I missed the Rachel Maddow show on Monday, didn't get around to watching it "on demand" until a couple days ago. In one segment of the show she was talking with a guest about the traditional "conservatives vs. liberals" duality which has always existed in American politics, and probably politics everywhere.
"Liberals" always feel that a society is judged by how it treats its poorest members. They're in favor of healthcare and welfare and GMIs and rights and freedoms.
"Conservatives" represent the moneyed class, and strive for minimum taxation and regulation.
This has been my understanding of politics as well, all my life. The natural friction between the two interest groups makes for a thriving democracy, with neither side holding sway for very long. The republic rides the knife edge between competing priorities.
What has changed, this election cycle, is that the two poles are no longer equal in strength.
The Republicans, by which I mean the unseen billionaires and corporations controlling Republican politics, have tried before to dress up their agenda to make it more attractive to voters, who by sheer numbers, favor democratic policies. In 1980 they hired a lovable bumbling retired actor to be the face of "compassionate conservatism" and got a lot of their agenda passed. In 2000 they hired a partying fratboy with a low IQ to appeal to the trailer park demographic, and got a bunch more of their agenda enacted.
Then 9/11 happened, and the "minder" installed to keep tabs on the fratboy had to step in and take over from the hapless fool. He implemented some more policies in very draconian moves involving Guantanemo, "extraordinary renditions," "enhanced interrogations," disappearances and bid-less contracts. So-called conservatives used the War on Terror to ascend to previously unknown power.
In 2016 they found their newest "happy face" to sell their agenda, a megalomaniac reality TV star who appealed to the trailer park trash by telling them he was "protecting them from the government" while at the same time implementing the very policies that imperiled their existence.
In the meantime, the decades-long imbalance of power meant the courts were stocked with corporatists, and rulings were made removing limitations on financial contributions to politics, meaning billionaires, corporations, and, most-importantly, foreign countries could now control American politics.
Donald J. Trump has to post a $454 million bond by Monday March 25.
At the same time, he has started receiving classified foreign intelligence briefings, as his party's presidential nominee.
He's already shown a propensity for keeping valuable documents that were shown to him, many of which later disappeared. Foreign intelligence agents have been turning up dead mysteriously all over the world. Trump's many failed businesses are nearly bankrupt, yet he seems to have an endless supply of cash. It doesn't take much of a leap to realize he's selling US secrets to keep himself afloat.
And the cabal supporting him is just fine with this, because their intent is to "dismantle the administrative state." They want government to be "small enough to drown in the bathtub." They want unfettered capitalism and survival of the fittest.
This time around, though, they just might succeed. With rampant voter suppression, and AI-generated disinformation, and unlimited cash from Russia and Saudi Arabia, with the manipulation of the press and social media and gasoline prices, with a completely corrupt judicial system, they have all the pieces in place to finally, once-and-for-all, put an end to the tension between conservatives and liberals.
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