Long Time Coming
Almost everyone agrees we are at a dangerous moment. One year after an armed mob stormed the capitol, the future of democracy is in question. A recent CBS News/YouGov poll found that 66% of Americans believe “democracy is threatened.”
Conversations about the possibilities of fascism, authoritarianism, and dictatorships have entered the mainstream of American consciousness. The recognition is growing that we are engaged in a new kind of civil war, where everything from mask mandates to school library books have become battlefields. Increasing, these battlefields are shifting from symbolic to real, as violence is encouraged and sanctioned.
In some ways there is nothing new about this struggle. It began when the first Europeans decided they were justified in killing native people and taking their land. It intensified with the stealing of people from Africa and compromising into law freedom for some, brutal slavery for others. The history of American democracy is a history of the willingness of many people to protect white supremacy and capitalists profits, no matter the human toll.
The struggle between the protection of racial capital and a living democracy has defined our country. The election of Donald Trump and his efforts to keep power are but the latest expression of this enduring fight.
As with each generation that has faced the choices of what kind of people we are and want to be, there is a specific history we face that shapes this moment. The focus on the storming of the capitol obscures deeper currents at work. This struggle is more than the machinations of Trump.
It is useful, I think, to understand that we are reaping the legacy of Ronald Regan, who championed efforts to turn back the tide of black power, civil rights, and human progress. During his two terms in office, income inequality grew, labor unions were attacked, federal spending to cities was slashed, environmental protections were destroyed, and regulation of big business abandoned. All of these actions were surrounded by an ideology that pushed lies over truths and racist concepts demonizing cities, women and people of color. Rather than calling this out, much of the media dubbed him “the great communicator.”
As Peter Dreier noted, “Reagan’s most famous statement—'Government is not a solution to our problem. Government is the problem’” became the “unofficial slogan for the resurgence of right-wing extremism…The policy ideas promulgated by propaganda outfits like the Cato Institute and the Heritage Foundation masquerading as think tanks and the takeover of the Republican Party by its most conservative wing were all incubated during the Reagan years. Indeed, they all claim to be carrying out the Reagan Revolution.”
For more than 40 years we have been exposed to “a well-oiled corporate-funded conservative propaganda machine—including think tanks and lobby groups, endowed professorships at universities, legal advocacy organizations, magazines, and college student internships to train the next generation—designed to demonize activist government and glorify unregulated markets.”
Now old Regan cronies have been joined by new generations entrenched in this ideology. The divide in our country was not created by Donald Trump. It has been carefully and strategically created with the drive to protect corporate power that was given renewed force and direction in the Regan Era.
The questions in front of us are no accident. They are not the expression of some new found working class angst. They have been a long time coming. They bring us the opportunity to make the kind of fundamental changes that could at last create a living democracy, reflecting our best hopes for life and freedom. Our future depends very much on what we do now.