Editor’s note: This commentary is by Michael Long, a retired English teacher who has lived in Burlington since 1975.
It was jarring when “American carnage” was prominently featured in the 2017 inaugural address. Like so many of Donald Trump’s pronouncements, it didn’t quite make sense. Surely the nation did have problems to address, but he was ascending to the presidency of a nation with a growing economy and no major crises. As his speech began, he graciously celebrated the peaceful transition and thanked the Obamas, but went on as if Barack Obama and every previous president had taken advantage of the American people, while he, Donald Trump, would be their savior. Clearly, like the stolen election of 2020 and like his cultivated image as a maskless tough guy or a savvy businessman, the image of American carnage was a fantasy, fabricated without factual basis for political effect. The Trump campaign, inauguration, and administration have been post-truth through and through. He promised to restore power to the people and wrest it from selfish, corrupt elites, but he embraced corruption to serve himself and selfishly exploited the people.
Now as the Trump nightmare blessedly (we hope) fades away, Americans stand dazed amid carnage aplenty. National debt has been recklessly inflated to redistribute wealth to corporations and individuals wealthy to begin with. Responsible stewardship of the environment — the air, the water, the climate — has been dismantled in the name of deregulation and science denial. A pandemic has killed tens of thousands more than it would have had it been managed in the public interest rather than in this one man’s political interest. The courts have been packed with ultra-conservative judges (though it remains to be seen whether they will in fact deliver the skewed justice they were intended to secure). Many billions have been squandered on just 452 miles of border wall — more for symbolic than practical effect — and only 40 miles of which cover areas not previously fenced.
Self-interest, science denial, magical thinking, grievance, and now insurrection and sedition largely define the policies and the legacy of Trump.
He and his many enablers have paid scant attention to the Constitution except to invoke it like “freedom” and “the flag” as a partisan accoutrement. America is lacerated and deeply, intentionally divided by lies and ill-will tweeted and otherwise spread for personal and political advantage. In Trump World, anyone who is not a fan or who has the temerity to speak the truth is an enemy of the people, a socialist, a communist, or a radical leftist out to destroy our beautiful country. This divisive president has raised the threat of domestic terrorism into the red zone — especially now in the aftermath of a crazed mob attacking the Capitol and menacing Congress to reverse the clear result of a fair and free presidential election.
The 2020 presidential election stands apart only because the pandemic made voting by mail the safest and most responsible method. The Big Lie asserting that the election was stolen has infected the populace and spread like the coronavirus only because Donald Trump has promoted it relentlessly without shame, aided by his misguided or unprincipled fans in Congress and the media.
This is a deranged presidency launched on the racist lie of birtherism and landing in shambles: the big lie of a stolen election, an incensed mob bent on hanging the vice president, a Congress running for its life, and a Capitol complex trashed and sullied. As Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., powerfully noted, the insurrection that put Congress and the Capitol at risk happened because the president betrayed the nation.
We all know that no candidate is ever guaranteed election victory, but Trump, even before he won in 2016, asserted that he would accept the results only if he won. His posture was much the same in 2020. He was sure to win unless the election was rigged. When he lost by seven million votes and by the same 74 vote electoral “landslide” that determined his win over Clinton in 2016, the result was not in any legitimate doubt. And his claim of fraud should have had zero credibility because, after all, he had declared it before voting had even begun.
Nevertheless, he lied and lied and lied and for many the lie took root. And he refused or resisted committing to a peaceful transfer of power — as if it were up to him whether to surrender the White House or not.
This is not normal or permissible behavior for a president. Our Constitution establishes the peaceful transfer of power as a given. It’s not a question that should ever arise. And conceding a lost election too — though no protocol is constitutionally enshrined — should be and has been the norm. But the big lie, the fraudulent charge of fraud, locked Trump into never honorably conceding.
This undermined democracy, truth, and decency, incited insurrection, and ended in impeachment as it must and should if the Constitution, democracy, decency, and truth are to endure.
