The Trump Train Leads to Tyranny
By: Robert Reich
Taken From: Robert Reich
When I was a boy
and lost just about every sporting event I tried, my father told me, “What
counts isn’t whether you win or lose but how you play the game.”
Most parents told
their kids this. It was part of the American creed. But I doubt Fred Trump
passed on the same advice to little Donald, who seems to have learned the
opposite: It’s not how you play the game but whether you win or lose.
If there’s one
idea that summarizes Donald Trump — his character, temperament, career,
business strategy, politics and worldview — it’s winning at any cost. That’s
the art of the deal.
Playing the game
well or honorably is irrelevant.
Now that he is the
presumed Republican nominee for the highest office in the land, this view is
outright dangerous.
Government is
about process. Democracy is about law. The Constitution establishes the rules
of the game. A tacit social contract binds us all together.
So when, as the
presumed Republican presidential nominee, Trump says a federal judge who’s
considering a case against him is a “disgrace” and a “hater” who shouldn’t be
hearing the case because the judge’s parents were Mexican, he’s doing more than
insulting a member of the judiciary. He’s attacking our legal system.
When Trump
threatens his critics, saying he’ll “loosen” federal libel laws to sue news
organizations and unleash federal regulators on those who oppose him, he’s not
just bullying. He’s endangering our democracy.
And when Trump
foments bigotry, demanding that people of a certain faith not be allowed into
the United States, or claiming without any evidence that “thousands and
thousands” of Muslim Americans in New Jersey celebrated the collapse of the
Twin Towers on 9/11, he’s not just telling lies. He’s threatening the social
contract that binds us together.
If governing is
not undertaken correctly and respectfully, the entire system we rely on is
weakened.
Trump is the
extreme, but his candidacy is the logical culmination of years of
win-at-any-cost politics. If any public official is responsible for starting us
down this bleak road, it’s Newt Gingrich – reputedly on the short-list for
becoming Trump’s vice president.
Yes, Gingrich
scolded Trump for his recent comment about the federal judge. But Gingrich’s
approach to politics has been almost as divisive and destructive.
After Gingrich
became speaker of the House in 1995, Washington was transformed from a place
where legislators sought common ground into a war zone. Compromise was replaced
by brinkmanship, bargaining by obstruction.
According to
political scientists Norman Ornstein and Thomas Mann, “the forces Gingrich
unleashed destroyed whatever comity existed across party lines, activated an
extreme and virulently anti-Washington base — most recently represented by tea
party activists — and helped drive moderate Republicans out of Congress.”
Under Gingrich’s
lead, House Republicans closed down the government when they didn’t get their
way on the budget. Then they voted to impeach Bill Clinton. Gingrich left the
House under a cloud, but his legacy lived on.
House Republicans
shut down government again in 2011 in a dispute over raising the federal debt
ceiling — which could have triggered a government default and risked the
creditworthiness of the U.S.
Gingrich has
continued down his destructive path. In the presidential campaign of 2012, he
even asserted that public officials aren’t bound to follow the decisions of
federal courts. Trump’s attack on a particular federal judge is almost tame
compared to Gingrich’s sweeping attack on the entire court system.
Winning by
weakening our system of government is heinous. So why are Republican voters
prepared to make Trump president?
Maybe it’s because
so many of them have been losing economic ground for so long they want a winner
on their side, even if that winner sacrifices democracy.
They are deluded.
The only real hope for positive change is to make democracy stronger. The Trump
bandwagon is taking us down the road to tyranny.
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