democracy

Are We There Yet? On Dictatorship, Civil War, and Revolution

~ Randy Blazak ~ Leave a comment

From The Blazak Report on Substack, August 21, 2025.

August 21, 2025

Usually my time machine fantasies involve things like going back to 1965 to see the Beatles at Shea Stadium, or to 1415 to see if the Battle of Agincourt was anything like Shakespeare and all those movies depicted. These days I’m trying to leap ahead 100 years to see how 2025 turned out. Will 2125 be a new feudal era, another Dark Ages, where elite technocrats hold the all wealth and power and the rest of us are just miserable renters? Or will we have chopped the heads off the authoritarians and preserved democracy for another century?

There’s no guarantee that the United States lasts another five years, let alone a hundred. I’ve seen plenty of nations come and go in my life and Trump and his handlers are dismantling democracy so fast, I don’t have much faith that we will have free and fair elections in 2026. If Texas is any indicator, Trump and the GOP (now Guardians of Pedophiles) are setting up the apparatus of permanent rule.

But there’s a “but” there that I will get to in a minute.

There’s a lot of hand wringing at the moment around these three questions:

Are we in a dictatorship? It certainly feels like it. Trump is busy destroying the checks and balances of our constitutional democracy, there are troops on the street, and he is attempting an Orwellian rewrite of American history. But there are almost 900 federal judges who can gum up Trump’s plans and over 3 million federal workers who can throw in plenty of monkey wrenches. While the mainstream media has capitulated as much as congressional Republicans, the internet is still wide open and the journalists of social media are doing the hard work of covering fascism in real time.

Are we in a civil war? Not yet. If the National Guard starts firing on civilians, probably. But polls show the vast majority of Americans disapprove of Trump and his tactics, including the Gestapo-like sweeps of immigrants. We are not “brother vs. brother” in the 1861 sense. Yet. There’s a former Marine and current ICE protestor who told me that we shouldn’t “look right or left, but up.” He talks to conservatives (and ICE agents when they detain him) about joining this fight. More and more people are leaving MAGA as they figure out that Trump is only serving his billionaire oligarchs.

Is it time for revolution? This is a tough one. The people of 2125 may ask why Americans in 2025 didn’t stop the authoritarian takeover when they had the chance. (We love to ask the same question of 1933 Germany.) We know the heavy hand of the state is already upon us. Just look at how the entire Department of Justice was mobilized to mete out swift justice to the lawyer who threw a Subway sandwich at a federal agent. People throwing rocks at ICE vehicles are being quickly arrested. And the NRA is strangely silent.

I want to believe this can be resolved with a massive nonviolent uprising, but there may be a growing voice that advocates for offing the king and his corrupt court. The nightly battles at the Portland ICE building seem like rehearsals for storming the Bastille.

So here’s the “but.” We don’t have the advantage of 2125’s perspective. If there’s one thing I learned from Joe Strummer it’s that the future is unwritten. A whole bunch of things could happen. Donald Trump and JD Vance/Peter Thiel could drop dead (please, sweet Jesus, do us this solid), and America could wake up to the great harm done. The GOP could decide to take back its soul (led by the ghost of John McCain). The Democratic Party could get it’s shit together, focus on tariff-inducing inflation, health care, and making sure our elections are fair, and we, as a democratic nation, could burst Trump’s narcissistic bubble.

So, yes, it’s time for revolution, but it doesn’t have to be a violent one. Once MAGA feels the hit of the “big beautiful bill,” the ranks of the resistance will swell. It’s already happening. The protests at the Heritage Foundation, the Epstein scandal, the closing of rural hospitals, direct actions confronting returning members of Congress, and the fact that Sesame Street has been foreclosed on by Donald Grump will bring in Americans ready to fight and shut the machine down. This is just the beginning of our resistance.

There’s still more of us than them.

“The people have the power to redeem the work of fools.” – Patti Smith

Are Third Places Democracy’s Last Hope?

