17 Comments
Oct 8, 2022Liked by Steven Beschloss

After six-plus years of Trump and the rising of the right wing to the raw power and open influence it has not seen since the 1950s days of McCarthyism, the red scare and the cold war, I am almost joyless. Certainly dispirited, but perhaps that comes from living in the bright red state of Florida with its smarmy governor and rubber stamp state legislature. Joyless. Dispirited. And saddened. Deeply saddened that our great experiment is about to end and I cannot do anything about it.

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Oct 8, 2022Liked by Steven Beschloss

Your words describe my journey exactly. I was personally never this involved in "politics" prior to Obama's 8 years. Now I read lots of sources of information & news, I march, write letters and postcards, vote in each & every election and vote every time for the Democratic candidate. There was a time I would at least consider what the Republican candidate's platform was, but not now. Anyone who still calls themselves a Republican is declaring they approve of the direction of the party toward totalitarianism.

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I’ve become a full-fledged progressive, socially, though I still balk at some of the more “everyone gets a trophy for showing up” policies. Have dedicated the last of my working years to serving others. First by resuscitating a spiritual community (I’m a non believer) and lately by running our local Habitat for Humanity. We cannot do nothing.

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The morning after the 2016 presidential election I was distraught at the results and suspected ill forces at work behind the scenes but never suspected then the complicity of the entire Republican Party. The understanding that the party is all about power at any price slowly dawned on me over the course of the past six years. Although I knew about the marriage of politics and religion I failed to grasp the significance of that bond and the impact it would have on the country especially when it further embraced the pro-political violence movement. I no longer feel confident our democratic institutions will prevail against the Christian Nationalist threat. But I’m more politically active now than ever before, better informed, more willing to speak up, and happy to donate to candidates who are our last hope for preserving democracy.

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Oct 8, 2022Liked by Steven Beschloss

Ditto! Why should I say anything when you said it for me?

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Oct 8, 2022·edited Oct 8, 2022Liked by Steven Beschloss

While I learned long ago that in politics, many people do not reason but think backwards, the depths of which some people go to rationalize their previous choice is sad. We have allowed precepts such as "the end justify the means" and "anything goes in politics" to fester in our society for far too long. The "Maga" era is just the rotten fruit being shamelessly exposed. I have no general solution - I can only do my part as best as possible with honesty and integrity and vote for the best choice keeping these foundational virtues in mind. Perhaps we as a nation must sink lower to know we've hit rock bottom. But I hope not. My hope is that we recognize the disaster we are in and work together towards a country that works for everyone. IMHO, it doesn't do any good to be only pessimistic but realistic in expressing the dangers and working and doing our best without throwing our hands up to counter it.

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Oct 8, 2022Liked by Steven Beschloss

I have become more cynical over the past 6 years. Having been aware of DJT for the past 30 years I was not prepared for too many of my fellow citizens to fall for his hateful rhetoric and vengeful direction. It had started with the blatant and more subtle racism when BHO was president that others did not hesitate to voice. I also am a person who used to vote for Republicans if I felt they were better equipped for a position. Not now. About 8 years ago my family discussed how the Republican Party was changing. Even then we could not have guessed the extreme it would go to. I tend toward the longview, that things eventually come back around. I just hate that we have to go through the ordeal of getting 'back around'.

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Oct 8, 2022Liked by Steven Beschloss

I became fearful the day trump announced. I carry More anger, more sadness, more fear. Each of you has well voiced my feelings. Democracy is worth all the effort we can give. Without it we have nothing that matters.

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Oct 8, 2022Liked by Steven Beschloss

What a great question! My journey has been interesting indeed. I've been on the left for too many decades to count (and that verges on TMI), starting with the far left, then settling comfortably for many years into the western liberal tradition championed by political philosophers like John Rawls. My sympathies have been with the Democrats ever since the botched election of 2000, in which Gore's loss can pretty clearly be shown to be a direct consequence of Nader's candidacy. I'm still angry with Nader for turning the country over to Bush. Anyway, that's water long under the bridge. :)

I was pro-Clinton, then pro-Obama, then pro-Clinton, then pro-Biden. And, like any sane observer, I still judge Trump to be not only dangerous for American democracy, but part of a vanguard of would-be strong-men who want to establish a global plutocratic hegemony of authoritarian fascism (sorry about that mouthful).

At the same time, I'm an atheist, not because I dislike the aspirations of religion, but because I embrace one which I hold as most basic: truth matters most of all. That, I believe, is the grounding principle of science and all human knowledge, and hence, a criterion by which all political platforms must be assessed.

Sadly, over the past few years, I've watched my dear Democrats become corrupted by a tapestry of illiberal ideas that threaten the foundations of democracy every bit as much as the frontal attack from the right. The left and right have ever been slaves to ideology; that's nothing new. What has changed, I think, is that the ideological fervor of the left's pursuit of rooting out oppression in society has rendered it insensitive to a much bigger threat: the encroachment of a rigid dogmatism that wishes to silence all opposition. In short, the left has become an enemy of the core liberal values of free thought and free speech.

