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It has been true since long before I was born that political parties are a pay off machines and protection rackets. There is an inherent moral hazard in possessing power. And the more power you aggregate the greater the moral hazard.
Conservatives inherently understand this. So conservatives support policies and laws that disaggregate power. But in one of the greatest ironies of our time, conservatives are called upon to support aggregated power — be it in the House, be it in the Senate, be it in the White House, be it in the Judiciary — in order to disaggregate power. But conservatives failed, or at least their strategies did. Supporting aggregated power did not lead to disaggregated power. Power flowed from the individual to the State, from the elected representatives to the Executive, and from the Congress to the Judiciary.
Conservatives have pursued a strategy of slowing change rather than pushing for a specific power balance that would require trimming federal employment and entitlements. This was a somewhat pragmatic strategy but created a ratchet effect that was rarely if ever reversed, and even when it was, only incrementally and not fundamentally. Conservatives got used to this as people do. Conservatives even succumbed to moral hazard themselves at times when adapting to a new normal and finding ways to financially benefit from the central government.
Through this process the system grew and became all-powerful, dispensing favors and money to persons and entities based on how they promoted the growth and well-being of the system and not the people. Politicians that supported the system were rewarded and protected, politicians who bucked the system were marginalized or destroyed. While it might be true that one of the two parties was more disciplined, more doctrinaire, in truth the party process was fairly universal to the extent that party professionals were involved. Thus decadence set in to all levels of government over time.
Nearly all of us in the country are post-New Deal Americans. Only a slight majority of us have lived in a pre-surveillance State. We are accustomed to muscular government and the only question is who will control it and how will it be used? We are the embodiment of the moral hazard to which John Adams warned:
Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
We did not know that clearly until Donald J Trump ran for President in 2016. He did not run as a limited government reformer, but he did call out the decadence in government and promoted lesser government. To that extent he was not unusual from other Republican candidates of the past, but his manner was dismissive of the professional politicians and political operatives. You can beat a man and still be friends, but if you humiliate him in the process you make an implacable enemy. The professionals were humiliated in two dimensions: (1) that a boorish, non-politician could beat a disciplined and polished partisan machine, and (2) that his winning message rebuked the legitimacy of the system they had created and from which they were richly rewarded. And this was as true for Republicans as it was for Democrats.
And then the "soft" coup began. The goal was to turn victory into defeat, to turn celebration to ashes --
“I will hurt you for this. I don't know how yet, but give me time. A day will come when you think yourself safe and happy, and suddenly your joy will turn to ashes in your mouth, and you'll know the debt is paid.” ― George R.R. Martin, A Clash of Kings
As we saw this coup progress a schism was created. The people who supported President Trump were fused to the idea that government was no longer a servant to them, but now a weapon against them. On the other hand the people who did not support President Trump were fused to the idea that the system was in peril and in need of protection. Never mind the incoherence about how the system was both unjust (systemic racism) and in need of protection, it was somehow the repository of their safety and security. And so a Barely Civil Civil War (BCCW) commenced with battles in the courts, the media, arts, academia, politics and, sporadically, in the streets.
There are signs that as the BCCW has gone on, more people have come to the conclusion that the system is not in need of protection. They are now seeing that the system is bad, not because of systemic racism, but because the system is making their lives less financially and physically secure. The system may not have reached peaked decadence, but it certainly is not working democratically anymore. Our Declaration of Independence defined the just ends of democracy --
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.—That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,—That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
The means for "abolishing" a government in a democracy is through the ballot box. We democratically voted to abolish the pre-Trump government in 2016, but they would not yield. Instead at every point they obstructed and countered lawful management of executive power. Enough people caught on to this and became alarmed so that, notwithstanding President Trump's personal imperfections and periodic policy errors, more people voted for him in 2020 than in 2016 — nearly a 20% increase in support after 4 years and a pandemic. But, we are told, he lost —notwithstanding numerous questionable acts that the system decided were below notice and consideration. The system put ashes in our mouths on January 6, 2021. The system has or is prosecuting over 1100 people connected to the January 6 protest/riot, while declining to prosecute or minimizing incarceration for other rioters whose actions supported the system. The system has impeached President Trump twice — once in office, once after leaving office. The system has civilly and criminal charged President Trump and his associates. The system is trying to deny President Trump a place on the primary, not just the General Election, ballot. The system is promoting inflation and encouraging mass migration — both of which immiserate the prior lawful inhabitants of our nation through job competition and public payments funded by those lawful inhabitants. The system is supporting a reduction of national sovereignty through subordination of the US Constitution to international agreements that undermine individual liberties.
Americans in great numbers voted against the system, twice. One victory was recorded but obstructed, the other victory unrecorded and denied. And now the system doesn't want any ballot position for a referendum on the system. If there is no democratic means of controlling the system, the system feels secure.
If you want a vision of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face - forever. George Orwell, 1984
2024 feels like a pivotal year. The system may have won already and the November "vote" will simply publicly stamp the victory. But if the system thinks it is secure, talk to the House of Bourbon in France. "A day will come when you think yourself safe and happy, and suddenly your joy will turn to ashes in your mouth."
Discussion (12)
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Very good summary of where we are, and where we will be.
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That's the word of the day (or the millennium).
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Some of us have thought for a long time that the government was too powerful. The pond scum we call the GOPe didn't agree with us. They believed the only thing wrong was that they weren't the ones in power.
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I guess I'm 70 percent in agreement. But the OP starts out talking about the two main parties as pay off machines. But McCain-Feingold stabbed that reality in the heart. The party professionals have far less control over who gets nominated for an elected office. The party apparatus, I'm talking both parties, has been impotent for decades, and this started happening after 1972, when the Democratic nominee, George McGovern, "democratized" the selection process. The Republicans followed along.
And it was precisely that weakness that allowed for Donald Trump's nomination, a man who for all practical purposes was not a Republican in most senses of the word.
For that matter, Joe Biden was a reaction to the possibility that Bernie Saunders might get the Democraticc nomination in 2020, a man who, up until then, was avowedly not a Democrat.
So Donald Trump did not end the primacy of the party insiders. That primacy was already dead and had been for at least a couple of decades.
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This is not always true. (Although I would like to be as Al Sparks is stating, 70% in agreement.)
I think your assessment of how the Dems left us with ashes in our mouths is a decent one. But some of the ashes came about due to what went on once Trump declared the COV infection to be a pandemic.
Thinking the answer is to vote "R" may work some of the time. But it does seem that once one party has full ascendancy that then the result ends up being "Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely"
An example: Republicans in Utah have kept that state fairly red. But there is a huge level of corruption inside that state. Having one political party in power, as well as what is an on going religion-based state does not guarantee honest policies.
Currently the Democrats inside Calif have hamstrung our state with a horrific deficit that is now looming over us to the tune of 68 billion dollars.
They also have made it impossible to undo the tyranny of our major household and business utility companies. Many of us have seen a doubling of our energy costs over 12 months. Meanwhile the headlines are that more rounds of energy price hikes will be here by the time that we receive our mid-Jan 2024 utility bills.
Until recently, a single citizen or a group of like minded citizens could have hit up the utility companies with Anti Trust charges. Now it is legal only for the Secretary of State to do that. And it is obvious that the Democrats are in bed with the utilities.
But if the Republicans were in charge of California, would they be any more likely to tackle the matter of the utility companies? If we had someone like Kevin Kiley, perhaps so. But so many Republicans who have run for the Senate or the governorship had huge ties to the energy producers and distributors.
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