection kickoff event in Orlando in June. “They want to destroy you and they want to destroy our country as we know it.” This is the core of the president’s pitch to his supporters: He is all that stands between them and the abyss.

In October, with the specter of impeachment looming, he fumed on Twitter, “What is taking place is not an impeachment, it is a COUP, intended to take away the Power of the People, their VOTE, their Freedoms, their Second Amendment, Religion, Military, Border Wall, and their God-given rights as a Citizen of The United States of America!” For good measure, he also quoted a supporter’s dark prediction that impeachment “will cause a Civil War like fracture in this Nation from which our Country will never heal.”

Trump’s apocalyptic rhetoric matches the tenor of the times. The body politic is more fractious than at any time in recent memory. Over the past 25 years, both red and blue areas have become more deeply hued, with Democrats clustering in cities and suburbs and Republicans filling in rural areas and exurbs. In Congress, where the two caucuses once overlapped ideologically, the dividing aisle has turned into a chasm.

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/12/how-america-ends/600757/

This article really captures and mirrors my own take on where we are at and where America may soon be going. These are most certainly transitional times, for better or for worse. There is no doubt about that. However, it does have a lot of potential for us as far as democrats, liberals and even progressives go. The demographics are with us, at least.

[OAITW r.2.0]

1. Or, maybe, it is How America Begins Again.

There is a serious war underway by those who believe in the Eisenhower/Kennedy/Carter/Clinton/Obama view of American.

Versus the Nixon/Reagan/Bush/Bush/Trump amalgam.


Actually, I think about the degeneration of the Republican Party and that pretty much explains it.

[Newest Reality]

4. That's optimistic.

Well, yes, a breakdown of the old system can lead to the potential for changes we really need.

Add to this the tsunami of digital infrastructure from the 4th Industrial Revolution in progress, and who knows how it will go or turn out. We can be assured of more chaos, but chaos is disruption of order, so it is going to require a lot of open-minded awareness of what is going on and how to respond. If we can all cope with inspecting our biases and are able to embrace the amount of push and pull that is coming, that may be the game changer.

Yes, it seems rather clear that the reactionary desperation on the part of the GOP is based partially on the prospectus for their continuation as having any future relevance and I urge people to consider that and the Fascist elements that influence their current attempts to retain control and power. Fascism, (read: techno-Fascism) is a major concern since capitalism plus AI will lean in that direction in order to maintain and increase profits exclusively, which does not work out well for most of us in that case.

[Celerity]

9. Do not forget Lyndon Johnson on the good side! nt

[TreasonousBastard]

2. This is not the first time we've been through this. The worst was what led up to the civil war...

but there were plenty of other smaller melees.

I alway take comfort in the hope that blind rage eventually burns itself out and we all get back to work. At least that's what usually happens.

[NurseJackie]

3. So glad to be old.

[underpants]

5. Great read. I'd seen someone reference it in another thread. Thanks.

Many great lines and great research. This one was really good.

A conservatism defined by ideas can hold its own against progressivism, winning converts to its principles and evolving with each generation. A conservatism defined by identity reduces the complex calculus of politics to a simple arithmetic question—and at some point, the numbers no longer add up.

[Garrett78]

6. It is a good read, though I'm only a little more than halfway through, but...

Last edited Thu Nov 14, 2019, 02:37 AM - Edit history (1)

...I do take some issue with the notion that "conservatism defined by ideas can hold its own..." Those ideas have always been linked ever so closely with greed, white supremacy and patriarchy, so I do not give conservatism the credit of being able to hold its own. The pursuit of "small government" and "states' rights" and "traditional values" has everything to do with curtailing justice and equity, or enabling injustice and inequity. Long, long before Trump - even when they seemed relatively sane - the right wing in the US has been wholly dependent on fomenting and exploiting racism and sexism.

The GOP’s efforts to cling to power by coercion instead of persuasion have illuminated the perils of defining a political party in a pluralistic democracy around a common heritage, rather than around values or ideals.

Again, though, that "common heritage" *is* (and long has been) the predominant value/ideal of conservatism. It was just masked more effectively in the past.

And Cody Cain is quite obviously correct that the GOP must lie in order to survive. That's not a new reality, and it gives lie to the idea that conservatism can hold its own.

The "self-made" person is mythical, as is the notion of a "free market" (a market totally free of government intervention).

Nor does opposition to change make any sense when it's the one true/unavoidable constant.

The whole philosophy, in other words, is a house of cards.

The collapse of the mainstream Republican Party in the face of Trumpism...