~ Randy Blazak ~ Leave a comment

From The Blazak Report (July 24, 2025)

July 24, 2025

My parents met in a bowling alley. A lot of my generational peers’ parents met in bowling alleys. Those days are long gone. As sociologist Robert Putnam detailed in his 2000 classic, Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community, nobody joins clubs anymore and our happiness has suffered for it. We are a nation of miserable loners. No wonder people identify with Trump.

A land of 340 million people staring at their phones does not make for a vibrant democracy. COVID was the nail in the coffin of civic engagement. We were locked down with Netflix and we liked it. Why build community when you can binge Love Island? Why prioritize democracy when you can doom scroll. And now you can share your alienation with your AI girlfriend.

All this loneliness is catnip to fascism. Where we got endorphins from meeting people at parties and pubs, we now get it from likes and algorithms. Fascism will walk in while we’re on TikTok, and be just another 60 second reel.

Let’s hope for a countertrend. And the countertrend is actually pretty cool.

As a college student, I probably over-romanticized the mythology of revolutions and protests being born in cafés and coffeehouses, but there is some truth to those stories. Rejecting British tea, the political discussions in the American colonies moved to coffeehouses. The Green Dragon tavern and coffeehouse, built in 1701 in Boston, became known as the “headquarters of the revolution” after Paul Revere bought it 1764 to give the Sons of Liberty a meeting place.

Sociologist Ray Oldenburg, in his 1989 book, Coffee Shops, Bookstores, Bars, Hair Salons, and Other Hangouts at the Heart of a Community, refers to places like the The Green Dragon as “third spaces.” First place is home and second place is work. Third spaces are the community gathering spots where we have regular interactions with our neighbors. They include bars and barbershops, cafés and churches, local stores and hair salons. Anyplace people hang out. In the new 2025 edition, Oldenburg’s coauthor Karen Christensen argues that third places are the answer to political polarization and climate resilience. It’s like that Sesame Street song, who are the people in your neighborhood?

Third places are vital to democracy to several reasons. Putnam argues these places create social capital among community members, building trust which is key to democratic action. Taverns and barbershops encourage free expression and the exchange of ideas. Many a night in my youth I argued theory at cafés until the chairs were on the tables. Third places become places for building social movements. Yeah, Hitler did it in beer halls, but we can hijack Starbucks to fight fascism. Third places are a cure for isolation as we reconnect with fellow travelers. Finally, democracy requires a sense of shared ownership and salons and local shops can help people to care about public life and bond over shared struggles.

In the 1990s, I had a third place I virtually lived in in Atlanta called Café Diem. To say I held court there would be an understatement. But the realization that inhabiting that space and getting to know owners, employees, and regulars was more rewarding than sitting on a couch in front of a TV made it an easy lifestyle choice. Much bohemian joy came from what we lovingly referred to as “Diemland.” Social media has zapped that impulse in the 21st century. We’re zombies.

But the counter-trend is bubbling off screen. Two years ago a group of dads at my daughter’s elementary school started a poker club and it’s become medicine for my soul. Every other Thursday, cards, whiskey, and good conversation. People are re-discovering their local coffeehouses, not as alternative offices, but place just to talk and share the emotions of this insane moment. Churches, mosques, and temples aren’t just for religion anymore. I actually went to a great local church, called Riversgate, to hear people talk about political civility! It was awesome!

So let’s get out of our first place and find a third place. You don’t have to dive in like a crazy person. “Hi everyone! What the fuck are we gonna do about this fucking fascism?” Ease in like you’re a new kid at school. Third places are relaxed. Belly up to the bar and check the vibe. You might talk about a ball game or the history of the establishment long before you bridge political chat. Maybe you’ll just hang out reading a book until somebody asks you what you’re reading. But that’s your place and those are your people. It’s time to get to know them. Democracy might depend on it.

The American Revolution started in a coffee house. And it will again.

What Do We Do When the Violence Comes?

