The Flames of Wrath

 When I departed the shores of my native land some twenty years ago, I expected to miss some aspects of life in the old country and I was not disappointed in my expectations. What I did not miss was the violence and death that stalked our elections, and that I naively believed I had left well behind. Till now. This past month and more, it has been increasingly obvious that this nation I now call my residence was hurtling towards a cliff and that the leaders of the executive branch of government were busy pushing it forward ever faster instead of making any attempt to stay its course towards mayhem and destruction, aided and abetted by their allies in the legislature. On a wintry afternoon in the first week of the new year, the United States found itself on the edge of the cliff and staring down into the flames of chaos and as this week turns, it is far from clear if we have reeled away from the precipice or whether we are still tethering there, arms windmilling and wondering if the slightest mistake will send us hurtling down into the abyss. 

For as long as I can remember, the world has looked, rightly or wrongly, to the United States as an example of how a democratic republic should function. Unlike the United Kingdom, with its centuries long history and tradition that helped them develop their democratic institutions, the USA was a better example to newly independent nations emerging into the light of freedom, especially when for nations that had suffered years under European colonial rule but also for nations that had fallen under dictatorships or communist rule during the Cold War. To be sure, the Philippines may have taught us a thing or two about American colonialism, but we saw that less and were generally enamored of the brighter image, of a nation that cast off colonial rule and forged its own destiny by adopting a progressive and revolutionary government where the power resided with the governed populace. And while the US model was flawed, it always seemed to be trending forward leading towards a better, brighter future for all. And one thing that was never even questioned was the transfer of power from one administration to the next. Even when the 2000 election transfixed the world and opened our eyes to the myriad oddities of the US electoral system -  electoral college, no national or even state-level system, archaic and non-uniform - on the far side of the world, I never doubted that there would be a peaceful and orderly transfer of power. It was one of our greatest sources of pride in India that our own young republic had managed a similar tradition and that no matter how deep the political or personal differences, a losing government graciously yielded to its vanquisher, while an unsuccessful challenger ruefully accepted its loss, and this in contrast to most other nations in the neighborhood and further abroad.

In 2016, I never expected Donald Trump to defeat Hilary Clinton but I sensed that something had changed forever in his continuous talk about how the election was rigged against him (it wasn't!) and his refusal to accept the results unless he won. I suspected that he was simply setting up for his defeat, as a way to avoid that he had lost to a woman; I also suspected that Russia expected no more than to create divisions, to cast doubts and de-legitimize the incoming president, and were as surprised as anyone else when Trump tapped into a deep vein of rural discontent and rode it to victory. Four years of corruption and ineptness later, President Trump returned to the same playbook, railing about rigged elections though the electoral college actually favors him and the Republicans fully control or at least share power in all the battleground states, sowing division and hatred, lying shamelessly with absolute disregard for reality or truth. And when he finally came up short, to the tune of seven million votes, he refused to accept his defeat and did all that I had expected in 2016, except that his actions were now the actions of the President of the United States.

From the moment it became obvious that Biden had restored the Democrat's "blue wall" in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania and flipped Georgia and  Arizona to cement his victory, Trump went into overdrive with ludicrous claims of fraud and after barely a moment's hesitation, the elected congresspeople of his party swung into line. Some of them tried to have it both ways, neither endorsing Trump's false claims but not repudiating them either nor acknowledging the obvious victory of president-elect Joe Biden. Others were less bashful and leaned into the president's dangerous narrative, claiming to share his beliefs of dead voters, fake ballots and other fake assertions. And through their self-serving acts of omission and commission, they fanned the mistaken belief of Trump's more fervent believers that their champion's victory had been stolen by nefarious actions. Rather than highlight the fact that Trump's lawyers had never stood by their claims of fraud in court nor brought any evidence before the courts in even one of more than five dozen chances. But his supporters never saw, or at least never acknowledged the sixty to one record in court challenges. They were fed an unvaried diet of lies on their preferred source of propaganda (it is impossible to pretend that these are news services), amplified on Twitter and Facebook and other less social media. Rather than let them move through the stages of grief, the president trapped his supporters in denial and as the clock counted down to the end of his inglorious term of office, they finally reached anger, and finally on January 6th, it boiled over in a way that we had never imagined but should have seen coming all the way from 2016.

When an angry, armed mob storms the Capitol, chanting their intent to hang the vice-president, it is impossible to call this anything other than an insurrection. It failed, partly because this was a mob led by a morally corrupt coward, a man who embraced them while things seemed to go his way but denounced them and threatened them with dire consequences as soon as it became obvious that he would have to pay for his role in the violence. A fanatical supporter, an Air Force veteran was shot dead, while a policeman was beaten to death and three others died of indirect causes and the death toll was no larger only because the mob had no plan beyond storming the Capitol and stopping the pro-forma certification of the winner of the election win. Had they actually encountered Democrat or the small number of Republicans who accepted reality, though, things may have been much, much worse. The rioters were largely drunk on lies and white privilege and no one explained their attitude better than Elizabeth from Knoxville, who was shocked that police used mace on her while she was storming the capitol as part of a"revolution". But while the execution may have been ludicrous and their attitude lends itself to mockery, the anger is real enough. When millions of people buy passionately into so dangerous a lie and believe that they have been wronged and robbed, they are not going to easily accept that they were in the wrong and quietly accept that they have lost. When many of them have come to believe the wildest of conspiracy theories and come to view the situation as a pivotal point of history with themselves as the guys in white hats, and when so many of them are also owners of weapons of war, the potential for violence is beyond possible and almost certain. Trump and his Congressional enablers have sown the wind, and while Mitch McConnell may have decided to hop off the crazy train now, the situation is now beyond their control and it is the nation that must reap the hurricane. Opportunists like Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley, Trumpists like Matt Gaetz, the owner of Devin Nunes' cow, Mo Brooks et al, and conspiracy-crazed newcomers like Representatives Boebert and Greene might seek to ride the wave they've helped unleash, in reality they control it as much as a rider on a tiger - if they ever try to pivot back towards reality, they will find themselves considered traitors and hated even more than perennial enemies of this movement. Mike Pence has experienced it already, as have others like McConnell and Lindsey Graham. Even the nominal leader of this movement, Donald Trump himself, is now irrelevant and his feeble calls for peace are likely to be ignored; many of his supporters have dismissed these messages as coerced or fake and have vowed to continue with whatever it is they believe they are doing.

Donald Trump has to answer for so many sins against this nation, from gutting the Affordable Care Act without any alternative to destroying the postal service, from stacking the courts with hundreds of unvetted, and often, unqualified judges to politicizing the civil service, from destroying the environment to turning his back on combined action on climate change, from disparaging the US intelligence services in favor of Russia's (in all but name) dictator to stealing housing funds from the military to fund a mostly meaningless, ineffective and environmentally disastrous border wall. He is arguably culpable in the death of four hundred thousand victims of Covid-19. But this is the deepest and most lasting wound he has inflicted on his own country. He has sown the grapes of wrath and now he will skulk away into ignominious obscurity leaving us to harvest the bloody results.

Lightning in a Bottle

It's been over a month since the United States general election, and despite the myriad court cases and bizarre, bordering on ridiculous, conspiracy theories floated by President Trump and his allies, it now appear almost certain that the desire expressed by over half the nation will in fact be fulfilled and Donald Trump will soon be keeping company with George H. W. Bush and Jimmy Carter as a one term president. For most people, this would not be the worst company to keep, but Trump has turned losing an election into such a personal anathema that he recoils from any hint that he has been rejected by the country and instead clings to the most outlandish and ridiculous lies in an attempt to avoid facing reality. He has refused so far to recognize his conqueror and stubbornly persists in his delusions, though the moment of cold reality draws ever closer and it is over but for the wailing and pouting.

