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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsIs America a Failing State?
BY DAVID ROTHKOPF
We have the tin-pot leader whose vanity knows no bounds. We have the rapacious family feathering their nests without regard for the law or common decency. We have utter disregard for values at home and abroad, the disdain for democracy, the hunger for constraining a free press, the admiration for thugs and strongmen worldwide.
We have all the makings of a banana republic. But worse, we are showing the telltale signs of a failing state. Our government has ceased to function. Party politics and gross self-interest has rendered the majority party oblivious to its responsibilities to its constituents and the Constitution of the United States. On a daily basis, Republicans watch their leader violate not only the traditions and standards of the high office he occupies, but through inaction they enable him to personally profit from the presidency, promote policies that benefit his cronies and his class to the detriment of the majority of the American people, and serially attack the principles on which the country was founded from freedom of religion to the separation of powers.
We dont know what crimes may or may not have been committed but we do see several patterns of behavior. All are deeply worrisome. Trump has repeatedly shown a reckless disregard for U.S. national security and national interests. He has shown a contempt for the law and for the American legal system. And when challenges to the legality of the behavior of his associates have arisen, Trump has repeatedly acted in ways that appear intended to prevent or impede the ability of those who would seek the truth. (Perhaps worse, he regularly takes to Twitter and other media to do to them what he never does to the Russians who attacked our democracy: denigrate and discredit those individuals for doing their jobs and upholding their sworn duties.)
This deeply disturbing behavior is only made more worrisome by the fact that in other circumstances, as when the legality of immigration policies were repeatedly struck down by the courts, he has attacked judges and shown no appreciation for their independent and equivalent status to the executive branch in our system of government. In other words, he has repeatedly shown a desire to attack the system, laws, and Constitution he swore an oath to uphold. He has done so using all the tools of a demagogue and some of those more commonly associated with authoritarian regimes.
https://foreignpolicy.com/2017/05/10/is-america-a-failing-state-trump-fires-comey-fbi/
uponit7771
(90,339 posts)octoberlib
(14,971 posts)Oh ,wait he just brought it up.
uponit7771
(90,339 posts)2naSalit
(86,622 posts)nothing to see here. That Huckkkabee gal said that "...there is no evidence..." re: the Russiagate stuff. So that tells me that some bad hombres in the FBI are purging info as we speak.
We need some group to remove all of them from their lofty perches, all of these traitors all at once and detain them until their trials.
democratisphere
(17,235 posts)NRaleighLiberal
(60,014 posts)SticksnStones
(2,108 posts)It's a whole new world that the general population is suddenly witnessing.
I believe our Constitution will prevail.
And shame on SCOTUS for finding a legal rationale for letting the dark money monsters enter our gates.
RedWedge
(618 posts)But the term has a specific definition, and the fact that we're discussing applying it to the United States should disturb everyone.
BSdetect
(8,998 posts)Full of vague words like "bearing arms" and impeachment.
The checks and balances are a joke.
BannonsLiver
(16,387 posts)sarcasmo
(23,968 posts)Nitram
(22,801 posts)a right-wing assault. If we lose that fight, we could be on our way to a dictatorship. In that case democracy would have failed, but we'd still have a state.
dalton99a
(81,509 posts)CrispyQ
(36,470 posts)The entire republican leadership needs to be taken down or this rot will just continue.