~ Randy Blazak ~ 2 Comments

From The Blazak Report on Substack July 10, 2025

If we’re using history as our guide, we know it’s coming. The state sponsored violence against citizens. It’s already here at the hands of ICE and the violence against women’s body’s in the restriction of reproductive rights. But we can expect more waves of escalation. An ICE abduction that goes sideways when they try to kidnap an armed individual who does not want to be deported to some third country gulag. Protestors shot by National Guard who are unsure of their engagement orders, brains in fight or flight mode. The attempted arrest of Trump’s political prisoners who stand up to the weaponization of federal police. Critics of the regime who end up dead as is common in Putin’s Russia. We are a powder keg nation, one Kent State away from exploding. And that may be exactly what Trump wants.

Trump loves to cosplay strongman. He’s already sent the Marines to Los Angelos. He’s hellbent on turning America into one of those “shithole countries” he shit talks about. The slightest escalation could cause him to bring the hammer down so he can prove he’s an “alpha.” Then he has his pretext for suspending elections and cementing his police state rule. History has told this story before.

So how do we respond to the worst provocations of state violence?

The right has long argued for the need of a second American revolution against the multicultural liberal democracy that has sought to dethrone straight cis WASP men. (Can we start using SCWASPM, or is that too much?) The left is now quoting founding fathers like Thomas Jefferson. “The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.” Hidden among the peaceful protestors have been anarchists holstering side pieces. Is this the preamble to civil war?

I will admit the thought has crossed my mind. As someone who has had some weapons training, arming up for the coming shit show has been considered. But then I realize that’s a Hollywood fantasy of me protecting my family from Proud Boys and federal forces with an unlimited supply of ammo and slow mo John Rambo rage. It looks super cool in my head.

There will be blood. And there will be calls of retribution.

But, again, if history is our guide, we know that non-violence is the path. This isn’t the 18th century. For the last hundred years the model for the restoration of democracy has been built on mass uprisings that used peaceful means. They don’t always work. I’ll never forget watching the carnage in Tiananmen Square in 1989. But sometimes it has. (I also remember watching The Philippines and the People Power Revolution of 1986.) There will be casualties and it’s going to be heartbreaking. But the dictates of civil disobedience requires us to throw our bodies upon the wheel. Those deaths will be the seeds of a rebirth of democracy in the United States and their names will be cherished.

This moment, this terrifying moment in this terrifying history, could use a singular voice. We need an MLK or a Václav Havel to constantly remind us that the peaceful path is the most effective. To help us to channel our rage. An army of left-wing Timmothy McVeigh’s will not bring us the revolution we need. We can storm the ICE Bastille to liberate the prisoners of Trump’s race war. Or we can use our moral authority to transform those jailers to join us in the great experiment of democracy. In the absence of our Dr. King, we will have to be that singular voice.

We must hold the line and not become them. We’ve got the numbers and the moral arc.

Save America – Adopt a Republican

~ Randy Blazak ~ Leave a comment

April 18, 2025

This national divide we’re in feels like a ramp up to civil war, brother vs. brother. But instead of the “We Want to Keep Slaves” Confederacy versus the “Let’s Just Brutalize Indians” Union, it’s MAGAts versus Libtards. Have we ever been so divided?

I’ve been writing about the Great Schism in this blog since 2015, when Donald Trump came down from Billionaire Heaven on his golden escalator to blather about Mexicans being “murderers and rapists.” But since my work on a federally funded de-escalation project, I’ve been pushing a controversial approach to the conflict, talk to the other side instead of yelling at them.

Trump and DOGE ended the funding for our 3-year project to reduce political violence, but I have a new audience; Instagram. For whatever reason, my Instagram account (@blazakr) has exploded, from 2000 followers last week to over 43,000 (including some favorite celebs). The algorithm gods have said, “You must take this message to the people.”