Normally this would be a moment to savor, given the pain and damage this man has wrought upon the nation. This should have been a moment of sweet triumph when a man who delights in belittling others is himself brought low and when a lout who claims the powers of a king in a democratic republic is reminded that he does in fact answer to the people and that they have sat in judgment upon him and found him wanting. But the reality is that the this was not an election to be enjoyed. Trump, as he loves to point out, won more votes than any other president before him and only the inconvenient fact that his opponent won a good six million more votes than he and prevailed in a handful of key states denies him a chance to prolong our national agony. But the fact that over seventy million Americans decided that they would like another four years of the same is a sobering thought, a draft of gall that ruins the nectar of victory.

Tomorrow, the tally of the electoral college votes should further reinforce what we have known since the first week of November, that Joe Biden has won the election and will be the next president of the United States. But what of the man he displaced? Trump has made it clear that he will not accept his defeat, graciously or otherwise, and in a rarity for him, he has kept his promise that he will be a bad loser. But beyond the short term tantrums, theater and grift,  he has hinted that he will not do like previous losing candidates and yield the political centerstage. Other losing candidates have remained active - Al Gore became a climate change activist, Jimmy Carter championed housing for the less fortunate - but they exited the stage of presidential politics. Trump, by contrast, has hinted that he may run again for the presidency in 2024, something that has never been done before. To be sure, it is his right to do so, but  losing candidates of yesteryear have stepped aside not because of any law precluding them but because they have accepted the judgment of the people and know that their failure should open the path for new ideas, new candidates and new energy.

Donald Trump however is a Unicorn, a man of unique talents. This is not a compliment but a mere statement of fact. His record setting vote haul was noteworthy in the energy and dedication it revealed in his supporters but also in the wide swath of supporters he enjoys beyond the traditional Republican tent. In the same way that Nixon attracted Southern Democrats to the GOP, Trump has found a surprisingly durable vein of support in places not always favorable to the GOP. The party leadership would like to tap into that support for other electoral battles, but they are painfully aware that the support is for Trump, not for the GOP as a whole. Trump could draw that support because he had no real ideology and was happy to offer lie upon barefaced lie, telling his audience what they wanted to hear. His own aura of success was built on similar myth and it was easy enough for him to promise anything and everything to his followers. 

Now the GOP is caught in a trap of its own creation. Many candidates would like to vie for the leadership of the party, but with Trump refusing to yield his position, they must either step aside or challenge him. They have been so abject in the servility so far that it is nigh impossible to see any of them summon the courage to challenge Trump now, even though the longer they wait, the lower their chances of becoming the new face of the party even should Trump finally fall. But for the rest of the leadership, the men like Senate Leader Mitch McConnell or House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, the greater fear is that should Trump retreat into the shadows, the coalition he has created may collapse as suddenly as it formed. They, and all would be leaders of the party, know that no one else can capture the lightning in a bottle that Trump possesses. For one, they are generally bound to GOP orthodoxy, even when they spurned it at Trump's command. From no tax raises to free markets to corporate supremacy, they are on a vastly different path from that which drew support to Trump. The fact that Trump never delivered on his promises made little difference to his supporters since he always claimed with absolute confidence that he had in fact done so. From a woeful record of actual new manufacturing jobs to literally no increase in infrastructure spending, from trade wars with no clear plan to a lack of any healthcare agenda, Trump never attempted to actually deliver anything he had promised but he had the unique ability to lie boldly and unashamedly. None of his would be successors have that level of audacity; perhaps they are too rooted in reality to be able to actually pull it off. 

Trump had other skills that few realized would translate so well to electoral politics. He reveled in chaos, he understood the TV news cycle in a way that none of his peers did (and to be honest, neither did his critics in the press). He knew that any crisis could be swept out of the public's mind by simply creating a new controversy. He understood the short attention span of the American public because he understood the need of the press for non-stop continuous hype and excitement; he provided it through outrageous actions and statements and in the fog of confusion, no single issue ever grew big enough to hurt him. On the rare occasions when events remained beyond his control, he resorted to outrageous lies, depending on the distrust he had already created around the nation's news media and the unwillingness of the press to  recognize that he had torn up and trampled the rules that they still clung to. It is for sober research in years to come to determine exactly why so many people continued to believe his lies or excuse them, but the fact remains that no other GOP leader can hope to walk the same path he has blazed. They have too much awareness of reality and they have too long a record in public life to suddenly promise anything they need to win support. Ironically, a major anchor holding them back is their record through the Trump years and how they abandoned all their core beliefs to support Trump. To retain the support of Trump's devoted followers they must continue to bow down before him, while to stand up for themselves now would be to stand naked before the world. They are Trump's playthings, his puppets and they should know that whether he is deposed or simply fades when he loses the oxygen of attention, they cannot hope to be his successors, nor have they anything left to stand by themselves.

Mornië Alantië (A Promise Lives Within Us Now)

These may seem like darkness has indeed fallen, when Americans are being attacked while exercising their most fundamental freedom to protest, and the attackers are the agents of their own government. There have been some violent protests with destruction of public and private property, and a disproportionate number of attacks by heavily armed police on crowds marching to protest, ironically, the excessive use of force by the police. The president of the nation, in words reminiscent of Tsarist Russia or any absolutist government of your preference, has threatened to unleash the military against the civilian population, in the name of restoring "law and order"; one's attitude to this proclamation depends strongly on one's existing trust in his leadership. But a good sign of his true thoughts were revealed when he advised the states' governors that they needed to "dominate" their citizens through use of overwhelming force. Even more telling, however, was his statement in that same meeting that failure to crush the protests would make the governors look weak and foolish. And, so even as Washington DC is flooded by faceless but heavily armed paramilitary forces to help the president show his strength and courage, even as police cars mow into crowds of civilians, even as peaceful protesters are subjected to pepper balls that are not technically "tear gas" despite having much the same effect, even as crowds of Americans are attacked by police with batons and pepper spray, even on those nights when the nation burned and the shining city on the hill tethered on its foundations (seemingly made of sand, rather than the rock we always imagined), even in these darkest of times, I could not help but feel that things were never better, and was already smiling in anticipation of a much brighter tomorrow.

Let me start by saying that it's much easier for me to brush past the institutional racism suffered by most Black Americans. As an Indian, and a graduate engineer, I enjoy a position that is denied to black Americans who have been born in this country. But I am rejoicing not for myself, but for all victims of injustice in America. This is not the hopeful dream of a perennial optimist, but a reading of reality. As an outsider, I have the advantage of seeing the bigger picture in a way that is hidden to those living, and suffering, through the actual events. As a person, technically, of color (a term that I have the privilege to brush off without consequences, a privilege denied to black or Hispanic Americans), I do not suffer the burden of white Americans who struggle with the guilt of not having solved the obvious issues of racism and injustice, with the guilt by association of having family and friends who voted Donald Trump into power. Neither black or white Americans are free enough of their involvement in this tragedy unfolding before them to see that the dark clouds enveloping them have not a silver lining but that in fact the dark cloud is but a spot in a much larger bank of dazzlingly silver clouds.

The world has changed tremendously in the last dozen years. For black Americans, and for white Americans who are capable of human empathy, it may seem that the last eight years have seen nothing but a wall of shame covered with a mosaic of murdered Black men and women, people cut down for the crime of being black rather than any crime they may have actually committed. No crime deserves a death sentence, much less one executed before trial and with chilling finality. Eric Garner was selling cigarettes illegally,  Michael Brown had stolen a box of cigars using force, Walter Scott had an outstanding warrant over child support payments but not since medieval times have we executed people for such minor crimes; Trayvon Martin was walking home when a (non-police) vigilante followed him and an ensuing scuffle ended with him being killed, Philandro Castile was shot in a routine traffic stop, Tamir Rice was shot and killed for playing with a toy gun, Breona Taylor was shot in her home by police executing a "no knock" warrant (at the wrong place, just to make it worse, but that detail shouldn't even be important). On the face of it, George Floyd may seem like just another name on a long, endless and shameful list. But each death has moved the weight of public opinion towards its watershed moment. For the dead, for their families and for many in the communities that suffer and fear each day, the movement may seem glacial, and long overdue, and I cannot deny the justice in that sentiment. But I prefer to look at how the majority of the country is waking up to the injustice perpetrated in their name and finally they stood up and said, "No more!"

