Keith McNenly
Special to The Lake Report
Everyone should get up and witness sunrise on Jan. 20.
That will be the last sunrise in the United States of America as we know it, for a time, so set your alarm clocks for that morning at 7:22 a.m. At noon Jan. 20 the president-election will take the presidential oath — again.
He may not give a speech as all presidents have done before him as it would be redundant to do so. He has already said what Americans can expect. Even he might see the irony of repeating his to-do list moments after swearing an oath to uphold the constitution.
He promised:
- He will be a dictator.
- He will round up and deport immigrants who in his and Hitler’s words “poison the blood” of America.
- He will purge significant numbers of the federal civil service who he considers disloyal to him personally.
- He will enact revenge against his perceived enemies using the power of the Department of Justice.
- He will eliminate the free press who criticize him.
These are just his greatest hits. Less clear is the execution of his wrath on the world’s democracies.
As you watch the Jan. 20 sunrise, you might think of the American national anthem: “And the rocket’s red glare, the bombs bursting in air …”
Those words are a stirring but quaint anachronism of a time long past.
In the nuclear age, a global war waged with bombs is unlikely unless by accident or incompetence, because a “hot” war could mean annihilation.
Fascist world leaders are happy rich palace dwellers, not suicidal. Destruction of democracy is the goal, not destruction of the land. They want our democracies to join their authoritarian club. Birds of a feather!
Hot wars are not the answer. It didn’t turn out well for Napoleon, nor for Hitler. Democracies have made Cold War so easy with the invention of the ultimate weapons, the internet, cable news and social media.
The ongoing “cold” war has been engaged by fascist adversaries against western democracies by weaponizing our own freedoms against us, proliferating lies and propaganda by unrestrained social media and cable.
In the internet age of social media and cable “news,” the power of propaganda and lies is supersized. It’s a fascist’s Happy Meal.
In a democracy, freedom of speech is the main course in the diet of our liberty. That is also our greatest weakness and it would be naive to think foreign and domestic opponents of freedom couldn’t figure that one out.
The president-elect has targeted Canada for 25 per cent tariffs on day one under the false pretext of drugs and illegals pouring across our border.
While factually untrue, he has “demanded” we “solve this long-simmering problem,” and Canada will “pay a very big price.” This is just the opening gambit of his attack on our sovereignty.
A free and fair election is won by a competition of ideas and truth, not a smorgasbord of lies. By millions of citizens’ contributions to campaigns, not a few men with hundreds of billions of dollars buying political power.
Most countries that have fallen to fascism have long histories of autocratic rulers, tsars, kings and emperors, and so have never really learned freedom.
If you are not born into it, it might be hard to figure out and is easily wrested from a citizenry that never knew liberty. Apparently the “oldest democracy” is not immune from being tricked into putting an authoritarian felon in power.
Americans know freedom and hopefully, that’s the monkey wrench in an adversary’s plan, that they will never find peace trying to subjugate Americans.
The U.S. is a pseudo-democracy where the rules are preset to favour the authoritarian right-wing. Americans are complacent about this democratic imbalance.
In the 100-member Senate, a sham filibuster rule gives the win on a vote to the minority, 41 votes wins and 59 votes loses.
This is in addition to the constitutional requirement that California with close to 40 million residents gets two out of the 100 senators, while the two Dakotas with under two million residents get four senators. That’s not democracy.
Partisan gerrymandering (remapping electoral districts to ensure minority right-wing candidates win congressional seats) and unlimited corporate and billionaire campaign contributions are both allowed by the U.S. Republican Supreme Court.
Canada outlawed gerrymandering more than 60 years ago and has strict rules mandating rational campaign funding, ensuring citizens and not billionaires choose our representatives.
The U.S. Republican Supreme Court gave the president-elect the full power of a king to commit crimes without consequence of law. Canada already has a king, but only as a figurehead connection to history — a king without power.
Canada is a free country, making our own decisions as citizens and forging our own democratic path in the world. Exchange independence for two of 100 seats in an undemocratic U.S. Senate? The 51st state indeed.
Cold War never ends and so we must be eternally vigilant. Social media and some cable “news” are just commercial products designed by rich, greedy oligarchs to get viewers hooked on conspiracies that numb us to reality.
Should the world’s most economically and militarily powerful country truly shift away from democracy at this time of rapid technological change, and with humanity creating non-human artificial intelligence, the future will be unpredictable on an epic scale.
Both Canada and Ontario will hold elections in 2025.
Canadians can buck the global right-wing trend toward authoritarianism:
- Reject politicians when they tell their first lie. Their lies take away our power to make informed decisions.
- Reward truth-tellers with votes.
- Be skeptical and patient: Truth takes longer than 15 seconds to get its point across. If a point is just a slogan, it’s pointless.
- Get informed from mainstream regulated media, newspapers and network television news. Give social media the boot, especially during election campaigns.
It’s a fool’s errand to predict the mind of the voter so remain aware. Most scholarly pundits in the American election declared that Republicans would finally find that mythical place on the Serengeti where elephants go to die. Instead, we are treated to the despairing brae of the donkey.
Niagara-on-the-Lake resident Keith McNenly was the chief administrator of the Town of Mono for 41 years.