Here’s the simple truth. The 2024 election gave Trump the White House and both chambers of Congress. Trump and his MAGA acolytes believe America handed them a mandate, even though Trump got less than 50% of the votes. (77.3 million Americans voted for the Orange Don, but 108.5 registered voters didn’t even vote.) Since January 20th, Trump and his D.C. droogs have gone buck wild, shredding the very fabric of our democracy. DOGE has thrown over 65,000 Americans out work (and countless jobs that relied on federal funding, like mine). People have watched their 401Ks tank as Trump cosplays tough guy with tariffs. And between the ejection of due process protections and official buffoons chatting war plans on leaky apps, in 89 days the world has watched America collapse into a shithole nation.

Can America be saved?

Trump and his elite democracy death squads are hard at work dismantling the guardrails of our sacred system of checks and balances. His complete disregard with the Supreme Court’s unanimous order to facilitate the return of Kilmar Abrego Garcia from El Salvador is just one example of the collapse of the rule of law. Tik tok time is running out for the USA.

But there are still options on the table. The millions of Americans taking to the streets is a central strategy. The 2020s could make the 1960s look like the 1950s in terms of protest actions. But I’d like to offer an additional strategy to rescue this 249 year old citizen ship.

Talk to Republicans.

We have to build a majority and there are some important populations to bring on board our pro-democracy movement. The first are Trump voters. That includes the thousands of Trump voters who voted for Biden in 2020. Many of these people are not happy with what Trump, and his boss, Elon Musk, have done to their country. They are farmers and (former) federal workers, parents of kids with disabilities, and old white people who were about to retire.

I tend to lump Trump voters into three categories. There are the MAGA cult members who think Trump is Jesus. They refuse to believe he has ever lied or committed a crime. The 2020 election was stolen because he told them it was. The only way to reach them is with a serious deprogramming regiment. Then there are the fascists. They loved the cruelty of Trump 1.0 and they want Trump 2.0 to bury our multicultural democracy once and for all. They are accelerationists who fuel the chaos and dream to create a white ethno-state from the ashes.

But the third group are perhaps the biggest. They are the casual Trump voters. They voted for Trump because he told them he would drop the price of groceries and adult diapers on Day 1. They thought a businessman would make a better president than a Democrat big government liberal. Many believed the complete crap that came out of Trump’s mouth about “illegal aliens” and “transgender athletes,” and the complete crap that came out of the right wing noise machine about Kamala Harris. Many supported Nikki Haley and held their noses to vote for Trump.

These people can be reached. Many of them are already protesting in front of Tesla dealerships and raising hell at Republican town halls. They are ripe for the picking. But they won’t be won over by being told how stupid they were for voting for Trump. They share many common values with us, including caring about our democracy and the future our children face. And many care about the immigrants in their churches and communities. This is the time to unclench the fist and open the hand.

This same appeal to decency and democracy instead of cruelty and barbarity can be made to the millions of Americans who didn’t vote. We need them, too. The very existence of this nation is on the line. We might not all be perfectly in sync on Gaza or GMOs (but at least we are on the same page about Greenland), and that’s OK. We need to drop the dogma and show up for the promise of America.

The other population to reach out to are elected Republicans. Many have sold their souls to Trump and live in fear of his wrath if they waver in their loyalty. They kiss his ass profusely out of terror of being accused of a thoughtcrime, being a RINO. But there are others who see the cracks in MAGA and are facing re-election in 2026. They know Trump’s War on Woke won’t win over the electorate when eggs are $16 a dozen and retirement accounts have been zeroed out. They include the Reagan Republicans who can still hear the ghosts of John McCain and Mitt Romney. (I know Mitt is still alive, but you know what I mean.) The constituents of these R’s should flood their offices and town halls with demands that they stand up to the Trump-Musk assault on America.

I can’t believe that I’m going to say this, but we need Republicans right now. Yeah, I’m pissed that that Kamala Harris is MIA in this fight, but you know who could really taken Donald down a few pegs? George W. Bush. Yeah, I know, war criminal. But good God, if anybody could peel away some good ol’ boys from the Trump train, it’s W. and his folksy charm. There are Republicans who know that Putin is the bad guy and that undocumented immigrants deserve kindness not cruelty. They need a permission structure to abandon MAGA.

