Idiocracy

When I was a child, and a teenager, and even when I was a young man, I respected the people who held high offices like U.S. Congressmen and Senators and the American presidents. They seemed statesmanlike, for the most part. They debated issues of national importance: Civil Rights, Racial Integration, the Cold War, the Vietnam War, the Space Race, the War on Poverty, the Feminist movement. 

But in the recent past—and I'm not saying that it began with Donald Trump's election, but it seems connected somehow, so maybe Trump merely exploited it—the Republican Party seems to me to have gone off the rails. Many Republicans have become anti-science, some of them are promoting fascism (without using the word, of course), some are praising the rabble that attempted an insurrection at the nation's Capitol, some have adopted anti-democratic views, and many if not most have become "professional politicians" who crave the power and the perks and the big outside money that comes with holding a high office. It's a sad state of affairs.

I'm not saying Democrats are angels. Both parties have their problems. But Republicans are the most blatant about their anti-democratic positions. I feel a little bit like the boy in the story "The Emperor's New Clothes." But in my version of the story, many can see what is happening, but too many others agree that his new clothes are wonderful. I think we live in a dangerous time for democracy and our democratic institutions.

Time will tell how America gets through these troubles. People have to open their eyes; they have to learn about what is happening in places of power. They can't believe everything they hear and read, nor push it aside as "fake news." People have to be smart now. There was a time when we used to be smart. Maybe those days are behind us. It is possible that America's electorate is no longer capable of being rational, judicious, and well-informed. Sometimes I feel like I'm living in the 2006 film Idiocracy. 

And maybe I am. Maybe we all are.