There is now so little allowance for questioning the political orthodoxy of the left that to do so not only puts at risk one's standing in the civil social dialogue that should be enjoyed within a free society, but also jeopardizes one's livelihood - and even one's status as a law-abiding citizen. Journalists and their editors fear to openly question the passionately pronounced creeds associated with race, sexual mores, and gender, to the extent that an entire industry (exemplified by this very platform) has arisen to allow free expression to escape the clutches of the censorious left-leaning meaning establishment.

Nowhere is this illiberal attack on free thought more egregious than in the domain of transgender medical science. I've been researching this topic avidly for the past two years and what I've found has completely changed my political allegiance. I applaud the Democrats' defense of science with respect to climate change and hold the (perhaps quaint?) position that, to be consistent, they should follow the science in all matters, without regard to political expediency, their stance regarding the medical science concerning the trans debate has been appallingly closed-minded. Even as the U.K. and several European countries have started vigorously backing away from the doctrine of "affirmative care," the Biden administration is full steam ahead into the catastrophic morass that's leaving thousands of young people damaged for life. This is the worst medical scandal in modern history and mainstream investigative journalists (other than Fox and the others aligned with the Republican cabal) are only just now starting to expose it: https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-transyouth-care/.

Maybe the Democrats can still avoid the total immolation that seems likely to follow from the incredibly stupid blunder of telling American parents that they should leave the decisions about their children's futures to the self-appointed "experts," who, it turns out, are blind, led by the blind, and committed to the medical strategy of "first, do the harm, then seek the evidence."

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Oct 12, 2022Liked by Steven Beschloss

I listened to Clinton's concession speech and cried. Now my psyche looks like the opera house in Odesa. Still fighting, more cynical, definitely damaged and concerned but: very much alive, very much in the game, very much determined as Ukraine to keep fighting. Peace prevail!

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Oct 9, 2022Liked by Steven Beschloss

What you describe I see in myself. I also went from being a reliable Democratic voter without doing much else to an active member of my Democratic Town Committee. As a recent retiree, I am using my extra free time to work for candidates. I do everything from addressing post cards to delivering lawn signs. I am working up to door knocking and phone banking.

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Oct 8, 2022Liked by Steven Beschloss

After making my earlier comment, I received notification of this superb article in Quillette: https://quillette.com/2022/10/08/three-paths-to-despotism/ by Joel Kotkin. Here's a relevant quote:

"But these worrying developments on the political Right reflect only one expression of the new authoritarianism. The Western Left, once advocates of free speech and tolerant of markets, now embrace a massive expansion of state power, complete with expansive curbs on expression and speech. Perhaps most ominous of all, expanded state power and intolerance are also now being embraced by some of the world’s most powerful corporations, which have benefited greatly from liberalism, the rule of law, and open inquiry." The tendency of so many on the left to cower at the prospect of disagreeing with any of the precious orthodoxy of the Party Line should be deeply alarming to anyone who claims to value the liberal principles foundational to the Left. Unfortunately, the kneejerk response to any criticism of one's accepted political articles of faith tends to be to plug one's ears and loudly sing "la la la la la," hoping that the critic will go away and stop asking you to think.

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First the depression of 2016 then the continued outrage since then. I was off social media for a period of time in 2018 and 2019 but I went back on which was a mistake and stay on until this year when I went off again which has been good. I miss seeing posts about my friends and their grand babies and babies but the politics and obvious misinformation was killing me. I can no longer be nice about opposing views like I used to. This is what has happened to our society. I try not to engage those with opposing views so arguments will not ensue however. I am getting older and set in my ways and views. But…..I will NEVER EVER vote republican.

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You have pretty much read my mind. I have also become more pessimistic that we can get back to a real democracy because not only did we have a president who tried to destroy it, and continues to try to destroy it, but also political leaders in the GOP seem to go along with it, refuse to try to stop it, no longer have the moral compass to be real leaders, put party over country, act as if the only thing that matters is getting elected and imposing their personal beliefs and views over anyone without being willing to discuss both sides of policy issues as used to be the case when I was growing up. And on top of that there are also so many Americans who blindly follow these extreme politicians: and I’m not sure they even know why they are following, just that they want to defy the status quo I fear that so many don’t think through their politics, they just want to rebel without any policy in their heads. Gone are the days of 2 political parties with 2 ideologies and 2 approaches to solve problems, with both having the ultimate goal of bettering out country. Through all of this I have become cynical and depressed and angry. Part of me wants to stay engaged and active as I was during my college days, way back in the late 1960’s / early 1970’s. We had real problems then and we had divergent views and divergent ways we thought could best solve them. However, through all of that difference was the common purpose of believing in our democratic republic and putting the good of our government and the good of our people above all else. I am so sad that a high level of discourse no longer exists.

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I’ve learned that if a lie is repeated often enough people believe it, whether or not there’s evidence of it, that we’re living in a time of magical thinking as evidenced by the rise of evangelicals & the popularity of entertainment featuring imaginary beings with supernatural powers, that about one third of the population has difficulty determining fact from fiction and I’ve learned that facts aren’t important to a large percentage of Americans.

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