Look, I’m as radical as the next sociology professor. I think capitalism is a death trap for the masses. But I’m willing to put my righteousness to the side while we save this democratic experiment that is America. That’s why I’m urging every liberal, progressive, radical, libertarian, and vegan pagan priestess to adopt a Republican. Reach out to one Trumpie, whether it’s a co-worker, family member or U.S. Senator. Make them your pet project.

Instead of screaming at them (the temptation is real), ask them how they’re doing. Be curious about their lives and then steer the conversation to our common values and how we’re not red and blue Americans, but just Americans. Stay calm and kind. Discuss the harm done to people you know. Don’t get distracted by silly tirades about “men in girls’ sports.” Stay focused on preserving the fabric of America’s Constitutional democracy. Fighting on social media is fun but where has that gotten us? Let’s try something different. It’s just us. No them. And many of these attempts will be complete failures, but some folks will flip and that might just enough to save us. Kill MAGA with kindness. They won’t know what hit them.

Watching the Death of Nation in Real Time

~ Randy Blazak ~ 4 Comments

April 1, 2025

A hundred bucks says Donald Trump has never read the U.S. Constitution. Or The Bible. Or a book. His latest blather about running for a third term is either an overt telegraphing that he’s going to pull a Putin and declare himself “President for Life” or it’s another distraction from that fact that he and Musk are crashing the system so they can scoop up the pieces.

Either way, America is screwed.

I’ve written ad nauseam about the elements of the Trump movement that map directly on to the rise of fascism, starting back in 2015. The parallels this time around are even more stark, including hollowing out America’s system of checks and balances (starting with firing inspector generals), alienating our long term allies (Blame Canada?), flaunting the rule of law, especially due process, and the vision of expanding empire. Leave Greenland alone.

In 70 insane days, Trump has transformed the United States from a democracy to an anocracy. Anocracies are hybrids of democracy and authoritarianism. Russia has elections, but they are Putin-controlled cosplay. Trump is playing by Putin’s playbook, step by step, where a democracy is transformed into a dictatorship, with the support of the loyal oligarchs. And when your favorite oligarch is the richest man on the planet it’s that much easier.

The damage Elon Musk is doing to America may be irreparable. The 2400 Americans that Musk fired from the CDC today will have ripple effects across the world, but especially in communities that voted for Trump who require federal support in disease prevention. But, hey, MAGA got to own those liberal scientists! America is unravelling. Our safety net is being shredded. Social security is next. Our national security is already splayed open on the Signal app. The nation collapsing. And it’s not in slow motion.

Trump, his drunk frat boy sycophants, and the crafty billionaires that cleverly steer the President of the United States have a plan, to remake America into Russia, a feudal state where the landed gentry collect the wealth and the rest of us pay the interest on our debt to them. Trump going after DEI, civil rights protections, and vote by mail is all part of the race to autocracy. All that was great about 20th Century America is being erased before our eyes.

But in a moment straight from Monty Python and the Holy Grail, we’re not dead yet. We still have time to jump off the corpse wagon.

The natives are restless. Protests are growing all over the country, including in red states. Americans are waking up to the threat. Sociologist C. Wright Mills called it the sociological imagination. When you are aware of your values and those values are under threat, the crisis moves you to develop a wider analysis. If you value American democracy, this is a fucking crisis. And the irony is that it will be disaffected Republicans who tip this thing into a national surge against Trumpism. Yeah, Idiocracy requires idiots and there will always be MAGA cultists who will follow their orange god off a cliff, but we can do this without them. We need Reagan Republicans and the ghost of John McCain. (Eighties Me can’t believed I just typed that, but this is an emergency!)

This is go time, America. It’s time for old baby boomers and young Gen Alphas to make noise, monkey wrench, flood the courts, take to the streets, sit in, stand up, and stop this madness. Or there will be a point when we can no longer claim to be free.

