Telling the truth without getting anyone killed – RDI

I know what you’re thinking. Doesn’t RDI’s Democracy Brief usually come out on Thursdays? Shouldn’t the next issue come out on July 25?

Reading this post today is probably the biggest shock since… yesterday, when Joe Biden withdrew from the presidential race. Or when a would-be assassin shot Donald Trump at a rally in Pennsylvania. That was nine days ago.

The rapid succession of historical developments over the past few weeks is a little unsettling. It makes me think of the old Chinese curse: “May you live in interesting times.” There is no doubt that our current political moment is “interesting,” but I am torn between whether it is more reminiscent of a dystopian novel or a crude satire. Perhaps both.

The debate over Biden’s candidacy that has rocked the Democratic Party in recent days should have taken place a year ago. But the fact that the party has reconsidered its nominee (and an incumbent president at that!), albeit belatedly, is cause for optimism about the future of our democracy, because it shows that many Americans still understand that no leader is above reproach and that presidents are just as mortal as the rest of us. By now, the public is no longer used to a Rematch which nobody – except perhaps the nominees themselves – wanted.

Now to the ancient story: The assassination attempt on Trump.

One of the most difficult challenges since the assassination of former President Donald Trump has been to both cool the political mood and clearly highlight the threats to our institutions.

After Trump was nearly killed in Pennsylvania earlier this month, many public figures on both sides of the aisle called for “lowering the temperature.” Some of Trump’s most ardent supporters attributed the attempted murder to on criticism of the former president as “authoritarian” or “undemocratic”.

You’re right?

There is a stark Yiddishism that I draw upon as we delve into this complicated question –as di bubbe volt gehat beytsim volt zi gevain mayn zaidah– if grandma had balls, she’d be grandpa. A bit childish, sure, but I think it offers some wisdom for our current political situation.

It is true that accusing someone of having sympathies for authoritarian powers, drawing parallels to the darkest periods of our history, and saying that you not only disagree with that person but are a threat to democracy can lead to extreme behavior.

In 1995, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated amid an atmosphere of incitement; protesters held up dolls of Rabin in the black uniform of the Nazi SS.

In 2020, riots broke out in cities across the country following the killing of George Floyd, as protesters chanted “AmeriKKKa,” as if to say that America was just as racist then as it was during the Jim Crow era.

That same year, right-wing militants plotted to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer while critics – including Donald Trump – were calling her state’s controversial COVID lockdown authoritarian. If they accepted the argument that Governor Whitmer was assuming dictatorial powers, it’s quite possible that the would-be kidnappers actually saw themselves as freedom fighters.

These are just a few examples. And here’s the rub: Neither Rabin nor Whitmer were truly anti-democratic. This is no comment on the political views or opinions of these individuals. But they respected the transition of power. They did not contest the election results. They did not seek to use their policies and government power as a weapon against their political opponents at home. At the same time, the blanket condemnation of the United States as an illegitimate, racist state represents a gross distortion of our past and our present.

So I come back to this Yiddishism. If grandma had balls, she would be grandpa. And if Donald Trump did not openly strive for “Dictator for a day” or, try to overturn the election result, which has led to threats against his own Vice President (good luck, JD!), then it would be totally unfair and inflammatory to say he is endangering our democratic institutions. But then he wouldn’t be Donald Trump, would he?

The dangers of false equivalence

In our admirable quest for objectivity, we should be careful not to drift into false equivalences. Not all of our politicians are demagogic agitators, and therefore not all deserve to be labelled as such. But we have a responsibility to call a spade a spade, and we should not be afraid to raise cases where someone is using authoritarian rhetoric.

After nearly a decade of Trump on the national political stage, it’s time to give up the fantasy that he will somehow transform into someone fundamentally different from who he always was. A few starry-eyed pundits predicted that his speech to the RNC last week would show a changed man, humbled by his near-death experience. Instead, we got a self-serving, rambling speech of Gaddafi’s length that was at least typical of Donald Trump.

So how can we reconcile the lowering of the political temperature through these statements?

The key is to emphasize that all concerns about the above issues can be addressed at the ballot box. Political violence in a free and democratic country (which America still is, for all its flaws) solves nothing; instead, it takes us one step closer to authoritarianism. When we resort to guns, bombs, and knives for votes, posters, and petitions, we admit that our institutions cannot solve our problems. People start killing their kings, tsars, and warlords because there are no bloodless ways to replace the leader. But the killing never stops.

That’s why it’s absolutely critical for political leaders to ensure that the public continues to have faith in our institutions. That’s why we must clearly denounce authoritarianism and violent rhetoric. And that’s why we must also sanctify the peaceful democratic process in America. We must use high standards to judge whether someone is a threat to our democracy, and even if someone clears that hurdle, we recognize that threat but reject violence against that person, and that’s exactly why we do it. we are a democracy.

One can believe that someone’s actions are inconsistent with the principles of the American republic without believing that those actions justify inflicting physical harm on that person. None of these ideas are mutually exclusive—they are, simply put, imperatives of life in a free society.