The mainstream Republican Party set the stage for Trumpism. 50+ years of increasingly cruel and unhinged policy and rhetoric made Trump possible. We didn't call it Trumpism at the time, but Trumpism made Trump possible--not the other way around.

Something I wrote recently is in line with Appelbaum's piece:

The Republican Party has been trying for decades, with quite a bit of success, to undermine faith in government. Run up debt so as to cut entitlements, have corporations write legislation, deregulate industry, install heads of departments whose mission it is to erode those very departments, deny the stark reality that past and present injustice is not evenly distributed, etc.

Since the likes of Putin also wish to undermine democratic institutions for the purpose of self-enrichment, Putin and Republicans make for interesting bedfellows.

This is a war of ideologies: we vs. me. "It takes a village" vs. "every person for themselves" (cheating permitted...nay, encouraged). The likes of Barr, Bannon, Pompeo et al. are especially dangerous--they're white nationalists, isolationists and despise secularization.

Republicans have seen the writing on the wall (social progression, increased secularism, changing demographics, etc.), so their tactics have become increasingly extreme in recent years (intense voter suppression and gerrymandering, full-throated attacks on science and public education, persistent attacks on the "liberal media" to help shift the Overton Window, stealing a Supreme Court seat and packing the judiciary with right wing ideologues, aligning with dictators who share the goal of undermining democracy for personal enrichment, replacing the dog whistle with a bullhorn, and so on). They take comfort, though, in a tyranny of the minority system which, paradoxically, makes major structural reform nearly impossible to bring about for the very reasons why such reform is so desperately needed.

Getting back to Appelbaum's article, the following reeks of false equivalency:

Outright political violence remains considerably rarer than in other periods of partisan divide, including the late 1960s. But overheated rhetoric has helped radicalize some individuals. Cesar Sayoc, who was arrested for targeting multiple prominent Democrats with pipe bombs, was an avid Fox News watcher; in court filings, his lawyers said he took inspiration from Trump’s white-supremacist rhetoric. “It is impossible,” they wrote, “to separate the political climate and [Sayoc’s] mental illness.” James Hodgkinson, who shot at Republican lawmakers (and badly wounded Representative Steve Scalise) at a baseball practice, was a member of the Facebook groups Terminate the Republican Party and The Road to Hell Is Paved With Republicans. In other instances, political protests have turned violent, most notably in Charlottesville, Virginia, where a Unite the Right rally led to the murder of a young woman. In Portland, Oregon, and elsewhere, the left-wing “antifa” movement has clashed with police. The violence of extremist groups provides ammunition to ideologues seeking to stoke fear of the other side.

Right wing terrorism is a far, far greater threat in the US. It's not just me that says that; it's the FBI that says that.

Of course, the most catastrophic collapse of a democracy in the 19th century took place right here in the United States, sparked by the anxieties of white voters who feared the decline of their own power within a diversifying nation.

Replace 19th with 21st and that sentence holds true.

[Hortensis]

12. :) Reports of our death have been greatly exaggerated.

We're certainly in scary trouble right now, of course, but problems always force reaction. Without Russia and other enemies, I think we'd have ended the conservative era that began with Reagan's election and already be well into the next big, long liberal era.

As for the conservative half of our nation, they've been taken over and their greatest weaknesses perniciously manipulated by increasingly sophisticated psychological and mass communication techniques to create close to the worst versions of themselves.

But there's the other side of them, and most of that is ours also. Because liberals and conservatives have far more in common as individuals than the few important differences, both traits we're proud of and ones we like to ascribe only to them. Just read a few posts here for proof of that last. Under good leaders who encourage us all to be the better versions of ourselves, the differences are far less extreme and democracy works.

Abe Lincoln knew all their faults, but he knew that good conservatives could be very good citizens. "What is conservatism? Is it not adherence to the old and tried, against the new and untried?" ~ Abraham Lincoln. Echoed by Buckley, et al, as the best offering of conservatism to build an ideology on.

In order to divide and conquer us, in order to undo two centuries of mostly liberal and joint progressive advances that conservatives also saw as "the American way," the so-called libertarians had to start by purging from the GOP the positive contribution of the conservative resistance to change.

But that aspect of conservatism still lives within people who know something's gone very wrong. Their weaknesses have kept them dancing on authoritarian, partisan strings long past time to break and walk away, but nothing continues forever and problems create solutions.

[Garrett78]

14. Buckley, the bigot who called himself a libertarian and conservative...

...helped put the Republican Party on its present path.

Again, conservative ideology is as phony as a $3 bill. Caliman73 said it well: https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=12692475

[Hortensis]

16. Well, take heart. MOST people don't see those they share

their world with in very simple black or white, "us or them" terms. That's why others come say here what they'd be fired for at work. There really are such things as good sense and common wisdom.