Trump’s Shock & Awe Plan to Collapse the American Economy

~ Randy Blazak ~ Leave a comment

February 4, 2025

These first two weeks have been dizzying. Trump and his billionaire bros have attacked multiple aspects of our democracy. They have ripped the guardrails off while Democrats have stood there, dazed and confused. The flurry of bias-motivated executive actions, appointments of merit-less droogs hell-bent on dismantling the imagined “deep state,” inflation driving tariffs, saber-rattling at our allies, and the pardoning of violent criminals who, in 2021, tried stop democracy in its tracks. It’s all too much.

The chaos of Trump, ripped from the pages of Project 2025, is the intent. In a normal world, each action would occupy a few weeks in the news cycle, but there’s a dozen actions a day. The chaos is the point. The opposition is playing Wack-a-Mole to each insane impulse from the orange madmen who is declaring war on our allies with one hand and canceling Black History Month celebrations with other. He’s throwing countless federal employees into economic crisis (as well as those, like me, who are employed by federal grants), while blaming the airline crashes on Obama and dwarves. It’s like being punched in the face over and over again with no chance to land a counterpunch.

Trump didn’t invent this strategy. Bush used it to destroy Iraq in 2003. Twenty-two years ago, they called it “Shock and Awe.” Use the military might of the United States to overwhelm Iraq and out of the chaos, create a machine that would profit post-war contractors. Just Google: Halliburton, Iraq, and Profit. This “shock doctrine” (as Naomi Klein called in her 2007 book) has a history of effectiveness. The disaster capitalism employed in nations like Chile was utilized to generate billions in profits for war contractors in Iraq. This week, as witnessed by the plunging of markets after Trump announced 25 percent tariffs on Mexico and Canada, Trump has brought disaster capitalism to the homeland and he and his billionaire bros stand to take home all the money.

The shock doctrine relies on chaos to shake up markets and political organization. Not only is the opposition stuck on the back foot trying to respond to each affront, economic destabilization paralyzes the working class who is more worried about inflation and holding on to their jobs than developing a strategy to fight back. Meanwhile, oligarchs are positioned to swoop in and calmly reassemble the pieces in a way that permanently protects their power and profit. This happened in Russia in the 1990s and it’s happening here now. It’s like that scene in It’s a Wonderful Life when there’s a run on the banks and George Bailey tries to calm the panic, saying, “Don’t you see what’s happening? Potter isn’t selling. Potter’s buying! And why? Because we’re panicky and he’s not.”

Trump, unregistered foreign agent Elon Musk, and their army of gangster capitalists are crashing the economy on purpose. Shipping migrant labor across the border, ludicrous tariffs, rampant deregulation, and appointing insanely unqualified loyalists are all meant to tank financial stability. Trump no longer needs his MAGA troops who were told he would lower the price of groceries on “Day 1.” They served their purpose of installing him back in the White House. They will suffer at the checkout line along with the rest of us. But at least they got to “own the libs.” Musk, now with the keys to the U.S. Treasury, can let the air out of America’s tires and jack up his global banking portfolio and Trump’s voters will have no idea what happened.

Like Mr. Potter, Trump’s billionaire bros will come in to “manage” the economic crisis. The German National Socialist Party did this when the Great Depression hit Germany. They consolidated power with the promise of affordable eggs. And now, when we look for the storied institutions of democracy to prevent an authoritarian takeover in the United States, including a free press, an independent judiciary, and a non-partisan Department of Justice, we will find they have been hollowed out during MAGA’s war of the “deep state.” Trump’s vow to purge the FBI of agents and analysts who investigated January 6th should be all the warning Americans need.