When Ferguson, MO exploded in anger, the right-leaning press could highlight that the race of the protesters and use that as rationale for ignoring their demands for justice. When Baltimore burned after another Black Man was shot by police, President Trump could insult the whole city and its black citizens and despite some objections, he could get away with it. But today, there are white people marching in the streets besides their black brethren. Liberal stalwarts of course have spoken up in the past, but too many other people sat quietly and allowed a matter of justice for all become by default a matter of the color of one's skin. When whites and Asians sat on the sidelines, the only voices raised in a demand for change were black and it was easy for their opponents to recast this as racial battle and racial issues make everyone uncomfortable and so too many of us walked on by like the priest on the road to Jericho. But not this time! Finally, we have seen that this is not just a matter of race, it is a matter of justice and equality and simple humanity. Of course, race played a role in the events that led to the murder of George Floyd and Breona Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery but they deserve justice, not because they were black or their killers white, but because no one should be killed the way they were murdered and finally America has realized that we are only as good as the worst of our responses. And so a chorus of new and powerful voices joined those who have struggled alone for years. Taylor Swift, once raised up as paragon of white womanhood by white supremacists (without her consent and against her desires) has gradually thrown of the shackles of fearful silence. She has found her voice now and leaped to the front lines (metaphorically) adding the power and reach of her enormous pulpit to spread the message.

One of the most uplifting and hopeful stories came from Minneapolis after the first nights of violence. A Bangladeshi immigrant restaurant owner saw his life's work burnt to the ground, and his response was, "let it burn, we need justice for George Floyd". He understood that the violence was not against him, that this fight was not just the fight of the blacks but a struggle for justice and as such it was  fight for all Americans - and coincidentally his restaurant was named Gandhi Mahal, honoring the greatest apostle of non-violent advocacy in modern history. The same sentiment was articulated by Hasan Minaj, in one of the rawest, most powerful segments of his Patriot Act I have ever seen. Now Hasan is not a surprising supporter of justice and equality but he turned the spotlight inward and challenged each of us, especially those with brown skin, to face up to our inner racist. Racism is not an easy issue, and is rarely defined in black and white, or between blacks and whites, but all Americans are now thinking of this, and only good can come from this introspection.

When Colin Kapernick knelt to protest police brutality, he was pilloried as unpatriotic and somehow the fight for justice morphed into respect for the troops. The only men who stood with him were black and white America complained that they did not want to see their football sullied with such unpatriotic behavior. That was three years ago, but today the world has changed and we have Carson Wentz and Aaron Rodgers and Tom Brady speaking up for justice, voices that were conspicuously absent in the past. White coaches in the NBA like Greg Popovitch and Steve Kerr supported their black athletes, but the NFL remained tightly focused on their bottom line. Till today! Now we have thoughtful statements from a long line of football executives from Bill O'Brien to Brian Flores to John Elway admitting the mistake of their past silence. The few discordant statements from Vic Fangio and Drew Brees have been contested and since withdrawn - to be clear, they have every right to have their opinions, but they have been challenged and corrected on facts and have been forced to acknowledge reality. College coaches too have added their voices in support of change. For decades, the colossus that straddles the professional wrestling world has been a bastion of conservatism, and Vince McMahon has never been shy about casting all political positions he dislikes as unpatriotic and using the theater of the ring to humiliate those fictionalized and conveniently buffoonish enemies. But today a legion of his stars are standing proudly for justice, and some of them have marched in solidarity with the protesters. Like the NFL, other corporations are flocking to be counted on the right side of history, from Amazon to Nike to Uber and Lyft and United Airlines and Target and Snapchat and Twitter.

The swing in sentiment in Corporate America is telling. Corporations, and the NFL is one of them, have no moral compulsions, they do not make decisions because they are morally right. It is not a knock on corporations, per se - they are (with deference to the US Supreme Court) not people, they are amoral entities designed to maximize profit. They have not joined the calls for change because it is the morally right thing but because they realize that to oppose it, or even pretend that the problem does not exist, is against their own interests. The NFL and every other corporation are soulless but they depend on their workers and patrons and they have seen the signs - the public mood has shifted and it is time to align with the new winds of change or suffer loss of both staff and consumers. The change in the corporate mood is a sign that American sentiment has moved towards the light and the smarter and more nimble corporations are proving that reality.

The final, and most important proof that change has come, that it is now inevitable, is provided by no other than President Trump. His determination to crush the protests, his insistence on demonstration of strength stem for sheer terror on his side. He is scared, frightened that he can no longer bully the country nor gaslight them into apathy and his every move proves his weakness. When George Wallace threatened blacks during the civil rights movement, when Hosni Mubarak sent his army into the streets of Cairo, when Ferdinand Marcos did the same in Manila, when Indira Gandhi suspended the Indian parliament in 1975, when the Communist Politburo attempted a coup against Gorbachev in 1991 as the USSR crumbled, they were none of them acting as leaders secure in their position and they all fell before the strength of popular protests. Donald Trump is scared, as all those leaders were scared and his fantasies (and may they remain fantasies) of unleashing the military against American citizens stems from his knowledge of his own weakness, not matter how he may try to dress it up as strength. Strength never needs to strut and demonstrate its nature, a strong government has no fear of its own people. And in a democracy, the strength of a government derives from the support of the governed, not from the number of jack-booted stormtroopers it can line up in the streets.

Sometimes, governments manage to crush their people, as Deng Xiopeng did in Tienanmen Square. But the United States is still a democracy and I believe in the American Experiment. Despite all the damage done over the last three years, I believe in people and I believe that today a critical mass of the population has moved past sitting silently and passively while their fellow citizens suffer. And with each act of violence by the police, the case for change is made ever more clear. Perhaps Trump will survive this, perhaps the protests will dissipate, but I do not think it will be that easy. Change is coming and in the words of Viktor Lazlo (Casblanca), "This time I know we will win!"

When the night is overcome, may you rise to see the sun!

Reality Strikes Back

It's been a long while since I've blogged, not because of a lack of material nor even a lack of things to say, but it's been a soul crushing three years and counting. In 2016, the people of the United States decided that a conman and liar, who also happened to be a really bad businessman and very possibly enmeshed in myriad deals of dubious legality, was the best option to run the country, over a woman whose resume included being First Lady, US Senator and Secretary of State. It is at this point quite worthless to go back into what drove nearly half the country to choose certain ineptitude over proven skills, but enough people in enough places did so, and so this country will forever have Donald Trump in their history books as the forty fifth president of the republic.

The bigger question is whether time has led to a change in viewpoints, and strangely enough it appears that a very significant, perhaps even an overwhelming majority of his original supporters have not changed their minds at all and have simply doubled down on their support despite a long litany of failed promises and dismal incompetence, always playing out against a backdrop of corruption and pettiness. Through it all, the core supporters of the Republican Party have stood staunchly behind Trump and in doing so, ensured that no GOP representative or senator should feel a sudden twinge of duty to the country they pledged to serve. They stood shoulder to shoulder through the generally pointless trade wars - many of them may believe that the US is winning the trade deals, and it is unlikely that facts would sway them. They've not even blinked at the policies enacted or embraced by this administration that are polar opposites of what was promised by Trump while campaigning. They've been unfazed by insults and worse heaped upon uniformed military officers by a man who claims to be the biggest supporter of those same soldiers, not to mention their glee at the insults directed at all other perceived opponents, which basically means everyone who does not kiss the ring their leader. The principals of democracy have been undermined at every turn, and like Senator Mitch McConnell, they care not whit. But worst of all, they've shrugged at the continuous loss of trained professionals from every department of government.

Sadly, the GOP for the last forty years, starting at least with Reagan, have distrusted people who are experts in their field. This has allowed blowhards and conspiracy theorists to rule supreme in the non- elected circles that exert such massive influence over the party. Such disdain naturally extends to all people of science and this party would rather believe in miracles and magical ideas than embrace reason. So much so that any scientific position that disagrees with their established worldview is suspect, and scientific theories backed by mountains of emperical evidence are treated at best as no better than articles of religious faith - never mind that one does not "believe" in science, one understands it or one doesn't - and far more often, science is held to levels of proof and scrutiny that none of their preferred claims ever do.

