Written by ultra-liberal American/Canadian Henry Giroux just prior to the election this year, it is a diatribe on the societal fault lines that Donald Trump has exploited to gain political power. He cites the following trends as evidence of a disturbing turn to authoritarianism in the U.S:
- state sanctioned violence against afro-Americans (racial profiling, police shootings, high incarceration rates)
- state tolerated lead poisoning of 6000 children in Flint, MI due to corrosive water
- gun lobby which resulted in 2,525 children and teens dying of gunfire in 2014
- corruption of the U.S. media who are more interested in building advertisers revenue than doing in-depth analytical reporting
- blaming of immigrant Muslims for terrorism and Hispanics for stealing jobs
- increasing militarization of U.S. foreign policy instead of dialogue
Donald Trump is a demagogue authoritarian who has and will say anything to gain power. He does not ask the electorate for a sacrifice and is unconstrained by ideology. He is interested only in power for power’s sake and the effect that he has on people. Very scary and dangerous indeed.
Giroux’s hope is that broad based youthful social groups such as Black Lives Matter and the Occupy Movement will lead a broad social revolution in the U.S. that will address the root causes that are leading to the fracturing of their society along ethnic, social, religious and economic lines.
And now we see the Not My President protests beginning. Let us hope that this movement will remain peaceful and lead to real social, economic and ethnic relations progress and change in the U.S. I and many others have our doubts and fears.
A timely read, 4 out of 5 stars.
mattersofthemoment 