It’s easy to draw on the rise of Hitler as a historical parallel. And even though Melania has claimed that Trump kept Mein Kampf on his nightstand, Donald probably isn’t going back 90 years for a playbook. The rise of Putin and the rule of Russian oligarchs provide the formula. Just read Garry Kasparov’s 2015 book, Winter is Coming. Putin used economic calamity and the fear of Chechen terrorists to dismantle Russian democracy, making him President for Life. Dissidents get poisoned or sent to a Siberian gulag. Trump using the federal government to go after his political enemies is a page out of his comrade’s manifesto.

So what do we do?

We’ve have three weeks of the worst assault on American democracy in our lifetime. We’re all in shock that it’s really this bad. And it’s going to get worse. We can’t depend on Chuck Schumer and the corporate toadies of the Democratic Party save us. Many of them are in line to profit from the consolidation of power by the billionaire class. The Democrats who stand against them need to make themselves known now (or hang separately, as Ben Franklin said). But this is about us first. Us who are battered and defeated by the task at hand. Do we retreat into Netflix binges, or is there a path forward?

This is great opportunity to remember the practices of mindfulness. We’re all in reaction mode right now. Personally, I’ve had to resist the desire to punch someone, especially fellow working class people who think DEI is their enemy while their egg prices skyrocket. This is time to stop. Take a pause and breathe. Then we can start planning. There’s a great device popular in AA circles called “HALT.” Does this situation make me “Hungry Angry Lonely or Tired”? If so, just stop and take stock. So slowing the freakout roll is key.

Swiss sociologist Jennifer Walter offers a simple strategy to re-enage with solutions. First, focus on a few key issues you care about instead of being overwhelmed by the tsunami of fires that need to be put out (to mix metaphors). Second, find trusted sources of information who can do the work of providing needed facts and analysis. Third, if their goal is to overwhelm you, take mental health breaks. Meditation is a favorite “self gift” of mine. Next, Walter suggests taking 48 hours to respond to a news story to let your emotions subside and sort out what’s important. And lastly, build community to share the load. My faculty union president sent out an email last week, entitled, “What to Do in a Burning House,” asking faculty not disengage but step forward. I immediately joined a union committee.

Progressives, real patriots, and those who just care about the price of heat this winter, have been knocked to their knees by the Trump/Musk war on the buttresses of American democracy. But it’s time to stand back up. A lot of the heavy lifting is going to be done by lawyers who still have access to the courts to stop Trump’s actions, many of which are illegal and/or unconstitutional. The rest of us who are not the uber rich have a role, whether it’s monkey-wrenching the shock doctrine or building a viable alternative to Trump’s fear-fueled vision of America. Take a breath. We will do this.

The End of Democracy and the New Dark Age

~ Randy Blazak ~ 1 Comment

March 28, 2024

I lived long enough to see several nations cease to exist, including Rhodesia (1979), the USSR (1991), and Yugoslavia (1992). Even though many believe that “God likes us the best,” there is no guarantee that the United States will exist in perpetuity. We could exist for thousands of years, like Iran, or the U.S. could be kaput by this time next year. There are certainly warning signs that the great American experiment may have a rapidly approaching expiration date.

The idea of America was born in The Enlightenment, the European Age of Reason. Intellectuals, inspired by cracks in the medieval divine right of kings that propped up the authority of the Catholic Church, fashioned a new paradigm in which free thinkers were no longer burned at the stake as heretics. Those cracks were created by the Protestant Reformation in the 1500s, that encouraged the translation of the Bible and believers to seek the truth themselves instead of trusting the dogma of the Church. (Many of those reformers were killed by the Church, including William Tyndale, who dared to translate the Bible into English.) The new rebellion was embodied by Galileo Galilei who’s crime was to present evidence that the earth went around the sun, and not reverse (and who was put on trial by the Church in 1633).

Galileo laid out the framework for the new intellectual movements, taking root in oppressive monarchies in France and across Europe. Like Galileo, who did research based on a theory that made logical sense, the new thinking would be rooted in the values of rationality and empiricism, not blind trust and superstition. This “enlightenment” gave birth to an explosion of science that often contradicted the teachings of the Church. (“How do you reconcile the new fossil evidence with Genesis? Let’s do some research and find a truth rooted in the empirical!”) Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) infused this philosophy with the binding rights and responsibilities of the autonomous individual, a radical new conceptualization of freedom.