Now we are seeing what happens when a modern government purges its ranks of all apolitical experts who refuse to bend to the injudicious and sometimes unethical, even illegal, whims of a president woefully unequal to the challenge of the office he holds and surrounded by a cabinet of spineless yes-men. Scientists and professional administrators have been forced out and not been replaced, their expertise lost forever and dismissed with a wave of the hand by the president. For three years, we dodged disaster mostly by luck, but the COVID-19 pandemic has left us with nowhere to run, with no fig leaf to shelter behind.

It didn't have to be this way. To be sure, few countries have covered themselves in glory through this pandemic. It's true that the World Health Organization has made mistakes and stumbled quite badly, and only time will tell if their early mistakes were coerced by China in part, or just an honest oversight. But the US was supposed to have it's own premier organizations that would either reinforce or critically examine WHO guidance and act as an additional line of defense. The teams that were set up specifically to study pandemics and identify them before they became too big to handle were disbanded or shunted aside; whether they were ignored or incapable of identifying the problem remains a question to answered in the future, but it appears that well before the wave of the epidemic hit American shores, there were warnings from the intelligence community. One has to wonder if a more independent cabinet might have insisting of engaging the president if he was dismissive of the threat, or if a more mentally acute and engaged president might have recognized the magnitude of the threat gathering on the horizon. It is tempting to believe that former Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, as well as Hillary Clinton, would have been more aware, not only because they are more intelligent, more engaged in the world beyond their immediate family business and would have certainly listened to their intelligence briefing attentively (not to mention that their briefing would have been more detailed by their choice).

If facts have any meaning the sudden sell-off by several GOP congresspersons who heard classified intelligence briefing of looming stock market weakness must count as one of the more amazing coincidences of modern history. Yet the US government did nothing to prepare for the real problem and even when the virus had begun to spread within the country, the government reacted with nonchalance and bluster, led by the president himself who likened it to the normal flu and insisted that it would vanish in a week or two. Perhaps the real revelation in Trump's statement that the fifteen cases in the US at the time of his infamous statement would soon resolve to zero is that it shows how little he understood of the nature of the problem - he either didn't know or didn't understand that we had not tested people who had been in contact with the infected patients and that there was no way to realistically predict that the cases would immediately reduce. Of course, this president has never cared for reality and his supporters have rewarded his lies with blind belief - from claims that the testing shortage had been solved long before it was (even now we don't have the ability to do contact tracing and have pretty much abandoned that approach) to claims that Russia and Saudi Arabia were about to make a deal to save the oil industry (Russia rather cavalierly denied any talks had even started), Trump has lied casually about any and every issue. But while his lies may comfort his supporters, reality has finally broken past is wall of denial and while he may use the power of his position to petulantly to uncomfortable questions or profess total ignorance about the problems plaguing ever more cities across the country, the reality confront the country can no longer be really ignored. That initial denial of reality was all the way back in late January, when we had a dozen cases or so. The US did not cross a thousand cases till nearly mid-March, six weeks time during which we watched South Korea and Taiwan implement successful counter-programs, while Italy showed us the dangers of poor preparation and inadequate reaction. This was a time when we could have mobilized to to be ready. We would have still faced thousand of cases - the US is too big and too open a country, to factitious to marshal the same way as was done in Taiwan or South Korea. But we could have been prepared a lot better and maybe we would not have gone from one thousand to three hundred thousand in barely three weeks.

This a failure of massive proportions, and  Trump is not solely responsible, just as he is not solely responsible for the racism and xenophobia now running rampant in the country. But just as he pulled away the curtain and released those forces into the open, and acted as cheerleader for them, in the same way he presided over a weakening of the government, he tore down the institutions that informed the country and raised himself as the sole voice of government and whether he declares that he is not responsible for any failure (though he is quick to claim credit even when none is due and he is the only one offering himself plaudits), history will judge him far less kindly and will lay the eight thousand deaths (and counting) and the massive wrecking ball taken to our lives and economy squarely upon him. Would that the country had been spared this by seeing the inevitable in 2016 but we can only hope that we emerge from this nightmare in 2020 with a renewed understanding of the importance of science, intelligence, expertise and above all, empathy.

Who Else Must Go Back to Where They Came From?

Two years ago, I was saddened beyond description when America chose Donald Trump as it's new president. Like millions of others, I wondered how such a thing could happen, and in search of answers, I devoured every scrap of information possible. The fact, however, is that there were no simple answers, that the amazing support Trump enjoys from the most fervent and active members of the Republican Party defies all simple logic. It would be easy to say that Trump is a racist, a nativist (whatever that might mean in the USA), that he panders to the lowest common denominator in his party. But he enjoys the support of almost four of five Republicans, and it's actually very simple to see why no one from John McCain to Mitch McConnell to Paul Ryan to John Kasich dare to oppose him. Those who ventured to get off their knees for even an instant, like Bob Corker or Jeff Flake - and their defiance was beyond weak and fleeting - were instantly destroyed and run out of Congress, a stern warning to anyone else who would dare even to dream of standing up for what was good and right anymore.

But if Trump's power comes from his popularity with the rank and file of the party, what does it say about the party itself? How can so many Americans cover their eyes and ears in the face of his ignorance and hate-filled rantings? How can the people around me, people I know and work alongside and who seemingly respect intelligence and accept me as a person, yet smile and shrug (or even cheer loudly) when he tells women from racial minorities to "go back to where they came from"? Plenty of ink has been metaphorically spilled in pointing out the sheer ignorance of telling American citizens to "go home", but that misses the point. Trump never cares about the accuracy of his insults or his jibes, only whether they connect, and it is a time-honored tradition in America to tell immigrants, whether first or second generation to "go back home" when they do not conform to the appearance of the more established immigrants of three or more generations removed. The chant is even louder when the immigrants have temerity to hold ideas that they are entitled to the same rights and freedoms of their fellow citizens. The jibe is never intended to address whether its target is born in the US or a naturalized citizen or a permanent resident. No! it is intended, always, to de-legitimize the targets, to strip away their rights and cast doubts upon their legitimacy.

It's a trick old as time and played out across the world, time and again. Immigrants, minorities are always questioned - are they true citizens? Do they love this country as much as they should? We don't need to look back to the most horrific practitioners of this game, not when we have examples of it all around us. A hundred years ago, the Italian immigrants in New York faced the same taunts, echoing the charges leveled at the Irish before them and the Japanese after them faced the same trial by fire. Now it is the Hispanics and the Somalis and Iraqis whose patriotism and love of America are called into doubt, not because of anything they've actually said or done, but because of the color of their skin and their claim to their fundamental rights.

The tragedy is not that Trump and his circle of advisers have raised this terrifying shibboleth to assert their power over immigrants they dislike. The real tragedy is that all those nice Americans we work beside daily are acquiescing in this deceptive game. They pretend that it's not about race, that it's about the "anti-American" statements (incidentally non-existent statements that were never made by these women, and a particularly ridiculous charge to be made against four elected Representatives of the people), that it's just a "love America" call, that there is nothing chilling to tell immigrants that they should leave the country if they don't like it. The reason it's really a tragedy is because this is the kind of behavior that really sets us along the path of no return, when a demagogue can say anything without consequence, and when any minority can be targeted at will. It's a tragedy because these people should know better, they should know that this hatred targets their own neighbors, friends and co-workers. How can my Midwestern girl friend's mother wish me well, yet agree with Trump? How can the guy who sits across from me, smile and joke with me at work and yet support a "send them back" chant? How can a man whose daughter is married to a Chinese immigrant support an idea that immigrants do no love this country? That people in some mythical flyover counties and small towns may support Trump's racist rhetoric is sad but understandable; that people who know (and in some cases love) the immigrant co-workers and friends and family members will still support Trump in this naked threat against those same people is a tragedy beyond understanding.

