Where We Are Now and Where I Hope We're Not Going Next

State of the Union?  Not doin' so good.

The economy, well, people say it's getting better, and can dig up several indicators to prove it, but it still feels like we're in a recession.  Less people may be unemployed, but they might not have a good job either, and there's a sense that even that could be taken away in an instant.  The downside of this glorious global economy we've spent the last half century building is that you can get fired not because of any fault of your own, but because it's cheaper for your boss to pay someone on the other side of the planet to do your job.  Or your investments could take a hit because of what the Chinese or whoever is doing with their currency.  It's a time when it's hard to feel in control of your money.

The president's health care plan didn't work out like it was supposed to.  A lot of people have insurance now who didn't have any before, which is good, but everyone's paying more for their insurance too.  Something about not enough young, healthy folks buying into the system, only older people with big hospital bills.  Or so say the insurance companies.  It's not like they'd use an attempt at reform as an excuse to jack up prices so that either they make more money or public outcry convinces the politicians to repeal the reforms, right?

College is probably too expensive.  Start with a captive audience forced to buy overpriced textbooks, tack on tuition hikes to cover new student centers and sports stadiums, require them to pay for classes that have nothing to do with their major, and the end result is a degree which may or may not be entirely useless in the modern economy.  Though if you had to work a part-time job to support yourself during college, at least you have something to put on your résumé.

It feels like things are unfair, like the country isn't working the way it's supposed to.  It's a time when you'd want your elected officials to do something, to fix things, make things better.

Unfortunately, the government just doesn't function these days.  It's now an accomplishment not to pass a balanced budget, but any budget without some rogue faction shutting down the government over some grievance.  The party that pledged to oppose anything the current president tried to do is now in control of the legislature, and is unable to take action on the immigration crisis or the latest mass shooting because it would go against their conservative values.  Then they flip out when the president tries to do things with executive orders.

It'd be nice to get a better government, maybe elect leaders willing to pull the party plank out of their backsides, but there's three problems with that.  First, our electoral system sucks, it lets politicians stay in office indefinitely so long as their districts are drawn to marginalize the opposition party.  Second, the politicians suck, because again party planks, backsides.  And third, our electorate sucks because it's willing to vote those sucky politicians into office in the first place.  My district keeps reelecting the "pro-life conservative" who talked his wife and girlfriend into getting multiple abortions.

Democracy is the struggle to reconcile the idea that people should be able to rule themselves and control their own government with the creeping realization that people can be kind of stupid.

So take all this dissatisfaction, add the recurring bogeyman of terrorism, throw in concerns that Team America, World Police is losing control of global affairs, and you have a very dangerous situation.  People are scared, they're angry, and the normal means for dealing with these problems are breaking down.  When President Obama addresses gun control by executive action, a lot of people are furious with the abuse of power, but others shrug and say "well, if that's what it takes to actually do something..."  When Candidate Trump talks about banning Muslims from entering the country "until we figure out what's going on" - and it is terrifying to have a serious presidential candidate use those words as a campaign plank - many people are horrified at the betrayal of American values.  But others shrug and say "well, if that's what it takes for us to be safe..."

This is how democracy dies.

America is pretty special because, compared to a lot of presidential democracies, we've been both stable and liberal.  We had a civil war over slavery states' rights, but that was a way to resolve a divisive issue that had been festering since our country's creation.  Even the secessionists wanted to keep a democratic form of government, albeit a weak and ineffective one.  Other than that traumatic episode, there hasn't been a problem that we couldn't solve with our democratic system.  If one set of leaders couldn't handle things to our satisfaction, we voted in some who could.  That's the great strength of democracies, they schedule regular revolutions that allow citizens to change the government without tearing everything down.

But now, things aren't changing.  Our current government is demonstrating that it can't solve the problems facing the country, an election or two after the previous government proved the same thing.  So when the regular methods aren't working, other methods start to look more attractive, like an executive who goes beyond an "imperial presidency" to rule by decree.

And people are afraid.  The "war on terror" (another idiotic concept) has gone on for over a decade, and Americans are still dying in terror attacks, in our own country, even!  The economy is supposedly improving, but people are still afraid for their futures.  And since nothing our current government does seems to remove these sources of anxiety, some people need something to blame, a scapegoat whose removal will make everything better.  And so such people flock to candidates who promise to deport millions of Mexicans and forbid Muslims from entering the country.

Now, we haven't ever had a real tyrant in charge of America.  George W. Bush may have taken the first steps down the path to becoming a police state as he waged war on a tactic, but his heart was as empty of malice as his head was empty of wisdom.  Obama has been using his executive power in worrisome ways, but only when he can't get results from working with the legislature.  Trump... we'll see.

The point I'm making, and the good news, is that while we've had the components of a proper dictator, they haven't all been present in the same person.  We've had leaders willing to use disgusting methods in the name of security, a leader with a borderline personality cult and a willingness to take executive action when Congress won't respond, and now a candidate appealing to xenophobia by promising that by going after the right minorities everything can be made better.  We haven't had someone in the Oval Office willing to use torture and spy on American citizens, and rule by decree, and persecute a minority population to gain support from the majority.

The reason I'm worried, and the bad news, is that all those things have happened in sequence.  The precedent has been made.  A president can torture detainees, ship suspected terrorists to out-of-country black sites for even worse torture, imprison people without trial, all in the name of security, and as we've seen, that president can win reelection.  A president can try to reform by executive order when he feels Congress isn't doing enough, and as we're seeing, people will support him.  And now we have Trump, who is tapping into some of the worst sentiments in this country to fuel his campaign.

I'm not saying Trump is the next Hitler.  I'm saying that, if he's elected, he'll have all the pieces he needs to become one, if he chooses to assemble them.  So maybe now's the time to think real carefully about who to vote for.