The founders of the United States were not brutish patriots who merely wanted independence from their taxers. They were deep thinkers who studied and debated the Enlightenment tenets. Thomas Paine was involved in the French Revolution and Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson’s time in Paris deeply informed how the rational and empirical experiment of American democracy would be constructed. The United States of America is a child of the Enlightenment and exists because the core values of the Enlightenment have persisted for 248 years.

When I taught social theory at Portland State University, we’d often get get into a spirited discussion about the end of the Enlightenment. If the Enlightenment was born in coffeeshops in the 18th Century Europe, when did it end? Some students would argue for 2001, when religious extremists attacked America and a hostility to climate science was a hallmark of the Bush administration. I would counter-argue that as long as democracy and science are still widely valued, the Enlightenment is alive and well. I have since changed my mind. The Enlightenment, that lifted humanity out of the Dark Ages, died on January 6th, 2021.

We knew that the Trump Administration was hostile to science. We saw it on a regular bases during Trump’s COVID briefings, with his ludicrous suggestions that the virus could be cured with sunlight or by injecting bleach. One of the world’s leading immunologists, Anthony Fauci, became a meme as he regularly face-palmed behind Trump’s “I know better than the scientists” buffoonery. And we knew that Trump was hostile to democracy. His administration was characterized by attempts to weaken voting access, Congress, the Department of Justice, and the courts, and a constant war on the free press (parallel to his Russian compatriot, Vladimir Putin). January 6th, was the culmination where he unleashed his anti-vax hordes on the Capital. Believing, despite of all empirical evidence to the contrary, that the 2020 election was “stolen,” the Trump mob tried to prevent the constitutional transfer of power and install their monarch.

In the following years, Trump has cozied up to the world’s dictators, like Hungary’s Viktor Orbán, and made it clear that, if re-elected, he would weaponize the federal government to seek retribution against all his political enemies. I hope Mitt Romney has a safe room. Authoritarianism is six months away from America’s doorstep. Trump has joked that he would be a dictator on the first day of his presidency if he  wins. But if he loses, he’s already told his moronic anti-Enlightenment base that the election will have been stolen, and they are armed and ready to rectify the situation. Democracy’s only hope may be that Trump dies comically on the toilet this summer.

I routinely warn against the “sky is falling” prognostications. I remember thinking the Cold War tensions of 1983 would be the endpoint of the human race. (Remember Korean Air Flight 007?) We survived that and 1984. “The world moves on, another day, another drama, drama,” as Taylor Swift sings. But things are different this time. My feelings may be shaped by this federally funded project I’ve been working on for the last two years. We are tasked with interrupting political violence and the chatter I’m seeing about a “second civil war” has been ramping up the closer we get to Election Day. The Trump droogs are locked and loaded and ready to wage holy war on anything they deem to be “woke” or that stands in the way of their dear leader taking control of the reins of power. They are clear that both science and democracy will be fired from Trump 2.0, and if you don’t believe me, take a look at the Handmaid’s Tale agenda of the evangelicals at the Heritage Foundation who think Trump is God’s gift to embryos.

I try to talk about the Enlightenment whenever I can. It’s why America is here. It’s why we walked on the moon. It’s why we can save millions of lives with immunizations. And it’s why infertile couples can have children (except in Alabama). Trump and his minions embody the exact opposite of the values of the Age of Reason. They wanted to burn Anthony Fauci at the stake and hang Mike Pence from the gallows. If they succeed, three centuries of the triumph of rationality and empiricism will be succeeded by a new dark ages where the only value will be fealty to the sovereign, who is currently selling Bibles wrapped in an American flag. This is not dystopian fantasy. This a coming storm that could put out the light for a thousand years. But we stopped that storm 79 years ago. Can we do it again?