When Trump was elected, I deplored the fact that his liberal opponents had ignored so much of the electorate as unworthy of their attention, basically abandoning them to Trump's (and Russia's) propaganda. I did not believe that they were bad people then, and I don't believe they are bad people now. They can be dragged out of Trump's orbit, but it takes a lot of work. It takes us, Trump's victims on the immigration front-line, to give a face to his hatred, to show our co-workers and acquaintances that when Trump targets minorities, it's not some distant faceless group, but every single one of us who is his victim. Perhaps many of them will still support him, but I'm willing to bet that there are more who will turn away from their worst instincts and show themselves more honorable and more reasonable than we credit them. But they must see, that Trump is not just threatening poor, weak immigrants who try to cross the Southern border, it's not just them that he would put in cages, but all of us. We have much more that binds us together than divides us, but we need to reach out and embrace those who share some ideas that we do not like, that we do not agree with; just as we have ideas that they dislike. But dislike need not be hatred, ideological differences should not be a reason to break off contact, for it is that contact that's most important. We need to know how policies, laws affect our neighbors, and they need to see how we are affected - when we see our friends suffer, we do not support the laws that make them suffer. Politicians of Trump's ilk (and make no mistake, he is a politician at heart despite what so many of his supporters think) need us to split and see his targets as the "others", that is the secret of their power and that is the key to their defeat. When influencers oppose Trump, it's easy for his supporters to brush them aside as elitists, as socialists, as communists. But I have faith in America, in the people I see around me - if they see that we are the face of Trump's targets, they will turn away and stand beside us rather than stone us. In the words of Captain America, "I am willing to bet that I am not alone" in this.

A Hundred Days and Counting

The first artificial and arbitrary deadline for judging new governments was upon us this weekend, and it seemed like a good time for me to reflect on the good, the bad and the all too plentiful ugly that has characterized this period. To be honest, President Trump was absolutely right when he said that the hundred day period is meaningless, though he had set that benchmark for himself repeatedly, and then promptly claimed that he'd had one of the most successful opening acts of all time. That claim, like so many others, is all hyperbole, of a pattern readily recognizable in his utterances. But what is the reality?

As a liberal, I'm not really in a position to render impartial judgment; my own biases ensure that I will judge harshly. And given the chaos that undeniably swirls around this administration, it is easy for a critic to find fault with almost everything that President Trump has done. I will start with the low-hanging fruit - the lack of government appointees (or rather, lack of nominations for numerous positions), the constant overheated rhetoric, the inability to leave campaign mode and settle down to actual governing, the increasingly shrill attacks on the press, the seeming lack of understanding on any and every topic that affects the country, and perhaps most scary of all, the careless and offhand use of military force with no thought of the consequences of any US action. There is plenty to choose from, and be scared by in that list but for me, the greatest failure is that refusal to acknowledge even the slightest need for course correction, or personal accountability, be it in ordering a bloody military raid on Yemen or firing his National Security Advisor for numerous lapses in judgment and behavior, or in making wild and unsubstantiated (and probably totally false) charges against the former president. That President Trump is unprepared for the role he has sought and won is beyond doubt, and his own words admit as such. He has admitted, seemingly with absolutely no self-awareness, that healthcare policy is difficult and then absolutely and casually reversed his position on China as a currency manipulator when he was schooled in monetary policy by the visiting Chinese president - he again quite offhandedly admitted that he'd known nothing about Chinese government policy on a topic that had formed a huge part of his campaign promise. Then just this past week he said in an interview that he'd never expected the job to be so difficult; it is a toss up on whether to be more scared that he is casually admitting this with one breath and claiming undeserved mantles of greatness and accomplishment in the next, blithely ignoring the yawning contradictions in his own statements, or that he truly believed his own campaign rhetoric that the job of president was so easy that an accomplished businessman could walk in and do a better job without even exerting himself.

And yet, I am forced to admit that the apocalyptic terms employed by my fellow liberals are widely off the mark - this president's track record is a lot less terrible than it might have been. Much of what he's done, and most of his cabinet appointees are in line with his campaign promises and general GOP policy line. He has tried to rescind the Affordable Care Act, a promise and priority of both his campaign and the whole Republican Party; and yet, with the whole government controlled by one party, they've failed to even get legislation to a vote in the House, never mind passing it or getting it to a Senate vote. Tax breaks have been a GOP staple for more than three decades. Appointing a climate denier to head the Environmental Protection Agency, a private school advocate and anti-regulation partisan to the Department of Education and other similarly Orwellian appointments are well in line with prior promises. Liberals need to admit that none of this is surprising and that any GOP president would have done the same; they also need to admit that the US electorate, in their wisdom or lack thereof, has endorsed President Trump's policies. One might claim that Trump did not win the popular vote, or that only 27% of eligible voters (46% of 58% turnout) supported him, but the bottom line is that he won, and over 40% of the electorate did not object to his stated policies enough to even vote. Voters, though endorsement or apathy, also delivered the House and Senate to the GOP, giving President Trump full control of the government. In 2009, President Obama won a similar mandate to enact a liberal policy and did so. It is only fair, that no matter how dangerous we think this president's ideas and actions, we still respect the will of the people. That does not mean standing down and giving the GOP a free hand, but simply acknowledging that much of what is being now enacted is the choice of the American people, through their acts of commission or omission.

It is also important to note that President Trump has not done all that much in overturning the previous administration's policies. There have been some highly publicized executive orders, signed with much fanfare, but in the end, President Trump has not enacted but a fraction of the conservative and populist agenda he promised and most of the acts that liberals most fear have remained in abeyance. This is not a mark of approbation for his restraint however, but a censure of the strongest degree - things are not so bad, because this president is terrible at his job, and not really interested in the business of governing. The GOP sponsored alternative to Obamacare has sputtered in part because Trump is not invested in actually replacing it with a real alternative; unlike Speaker Ryan or the Freedom Caucus, Trump has no strong conviction on the matter and his lack of a core belief impacts his ability and willingness to force new legislation through Congress. For all his talk about making deals, he has shown absolute disinterest in actual negotiations, with holdouts in his party and much more so with the opposition, and is quite happy to see the matter die in Congress so long as he can deflect the blame to someone else. For most part, his impact will be through acts of omission rather than overt commission, a lack of action that certainly shapes public life as much as active intervention, and his largely invisible Cabinet is in keeping with that path. He has appointed people with less government experience to some positions, actually reducing the impact they might have on changing government policy; in many cases, most policy will remain in the hands of career bureaucrats for a while, and things will continue unchanged till his appointees gain full understanding and control of their departments, and that situation is delayed further by the lack of supporting cast for many of those Cabinet members.

The other, and significantly overlooked aspect of President Trump's government is how closely is reflects his own personality and business model. While President Obama won plaudits for creating a Cabinet of Rivals by keeping Defense Secretary Gates, and appointing his party opponent Hilary Clinton to Secretary of State, his cabinet reflected his broad policy vision and was guided by him. By contrast, it is not clear what the corresponding vision is for President Trump, and his closest advisors appear to share very different worldviews on many different topics. His own overriding interest is not public policy or political promises so much as TV ratings and public adulation, and he seems content to pass off photo opportunities and bombastic claims as perfectly acceptable alternatives to actual achievement. At some point he may have to deliver or risk losing the support of his most fervent supporters, but that day is not now and it will be long past a hundred days before the bill is due. Till then, I am simply grateful that his lack of experience and even greater lack of interest ensure that he will do much less real harm than a true believer with skills to match may have achieved.

The Race Is Not Always To The Swift

Augustus Fink-Nottle memorably explained this concept to the scholars of Market Snodsbury Grammar School, but minorities in America may well wonder if it is always to the white. The Black Lives Matter movement has torn aside the curtain that hid the simmering discontent amongst Black Americans and forced the nation to confront uncomfortable concepts like White privilege. While I generally dislike the BLM approach towards their nominal allies - do you gain anything by interrupting and insulting Bernie Sanders, Mike O'Malley or Hilary Clinton? - I can understand and empathize with some of the frustration within the community.

