You may wish to call me naive, but I actually do believe in some outdated values, which would make the modern cynic scoff. I believe most Americans care about notions of honor and liberty, even if their frustrations obscure their better angels. Something in the American character resists those forces, which threaten to extinguish the flame at the heart of our Republic. Despite all of its flaws, we seem to know their is something sacred and fragile there. An ideal, which didn’t exist before, and which could be stricken from the pages of history in the hands of an absent generation.
Indeed no civil rights movement would have been possible without this, dare I say, patriotic seed in the minds of those, who throw themselves onto the pyre of liberty. Dr. King not could have presented our system a moral plea, if he didn’t believe that at its heart America sought out the most noble path. Fredrick Douglas could not have been sustained by an impossible fight, if he did not glimpse some hidden magic in those early enlightenment thinkers. Black Lives Matter wouldn’t find the strength to march, if they somehow didn’t trust that when the truth was made plain, America would make the right choices.
This is not a clean process by any means. In order to pursue these ends, we tolerate many minor imperfections. It is not every generation, which will be asked to stand sentinel, but we owe the future our occasional vigilance. Over 200 years ago, we added this statement to our essential values.
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
Some would call this a right. Others may call it a responsibility. I see it as a charge, and it is a sacred charge. You see we decided you, the media, must be protected from the law, because you are the only true defense we have against tyrants. If you cannot cope with the asymmetrical nature of the Trump campaign, then this belief was in err.
With every passing day, I find myself in greater anxiety over the real possibility that our institutional failures will lead us towards the cataclysmic election of Donald Trump. I say anxiety as not to be accused of hyperbole, but the honest word would be terror. I am not alone. Indeed every serious person seems to be raising alarms, which go unheeded. These alarms transcend the usual partisan spectacle, which passes for political discourse today.
If Trump takes the mantle of leader of the free world, there is no precedent to guide us. Never has a man with such little regard for public service or the machinations of representative government been so close to seizing control of it. At least not in our country.
Once he is elected, the ability of a free press to then provide appropriate scrutiny will be significantly diminished. All Trump will need is to pick up the phone to Putin, and the solutions to his critics will be dispensed. After all, the office of the presidency is practically beyond reproach. No president has been removed from office by an act of congress, and no president has ever answered any legal repercussions for actions they have taken, while in power. We defer to the electorate in these matters. If the American people decided to hand this person such great power, then we seem to accept popular wisdom as an exoneration.
So what happens, when an outspoken critic turns up dead? Speculation is not evidence. Rather it is a double edge sword, which both indicts and empowers someone with little regard for the notion of a limited executive. Putin may be widely considered the hand behind the slaying of his critics, but audacity of criticism wanes in light of this accusation.
So I must ask this of the media. If you are unable to hold to account Trump as your revenue benefactor, how will you hold him to account under threat of imprisonment or death?
Of course this would seem like a hyperbolic question, if it weren’t for the fact that we have Trump’s stated admiration for Machiavellian leaders on record on several occasions. You may feel that he is simply playing to an existing authoritarian populist sentiment, but how is that different from any other despot’s rise to power?