To Fracture the Right, Capture the Center

Cannon here. Sorry I've been away during these rather momentous days; I'm trying to finish a long-overdue project. I have a fair amount to say about the madness in Georgia, which cannot be understood properly unless you are following Jennifer Cohn's tweets. 

 

We should note, however, that the Georgia Secretary of State seems to have Lindsey Graham boxed in. That is to say: More than one witness claims that Lady G committed a crime. 

 

Biden has made noises indicating that he will follow an "all is forgiven" policy when it comes to the crimes committed during the past four years. I hope that he is saying such things simply to keep the bad guys off guard. The crimes committed during the past four months should be enough to see this whole sorry Q-approved crew frogmarched off to the pokey. The Democratic brand cannot be mud-free until the Republican brand is proven -- conclusively and irrefutably -- to be what it truly is. 

And that brings us to the following important essay by D-Jay...

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To Fracture the Right, Capture the Center

By D-Jay

Day-by-day, three things are becoming more and more likely:

1.  The will of the people is going to prevail. Joe Biden will be inaugurated on January 20^th as the 46^th President of the United States.

2.  Donald Trump will leave as big a mess as he possibly can for the new administration to deal with, and his acolytes are likely to cause trouble – bad trouble - for years to come.

3.  The fate of the world still hangs in the balance, but we now have 2 – 4 years to start getting things back on track.

If the presidential election had gone the wrong way, all would have been lost. With Biden’s solid victory, however – and the failure (so far) of Trump’s surprisingly inept efforts to annul the results – we have one more chance to save the world, literally.

History has shown us that when power-hungry despots gain too much authority, war and social collapse all-too-often follow. Narcissists all, they always want to extract a little more wealth for themselves and their cronies, squeeze one more ounce of blood out of their subjects, and gain the upper hand over rival leaders. If subterfuge fails, military force is fine. It fits their tough-guy self-images nicely.

With nuclear weapons in their hands, a confrontation of unrestrained tyrants would be little short of apocalyptic. If Trump had prevailed in the election, that is exactly what I think would eventually have happened. With Donald at the helm, America’s isolation and decline would have continued the rapid acceleration he set in motion four years ago. By the time another four years past, China would probably have surpassed the U.S. in terms of military as well as economic and technological strength. The soft power that has flowed from the example of American freedom and democracy would also be little more than a wistful memory.

The only way for Trump to have stopped this would have been war.

Unleashed at home, it is also hard to imagine that he would want to keep on bending the knee – and kissing the butt – of Russian President and Oligarch-in-Chief Vladimir Putin. Like a rising gang boss, Trump would have wanted to expand his turf…and to become the don at the head of the table. Having hobbled the press completely after another year or two in power, Trump would also have been in a position to wave off any kompromat Putin might use to threaten him as “FAKE NEWS!”

What better way to put Vlad in his place than a strong dose of U.S. military might?

And these cheerful scenarios don’t even consider the greater threat posed by climate change. Four more years of Trump and I doubt it would have been possible to pull ourselves back from the brink.

So we’ve got another chance to put things right…but what a task it will be!

Having had four years to see exactly what kind of man Trump is, and what kind of leader he was, 73 million Americans said, yeah – that’s our guy. That’s what we want.

It’s horrifying beyond belief.

More than anything, it shows how divorced from reality almost half the country has become.

We can blame this on Trump, but it has been decades in the making. It won’t be undone so easily - but undone it must be.

73 million Americans – or at least a significant portion thereof – need to be deprogramed and returned to the real world. 73 million people need to be brought back to a world that bases itself on provable facts, not wild-eyed conspiracy theories and the dear leader’s latest self-serving pronouncements.

How can such a thing possibly be done?

To even start we must first of all understand four things:

• Our opponents – Who are they? How did they get this way? What are their strengths and weaknesses?
• Ourselves. – Who are we? How can such a diverse group possible cooperate effectively? What are our strengths and weaknesses?
• What makes our opponents cling so fervently to such a delusional view of the world?
• What it is about us that repels our opponents so much that they willingly prefer Donald Trump to what we are selling?

Over the next few months, if not years, I expect to be writing a lot about these issues – and the myriad knotty problems that flow from them.

To get the ball rolling today, let me start with one simple proposition:

To return the country to sanity it is essential that we fracture the Right – break apart the seemingly monolithic 48% of the voters who cast their lot with Trump and the power structure behind them.

To start this process, we desperately need to capture the center, peel off that group who broke for Trump this time, but still function with a bit of sanity.

Can we lure them away from tent Trump by jettisoning anything that might be interpreted as wild-eyed socialism or anarchy and replacing it – in the jargon at any rate – with a philosophy that might be called, “Common Sense Centerism?”

A few examples:

Don’t push now for Medicare for All, but add a robust public option to Obama Care.

Don’t demand reparations for past racial injustice, but implement government investment policies which benefit historically disadvantaged communities, be they located in inner cities or Appalachia.

Don’t ever, ever, say, “Defund the Police,” but carry out an honest effort to reform our justice system in ways that will be fairer to all – racial minorities most definitely included.

Push hard for voting rights by stressing the traditional American value (if not practice) of one-person, one vote and wrapping up the effort where it belongs – in the American flag.

Don’t speak so loudly about the need to tax the rich more, but constantly point out that America was built by working men and women, not a bunch of oligarchs and trust-fund brats, and that trickle-down economics are a sham. Ordinary people having enough money in their pockets to live their lives in dignity and buy the things they need is what makes for a powerful economy, not the ultra-rich playing stock market and investment games.

You get the idea.

Fortunately for us, this sounds an awfully lot like the agenda of our President-elect, Joe Biden.

Now all he needs is Trump back in Mar-a-Lago, or better yet, where he truly belongs –

Prison. And a cooperative Senate…which will probably be the subject of my next piece.

Stay tuned!