Damned good thing, or the human race would have killed itself off millennia ago.

[Garrett78]

19. You talk about "an aspect of conservatism that still lives within people."

What aspect would that be, and why is that a good thing?

Conservatism is a house of cards. There's no fact-based foundation supporting it. "Small government" and resistance to change has always been about denying rights, denying progress. This notion that conservatism once was admirable is a lie.

[Arthur_Frain]

21. I think they're referring to "tradition" in the article.

Probably the only “aspect of conservatism” that I might be able to defend.

[Skittles]

7. the Deplorables are the assholes who just cannot accept or adapt to change

fuck them

[roamer65]

8. All empires die.

This one will be no different.

No one can stop it, but you can mitigate the effect of it in your life.

It doesn’t matter who we elect in 2020. The process is underway and faster than many have thought.

[Garrett78]

10. I think it's pretty damn important who we elect in 2020, even if the US Empire is collapsing.

If the current cast of characters is still in power after 1/20/21, there will be much more suffering than if they aren't.

[roamer65]

11. As far as suffering, you haven't seen anything yet.

The CO2 concentration in the atmosphere is accelerating.

There will a lot of suffering along the way to the eventual ELE. (Extinction Level Event)

That’s just the cold, hard truth.

[Newest Reality]

17. You are correct!

To me there is a list of "perfect storms" brewing and you could fill a couple pages about the ELE alone, so it is far beyond mere speculation.

It is rather gloomy and doomy. I have had a few discussions with people that have investigated and then grappled with the rather convincing evidence to this effect. We tend to agree that, due to the late states we are in, it is best for those who know enough to try to mitigate the impact on their lives and deal with the psychological impacts that will have. Conversely, I tend to leave anyone living in a bubble about it to whatever comforts them for now concerning all this. Sometimes it is just too big and complex to explain something that should already be clearly evident in the mainstream of society, facts and all.

The result? Well, those who are aware and grapple with it may have long, slow slog to the results, but they can prepare themselves and adapt as best as possible. Those who need to protect themselves mentally and emotionally will be better off over the short-term, but very susceptible to the eruptions and sudden shocks when it is on their doorstep, so to speak. There are pros and cons to both approaches on the individual level and collectively. There was a window of opportunity to really prevent this, but it is rapidly closing.

So, yes, the cold hard truth is quite disturbing and I just wanted to note one perspective on the two ways of looking at it at this stage and in regards to dealing with others. However, this all may be a ravaging cycle of changes and there are so many variables that I still can retain some optimism that pertains to potentials for either dealing with this better in the short-term or some sort of reversal in the far future, which all depends on the troubling question as to how far our species, (and the rest of the interdependent biosphere and its creatures) will make it. It seems to me that mitigating the effects of it all is even being given the priority it deserves now that stopping it or reversing it has become less viable.

[roamer65]

22. At best it will be a massive population crash.

At worst an ELE. All depends on how we end up dealing with the problem.

The climate crisis is merely a symptom or a larger problem...overpopulation.

People who say overpopulation isn’t the cause of the climate crisis are in denial. Period.

[Garrett78]

20. All the more reason to get sane people in power, so as to mitigate the damage.

[Blue_true]

13. I think that we will be ok.

I like what I am seeing from younger people and some older ones. Over our history, the country has seen many shifts, we have moved through them all after some difficulty.

[Garrett78]

15. 2 major problems:

1) The need for major structural reform has never been more apparent, while being nearly impossible to bring about for the reasons why it's so desperately needed. What to do, for instance, when - within 20 years - nearly 70% of the population is represented by just 30% of the US Senate?

2) Climate change.

[Newest Reality]

18. Yes, and a new variable...

What is being called the 4th Industrial Revolution may be rather transparent in the mainstream, but it does add a new variable to how we will deal with just about everything and, it some ways, it is already ubiquitous, which is the way computing and the Internet will go in that paradigm.

I include that as one potential point of reference for optimism, but you have to dig a little and look outside the myopic picture of the manipulative, sensationalist mainstream. I don't think we can imagine, yet, the total impact of this new and rapidly developing digital infrastructure, but it will be significant to the point of potentially changing not only the efficiency of our use of energy and resources, but could even make our ideas of economy and politics obsolete in short order.

A look see into what Germany is doing along these lines is a good place to get a peek of what I mean. America is caught in a tailspin comparatively which is another reason why the Republican ideologies, or "conservatism" may be extremely detrimental to the fate of our country and its people in times of accelerating change.