Democracy must fight back

We were perhaps naïve and very gullible when we relied on the US’s self-rating to judge the country’s socio-political standing. Despite some nefarious acts, be it lies about ‘weapons of mass destruction’, the illegal murder of Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi, Afghanistan invasion, soft spot for the Netanyahu’s Israeli regime despite its war crimes and genocide in Gaza, we still believed the US was a global leader in democracy.

Because of the optional ignorance of those who still believe in democracy and the well-publicised American dream, we cannot bring ourselves to believe that the USA, the most vocal role model of democracy in the free world, to be its biggest betrayer.

America is no longer sinking to authoritarianism, it is already there. Donald Trump is showing Americans and the world, that the three coequal branches of government (the executive, the judiciary and the legislative branches) is an American dream, not reality. The concept has always relied upon the self-restraint of the executive branch.

Trump is a dictator only beholden to lust for power, the corporate world, lobbyists and other dictators. The way he perceives himself and talks down anyone who dares question his worldview demonstrates a disturbing totalitarian mentality.

Individuals who truly believe in democracy as the best form of government are complicit in the rise of authoritarianism in the USA. People became too comfortable in their view that American democracy was a shared value in the country. Their approach to those sewing the seed of authoritarianism was to ignore that seed and hope it dies for want of water and oxygen.

Thus, they played the role of adults in the house but unfortunately left the sensitive socio-political space for the Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement to operate unchallenged because they believed the views expressed by the movement were too insane to be taken seriously by any reasonable American adult. The truth is different; 77 million people embraced the message or at least were prepared to give in a chance.

What it demonstrates is that Trump communicated with his base and independents at the level of their understanding; he focused on public daily concerns (inflation, migration and US foreign policy) and used the language and a style that was unsophisticated, crass as it often was to communicate with his base. He repeated the talking points, false as they often were, until his whole persona and what he uttered – nonsensical as it was most of the time – were normalised by everyone including the democratic party. Instead of pushing back at the blatant lies and communicating with the common man, the democrats continued talking at people.

Trump’s talking points were dismissed as rumblings and ‘Trump being Trump’ by the scholarly DNC who would not get low and fight Trump where he was because to them his talking points were too ridiculous to be given the light of day.

Degrading individuals (as seen in the video above) and certain population groups, personal attacks, name-calling have become the signature tool for Trump and his MAGA minions. Reference to ‘left lunatics’ whom he labels as dangerous and a danger to the US is heard repeatedly, but the democratic voices have struggled to thrust a forceful counter attacking messaging until recently when Gavin Newsom (California governor) intentionally decided to ‘go dark woke’, get down and dirty in his fight against Trump and his far-right down in the sewer where they are.

Judging by Fox News and MAGA base annoyance about Newsom, the strategy is working as intended.

For an effective fight back, the ability to occupy the socio-political spaces, build and sustain a progressive society, the democratic movement needs to build capacity to exercise power outside the formal political system. This requires galvanising its grassroot base and we can only achieve that when those who lead illustrate that they understand public needs in exactly the same way as the people they seek to work with and lead.

You can be nice while not being a walkover. Progressive forces must fight the conservatism that exploits and twists social practices (religion, culture, etc) for political means, control, and power. We must understand that for progressive programmes to make tangible change on the ground, there must be constant pressure and active participation by an energized grassroots base. And that energy can only be sustained by a cluster of combative, mass-based organizations implementing a common strategy which their members shape and “own.”