Critics of the movement, and they are legion and for most part shielded by the anonymity of the internet, have two main arguments against the protest cry. Firstly, why do only Black Lives matter? And secondly, why doesn't the community clean up its own act and quit blaming the whites for all the ills that bedevil them. They also level a number of other arguments, but most of those are of a straw man variety, arguing against aspects and positions that are not represented by the BLM activists. Even the main criticisms are easily addressed. The logic of the argument rests on the struggles faced by other ethnic groups that have faced adversity and yet do not blame the majority for their problems. But this ignores the most basic difference between African Americans and all other minorities. The ancestors of today's African Americans were brought in against their will as slaves; all other groups have arrived on American shores, for most part, by choice. They may have fled economic hardship or persecution, been coerced or otherwise pressured by their feudal overlords, or in my case, boredom and a lack of wheat beers and strip clubs, but they were never forced into America against their will and with absolutely no choice in the matter, to that same level. Also significantly, the Africans came from a vast variety of countries, regions and ethnic groups across the vast swath of continent but were lumped together by their new overlords with scarce a thought or nod to their deep differences. Their identity as a single ethnic group was forged in the fetters of slavery, and later, even after the 13th Amendment, in the shadow of Jim Crow laws. The damage wreaked upon this group through two hundred years and more of oppression cannot be easily undone; more significantly, the ethnic and cultural history that other groups could fall back upon for solace in the face of injustice and suffering was denied the African Americans - their history and ethnicity, to all extents and purposes, started with their enslavement. In my opinion, this makes it so much harder for them to overcome the roots of the problem in a way that was possible for the Irish, Germans, Italians, Chinese and even the Mexicans. It's also why newer African immigrants have a widely different experience.

The oppression did not end with the Civil War, nor even with the Civil Rights movement. Subtle and sometimes not-so-subtle prejudicial policy continues to damage the community and to be sure, in some cases, well meaning policies have hurt as well. The building of the interstate system facilitated the flight of affluent whites to the suburbs setting the stage for the decay and impoverishment of urban centers. In slowly dying cities the vicious cycle was set in motion whereby poor communities are denied education advancement, trapping them deeper in poverty and furthering the deterioration of the city and its amenities. No other community has faced quite that same level of challenges. Which brings one to the second argument against the validity of BLM's angst, that the majority of violence is perpetrated by Blacks against Blacks and that they are focused on a tiny fraction of killing by the police. Regardless of the reality of the statistic, what is missed here is that not only are the police not supposed to kill unarmed Black men, but that they are actually supposed to serve those communities and protect them from the violence of their own misguided members. Instead the police have unwittingly become a wall between these urban ghettos and the "good" communities, and have become enemies of the ghetto communities rather than their partners and servants.

There are problems with the BLM, as there are bound to be in any anger-fueled movement. Lacking a clear leadership - or any leadership - each group of activists vocalizes its own views and interests rather than a coherent overarching message. While the majority of the movement embraces non-violent protest, there are always going to be those who have less patience. There are some who will challenge their biggest national supporters to draw a reaction, ignoring how it may help or hurt the movement in the long run. There are some who have so lost faith in the police that they see them as implacable enemies and advocate violence against them, or at least cheer and condone violence against police officers. These are the real problems with the movement, along with a failure to get the actual message of "Black Lives Matter" out to the wider world. They've certainly tried, and of course, some people will never accept the message and will seek to misrepresent them. But the lack of a national face to the movement does not help and makes dissemination of the message much harder. It's why both Clinton and O'Malley responded to the BLM activists with the statement that "all lives matter". On the face of it, that sounds like a reasonable response, except that it totally misses the real message of "black lives matter". It is not that some lives matter and some don't, it is not a dismissal of the importance of Caucasian, or Asian or Hispanic lives, but an agonized statement that one group in America is targeted for violence on sight, that they are guilty until proved innocent and that they suffer a disproportionate amount at the hands of law enforcement, much of it unjustified.

My buddy posted a video some years ago that showed reactions of the general public to the sight of a young black man, a young white man and a young white woman trying to force open a lock on a cycle in the park. Need I mention which person attracted hostility and a 911 call? That's why the slogan matters. Because a twelve year old like Tamir Rice was shot down for holding a toy gun and we're arguing about whether he had the orange cap on the barrel to designate it as a toy rather than admitting that he would have likely never been perceived as a threat if he was White or Asian. Because till today the media is obsessed over the disappearance and possible murder of a young white woman on vacation in Aruba, while thousands of black men and women are killed and are no more than a statistic. Because if I see a group of black men standing by the side of the road, I'm nervous and will probably try to turn off before I reach them no matter how peaceable and nonthreatening they may seem, but I'll walk right by other ethnic groups with scarcely noticing them. All ethnic groups get stereotyped to an extent, but African Americans are prejudged as trouble and danger and the risk of violence against them is dramatically ibcreased as a result. The fact that so much violence is within the community is not a matter to be ignored; rather it is wrapped up in the scream that "black lives matter".

This movement, like other activist movements that spring from a deep and real cause, will not go away quietly. The challenge is to transform themselves into agents of positive change - and that means accepting that everyone has an interest and stake in the issue and that other groups are capable of empathizing. Excluding all other groups or declaring that no one else may address issues like slavery or racial prejudice is counter-productive. Attempting to exclude allies is counterproductive. This is a moment when the BLM movement faces a critical fork in the road. Down one road lies frustration, probably increasing violence, radicalism, splintering and eventual irrelevance - excluding whites and others from discussions of problems in the Black community is an unfortunate step along that road. The hope rather is that they coalesce around a real agenda for realistic change and find a way to galvanize their activists into working towards a better tomorrow. There are problems and it is in everyone's interest that we address and solve them, or risk having a repeat of the race riots of the sixties and seventies.

A Call From Arms

In the month since the Newtown, CT massacre, emotions have surged and ebbed, and as is my practice in such emotionally charged issues, I've waited a while before addressing it in my blog. While it appeared, in the first days after the killings, that the sheer horror of seeing a score of elementary school kids cut down in their schoolrooms would lead to a raft of overdue regulations to take some of the tools of mass execution out of the hands of would-be killers, with each passing day the chances of any meaningful legislation reduce rapidly. In a world of the twenty four news cycle,  even a tragedy of this magnitude cannot long hold our attention, especially when the national news is devoted to the never ending manufactured drama of the national debt and budget deficit, and predictably the first excitement has faded and with it the burst of energy to take on the entrenched interests of the gun industry has rapidly dissipated.

No discussion on gun control is complete without a mention of the National Rifle Association, which has only just reached five million members. That's not a small number, of course, but it represents only about a tenth of the total number of gun owners in the country. On the other hand their political power is far beyond their membership numbers suggest, all the more amazing when one considers that they don't seem to represent the interests of gun owners so much as those of gun manufacturers and sellers. Yet the legislature is largely beholden to them, and every presidential candidate has to profess his love for guns and his commitment to the right to own. The NRA and other gun rights groups have chipped away at controls and regulations, even used the courts to overturn laws they oppose, in the name of freedom and the rights of the Second Amendment. Members, and gun owning non-members have followed along, reading docilely from the script they've been handed and apparently driven by an irrational fear instilled in them by their handlers, and rarely stopping to actually question the actual dangers to their way of life.

The most amazing thing is that NRA seems to have abandoned their gun-owning individual members a long time ago, and now seem only to care about the rights, and profits, of the gun manufacturers and sellers. There is no other explanation for their opposition to background checks, their opposition to tracking gun sellers' inventories, their support for destruction of the records within twenty four hours and above all, their opposition to any restrictions on who can buy guns. Ironically, they always cloak their motives as protection of the rights of law abiding citizens. Yet all these policies they endorse have nothing to do with law abiding citizens and everything to do with selling guns at all  costs, to anyone and everyone. The NRA's favorite argument in favor of guns for law-abiding citizens' access to weapons is to protect themselves from criminals, who will have guns anyhow; an amazingly prescient argument, since the NRA does their best to ensure that those criminals will be able to buy guns whenever they want. It's a logic that benefits only those providing guns. As an interesting comparison, in many even most states, convicted (and even suspected to be convicted) felons lose their right to vote (and those convicted of sexual crimes, even be it urinating in public, can lose all rights to privacy), but they retain their right, or at least their ability to buy guns, in world of "don't ask, don't tell" between buyer and seller.

