We rethink the week with Dean Spiliotis, Civic Scholar and Presidential Scholar at Southern New Hampshire University, blogging at NHPolitics.com; Stephen Pimpare, Professor at the University of New Hampshire and a nationally recognized expert on poverty, homelessness, and U.S. social policy; and Bob Hennelly, investigative reporter at njinsider.com, salon.com, and The Chief/Leader (covering public unions and the civil service in NYC since 1897); and on Twitter @stucknation .
We discuss some people’s refusing to wear masks to reduce the spread of COVID-19, based on cultish irrationality and false propaganda. The impact on the voting process is especially worrisome. All these refuseniks have their own personal reasons: maybe they’re seeking attention, looking for a fight or whatever. But the context for any individual or locality is that the national government isn’t communicating a clear, consistent (or fact-based) national message about how we all can deal with COVID in a way that enables our country to get through this crisis with as little pain/death as possible.
Trump has also destroyed rational thinking about whether people will be willing to take any vaccine that might be put on the market in the next several months. Many people would welcome a vaccine that is scientifically proven to be safe and effective. But after heavy-handed interference by Trump and his cult, we can’t trust any of his claims as to what a purported vaccine might contain or whether it will protect us or kill us. Knowing Trump, the vaccine he tells us we should take could well contain bleach rather than anything adequately tested and medically appropriate.
We also discussed the many ways Pres. Trump is undermining our democratic government and leading us into authoritarianism. In the 1980s, Pres. Reagan revolutionized the way federal administrative agencies regulate corporations, the environment, the power struggle between labor and capital. He established OMB as a bottleneck to slow or stop any new regulations that didn’t meet his ideological litmus tests. He also reached down into the bureaucracy and put like-minded people into the civil service engine that was deciding how public policy should be implemented. In addition to agency heads and deputies, he appointed people to mid-level management positions whose goals were antithetical to the mission of the agency. He also hollowed out all the scientific and even administrative expertise within agencies, a strategy that Trump has now perfected.
Trump has added a new twist: systematically sidelining inspectors general and others who might have oversight authority which might put a stop to some of these deviations. These anti-democratic actions shift power away from legitimate government agencies (with expertise and a public service mission) and gives that power instead to the president himself to exercise with his self-centered mission of furthering his right-wing political agenda (and that of his wealthy chronies).
All in all, Trump is dismantling the ship of state while abusing and neutralizing the public servants who ordinarily carry out all the work that’s necessary to keep the ship afloat. He’s demonizing unions and intimidating anyone who advocates policies that disagree with his extreme right-wing agenda.
In other anti-democratic moves, Trump is leaving vacancies at the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) and at the Federal Election Commission (FEC), protective agencies that are part of the architecture that has been in place since before the Watergate reforms – to guarantee the enforcement of good govt/anti-corruption laws (such as the Hatch Act, etc.). And on the occasions when Trump appoints replacements to fill vacancies, he appoints temporary replacements so “his people” do not have to be vetted by the Senate.
We also discuss the continuing wildfires in the West. Fully 10% of the state of Oregon’s land area is out of control. In recent weeks, dual hurricanes moved into Louisiana and Texas. More catastrophic hurricanes are now gathering force and coming soon. Last year, farmers in Iowa suffered devastating floods. This year, it’s droughts. Climate change isn’t coming soon; it’s here! Are we up to the challenge?