I concede that if the most radical of gun control proponents had their way, there would be a lot of guns to collect and destroy. On the other hand, almost no one believes that such a sea change is practical, or even necessary; and even fervent believers in gun control such as I know that anything so radical would be tantamount to plunging the nation into chaos and bloodshed, hardly the end result desired. We may not believe in the need for any normal individual to own a gun, or ten, but we see the answer in education, not confiscations. Unfortunately, the most influential voices on the gun rights lobby refuse to accept that reality and either truly believe or cynically profess to believe that their rights to own guns are threatened, and their followers appear to buy into it rather wholeheartedly.

Most control proponents disagree with gun rights believers over the reading of the Second Amendment - indeed, millions of pages have been devoted to the correct interpretation of that one little sentence - but let us leave that argument for another time and grant a universal right to own firearms. Why is it then so impossible to find some common ground, based on common sense? No one, surely, wishes to see more deaths by guns (I would hope) and surely the basic interests of gun owners can be met while still ensuring civic safety in a practical manner; I emphasize practical, since there are some suggestions that the way to safety in schools is either bullet proof vests for the children (talk about a Dystopian scenario) or armed faculty or guards. The single biggest regulation required would cover high capacity gun magazines - does this in fact infringe on the normal gun owner? Would a lack of assault weapons - high rate of fire, high capacity magazines - really affect the vast majority of gun owners, or any legal owners in their professed needs?

To the best of my knowledge there are three main reasons that people own guns, viz. personal defense, hunting and protection against a tyrannical government. In the case of protection, whether in one's home or even for those partisans who claim a right to carry their guns at all times (again a topic that is best left for another time), the most effective weapons are pistols and shotguns. One rarely sees cases of home invasions or muggings deterred by individual with M-16 rifles; even in such cases as homeowners do defend their castles with assault rifles, it seems more like an overkill than a necessity, with the exception, of course, of those trapped in Precinct 13 on that fateful night. My intellectual twin, who couldn't agree less with me on almost any topic under the sun, is possibly the only hunter I know who claims to need an assault rifle to hunt hogs, but most other hunters seem to prefer weapons that are better at killing animals than human beings, or in other words, hunting rifles or shotguns; and I'm almost certain that Dick Cheney's hunting partners, like Harry Whittington, are strongly opposed to hunting with assault rifles.

Which brings us to the last reason for owning weapons. the one often touted by those on the far edges of the political spectrum: citizens need their guns to protect themselves from the tyranny of the government. This latest idea has been trotted out on Fox TV recently, suggesting that it is the new normal on the rightwing, but few of those advocating this position seem to really think through the argument. Let us set aside for a moment the very great differences between the times in which the Constitution was framed and the world we live in today - the men who wrote that document lived in a world of muskets, not automatic rifles. Perhaps even more importantly, the framers envisioned a citizen militia for national defense, and did not support the invention of a permanent professional army - again, an idea that was reasonable in the days it was written, but long since overtaken by a changing world. But let us set aside these lacunae, and focus only on the practical aspects of opposing the potential tyranny of the government in today's world. Let us even entertain, for academic purposes, the suspicion of the government, so rampant amongst owners of assault rifles and like weapons. Let us pretend that the government is in fact out to usurp our liberties and that we need to fight back against tyranny, even though I see no credible evidence of this happening in the way envisioned by these partisans. The fact is that weapons alone, even the powerful semi-automatic rifles available to everyone today, are far less important in withstanding State repression than their owners believe. Not only is the State (any functioning country really) possessed of far greater firepower than its civilians could muster - especially when the State in this case commands the might of the US military - but their advantages over would-be resistance fighters really lies in their command and control systems, their organization and dedicated communication networks, and their control over the wider communication systems. This is what has helped the Assad regime retain power in Syria, and that regime's gradual loss of control over those levers of power to their opponents is leading to their demise. It is why governments from Iran to Egypt have countered popular protests with a shut down of the internet and other public communications, and their successes in those endeavors have determined the success or failure of the protests against them.

Freedom must be protected, even in the freest of societies, but it is not defended with guns or swords. Those who think that they can take on the government with their personal weapons are fooling themselves - of course, most of those who seek to defend themselves against their government in the United States are living in an illusory world already. They suspect their government of sinister motives where none exist, and close their eyes to the actual constraints upon their freedom. These patriots fear the jack-booted minions of the government, seeking to tear their guns from them, when the real weapon of freedom is information. The power to know the truth of the workings of our government is the real shield against government tyranny, the ability to mobilize public opinion, share ideas and information is our real defense against a government's attempt to usurp our rights. Guns, especially in the hands of a disorganized mob, are of no avail and would do more harm than good, while a free press and open channels of communication are what keep our government servants, not masters of the citizenry.

Governments, especially tyrannical ones but even democratic ones, may like to keep their population's access to weapons limited, but they do not fear their armed citizens; they only fear informed and questioning citizenry. It is no coincidence that governments, everywhere, seek to draw a curtain over their actions and keep their secrets from the people they purport to serve. Guns do not compel transparency in governments, but ceaseless vigilance by citizens and the Fourth Estate does. A study of access to weapons in the populations of different nations showed no great co-relation between weapons and freedom. The USA leads the world in gun ownership, and staunchly democratic and liberal nations like Switzerland rank up there with it; however so do nations like Iraq, even under Saddam Hussein, Afghanistan and Somalia, which leave a lot to be desired by way of liberty. Nations like Japan enjoy the same level of freedom without a high percentage of armed citizens. Perhaps most telling in the argument regarding the importance of guns to liberty are the cases of Libya, Egypt and Tunisia - nations that have risen against dictators. Libya had plenty of weapons in the hands of its people, yet the forces of the state rapidly crushed the local militias and were stopped only by the more powerful air forces of Europe and the US. By contrast, Tunisia, and to a lesser extent Egypt had very low numbers of armed citizens, but overthrew their dictatorial governments through largely peaceful mobilization of huge swaths of the the population. Guns played next to no role in overthrowing the tyrants, while information and communication was king.

In conclusion, I may say that I see no overwhelming need for citizens to own the kind of assault weapons that so many gun proponents demand as a right. I'll concede that they may have a Constitutional right to weapons even (though I have never bought into that narrow reading of the Second Amendment) but if they see their weapons as protecting their freedom, they delude themselves. There has been no attempt to reduce the proliferation of guns in decades, while numerous rules have greatly expanded access to powerful weapons. The continued paranoia about government tyranny in the face of all facts would be merely pathetic, except that it has also placed this country far ahead of the rest of the world in every category of gun related violence and death. Guns may be cool to shoot, and I cannot help but wonder if in the case of military-style assault weapons, they also help the owners compensate for other shortcomings and feelings of inadequacy. But given the number of avoidable deaths, is the price too high?

Lamenting the Death of Conservatism

The 2012 general election was widely expected to be a blowout conservative victory -  at least in conservative circles. The right wing blogs, radio talk show hosts and television talking heads were certain that the president was going to lose, ending the brief chapter that interrupted the conservative story of this century. And history was on their side - the president had failed to turn the economy around, and his argument that he'd inherited an economy in shambles and faced non-stop obstruction from the right wing in Congress would not convince the electorate. With massive unemployment and seemingly little good news, at least for the working classes, it seemed impossible that President Obama could win another term, especially after the gridlock, standoffs and stalled economic agenda that marked the two years since the GOP won control of the House, an election that seemed already to indicate a deep distrust of the president's plans for the nation and a marked swing back towards conservative philosophy.

It is needless to add that all those predictions were false and that the president won a surprisingly robust re-election. As an unabashed liberal, I should be delighted, and certainly I am happy that Obama rather than Romney will take the oath of office in January. But that small consolation aside, this election was decidedly disappointing, at the presidential and congressional level. There were a few bright spots in the state referenda, the most significant being the clear victory for marriage equality in four states, marking the first popular vote in favor. The votes in a couple of states to legalize marijuana also portend a heartening move away from the three decade old sham called the "War on Drugs" - if the federal government reacts with wisdom.

But let me explain why the presidential election was such a letdown. In the run-up to voting day, this contest was portrayed as a clear cut choice between liberal and conservative agenda. Strangely enough, the loss of both the electoral college and the popular vote led to an instant revision on the part of some prominent conservative leaders who pointed out that the president had never really laid out a plan for his second term and hence lacked a mandate to undertake any plan during his term. They are partly right, but like the blind men with the elephant, also mostly wrong. First and foremost the president did have an agenda, and it is largely a continuation of his plans from his first term - regulation of the financial markets, extending healthcare coverage to larger numbers, immigration reform, controlling the deficit through a mixture of spending cuts and revenue increases. But, and this is the real crux of my problem, the president is no liberal and his agenda is really not at all liberal. He, like many Americans, leans slightly left of center, and is more likely to side with the liberal viewpoint than its opposite, but would be far more likely to be pretty much at the center if left to his own devices. President Obama took several years to embrace marriage equality, and has yet to rein in the Department of Justice from their long, wasteful and pointless war against drugs (targeting the smallest players and users while ensuring huge profits for the violent cartels and various terrorist organizations). He has embraced targeted assassinations of suspected enemies of the nation, with the verdict of death pronounced upon hundreds in secrecy and without trial, and many other questionable policies put in place by the Bush administration remain active or simply suspended (not cancelled or repudiated), with little transparency or scrutiny. The regulation of the financial market was a weak effort, and largely toothless, while the talk about increased marginal rates mostly remains just talk - these may be reflections of political necessity but the President has rarely pushed them vigorously in the halls of the legislature. His signature, and now likely permanent, achievement was the extension of health insurance to millions of previously uninsured workers. But the system lacked a strong government role and represents as much of a boon to the insurance industry as it does to the millions who now qualify for healthcare coverage. Tellingly, the basis of the entire plan was initially proposed by conservatives and first advanced as Bob Dole's alternative to President Clinton's plan, and then embraced by Speaker Newt Gingrich and implemented by Governor Romney in Massachusetts, before they developed a severe dislike of it. In short, the President is no liberal.

If that were the only problem, I would be only half as disappointed. Unfortunately, he was never opposed by any true Conservatives. Of course, to be opposed by a conservative, the movement would first have to decide exactly what form of conservatism they embrace and then pick a standard bearer to explain their position. Conservatism is essentially a wish to either keep things the way they are, or to restore them to the way they were at some point in the past. However from the practical viewpoint there are some things in the past that are considered worth keeping or restoring, while others are universally accepted as best left in the past. This concept is largely subjective obviously and manifest itself as two broad forms of conservatism, viz. social and fiscal, with an inherent dissonance betwixt them. Social conservatism is well defined in America, painfully so, with well defined positions that include support for the traditional family, opposition to birth control and abortion, opposition to gender equality, especially for homosexuals, and opposition to scientific theory that contradicts Christian theology. Perhaps I should be more charitable and describe their positions as support for only natural forms of birth control, strong belief in the sanctity of life, belief in the traditional roles of the "normal" sexes, and above all a deep religious faith in the absolute truth of Christian theology. This group was represented by Michelle Bachman, Mike Huckabee (in previous years) and Rick Santorum, and when the dust settled, they were left in the cold, with mere lip service to their ideology.

The fiscal conservatives have a less defined ideology. There are times when I wonder if they know exactly what they stand for themselves, for they sometimes seem to conflate policy for philosophy. Whether they articulate this or not, in the simplest and most positive terms they believe in the supremacy of the individual over the collective, and thence flows most of their policy. Since the individual is prime, government should be minimal, dealing with only issues like defense and international relations. The individual should be entitled to keep his earned wealth and spend it as he sees fit, rather than be forced to contribute it to a collective fund, which ties in nicely with the concept of a minimalist government. The individual rises or falls on his own merit, not on the support of others, an almost Darwinistic approach, but with space for compassion towards those of lesser merit, with the extent of compassionate assistance decided by each individual. In it's purest form, one can certainly understand this philosophy, even if one does not agree with the basic tenets.

From this philosophy flow the various conservative policies, but it is critical to note that a policy such as low taxation is means to an end, not an end in itself and too many conservative in America mistake one for the other. Low taxes as a policy follow from a philosophy that the individual is the best custodian of his wealth, but higher taxation would be a reasonable conservative policy if another policy took precedence, say national security. True conservatives believe in paying the bills as they go, and increased spending if deemed necessary must be paid for by higher taxes. And true conservatives should also accept the importance of prior commitments by the government to its citizens, even when they don't quite agree with that commitment - that commitment, be it social safety nets or medical coverage, must be met even as they're phased out, and by higher taxes if need be.

Governor Romney attempted to straddle the divide between the two strands of conservatism, but it was never clear exactly what aspects of conservatism he endorsed. It was never clear that he even understood the inherent conflict between social conservatism, which emphasizes the primacy of society over individual, and economic conservatism which takes the exactly opposite view. It is not impossible to reconcile the two worlds, but it required a level of intellectual honesty in assessing priorities that the GOP never indulged, neither in it's standard bearers and certainly not amongst its partisans. Both Governor Romney and to an even larger extent Representative Ryan ignored the dichotomy they were attempting to sell and never sought to define the conservatism they would embrace in their presumptive administration; Governor Romney had an inconsistent commitment to conservative principles to put it mildly, but I am not convinced that Paul Ryan, the supposed intellectual cares about the paradox in his position any better than Romney or even actually understands it.

While I do not share conservative principles, even less do I respect the many self-declared conservatives. And yet I, as bleeding heart a liberal a person whose heart ever bled,  lament the failure on the conservative side of the political divide. The liberals did not have a true candidate in this race, but President Obama is indubitably left of center (at least as the center is defined in America) and was accepted by liberals across the country; equally important he was identified as the liberal candidate by his opponents and embraced that label. But the conservatives never came to the fight, not on the intellectual field which is the challenging political battlefield. The GOP hoped to win the White House without winning the battle of ideas, believing that the election was theirs so long as they had a name on the ballot. Despite the ever increasing divergence between the social and economic conservative wings of their coalition, they did not address the issues but tried to pretend that they simply did not exist and nominated a man who sought to avoid every political label. The social conservatives did show up in the primary, and I admit that they are largely consistent in their core beliefs and clear about the kind of society they would like to build, but I am also convinced of the error of their beliefs and history has judged their ideas wanting time and again; in any event even the GOP decided against a full throat-ed endorsement of social conservatism in the presidential election. But the economic conservatives never came out to the lists and critically, have forgotten what their underlying ideology. Normally as a liberal, I would be delighted with a victory by the candidate on the left, but the fact is a healthy polity requires intelligent conservative policy as much as it needs liberals. Unlike some partisans, I respect honest economic conservatism even when I disagree fundamentally with the ideas. Conservatives are as invested in the success of society as liberals and it is foolish to accuse either side of hating themselves or their country; they only differ in the means to the same goal. In an ever changing world, continued success requires a continual examination of policy, and when one ideology gains too great a dominance, it tends to overreach and commit mistakes in policy. Equally dangerous is the stagnation that sets in on the intellectual side and refuses to recognize the changes in the world that make policy from a prior era unsustainable. Both sides of the ideological spectrum are equally susceptible to this failure born of hubris and need each other to balance their demons. If liberalism provides the helping hand and equal opportunity for every member of society, conservatism ensures that individual merit gains the recognition and reward it deserves. Conservatism ensures the generation of wealth while liberalism protects society from the excesses of over-concentrated wealth and indirectly provides the essential conditions that nurture merit and sustain growth in wealth in the first place. The disappearance of true economic conservatives leaves the American polity dangerously imbalanced, and clinging to clueless charlatans masquerading as intellectuals. The policies of Reagan do not work three decades later, but conservatives  have not yet figured the difference between policy and ideas and are floundering with no clear vision. Their only silver lining today is that the economic liberals are almost if not quite as intellectually bankrupt.