It’s one thing to lower the bar, but with Trump, someone pulled out the jackhammer and has dug through the floor.
But let’s not assume that Trump is the low ebb or an aberration. He signifies another level altogether of political contempt.
Politicians have a sense of entitlement and natural objection to transparency and accountability, having spent generations rigging the system to let them slide easily into power. Add in rich, white and male entitlements and we see the majority of politicians more than doubling down on arrogance.
But we can’t just presume things will get better after Trump.
- He has established a new realm of political behaviour that will allow equally or more repulsive and anti-social miscreants to seek their populist masses to champion.
- Current contemptuous politicians will see new capacity to dig even further into the slime in the political culture of their region.
- Politicians with integrity will find even more competitors dealing in abject lies which will increasingly go unchecked by corporate media that has been whipped into submission/irrelevance by the brashness of lying politicians and the self-immolating corporate media and their brand new level of apathy towards to truth and fact-checking all to serve the profitability of the corporate media owners’ agenda to serve the interests of their political compradors.
Solutions!
- We need to support media with integrity. Don’t expect this to come from corporate media. Look for independent media and amplify their voices. Remember, it was CANADALAND that broke the Jian Ghomeshi debacle.
- Use your own personal social networks to share information critical for participating in our civic duty. Not Facebook posts which must meet the elements of their fancy algorithms to even reach your people, try email or text messages or cocktail parties [we should have more of these] or brunches or phone calls to talk about life. And include political truths your people need to know. You don’t have to BECOME the media, you just need to amplify the positive messages.
- Next, go directly to political parties’/candidates’ websites to see where they really stand and what they’re saying in particular and in context. Amplify that, criticize that, augment that, demand better policy than that. The same goes for the contemptuous politicians: read their policy, compare it with what they say, and note the contradictions.
- Remember, you and me and all of us are the employers of these politicians. They constantly try to encourage us to obey them. This is nonsense. We need to resist that abusive stance and recognize our own power.
- Bernie Sanders almost became the Democratic nominee for president. He did that despite the successful work of corporate media and the Clinton/Party coalition to shut down and censor his message. Once he lost the California primary, the Democracy for America movement mobilized to nominate progressive Senate and House candidates. Controlling/influencing Congress could be a powerful element in fixing America. You will encounter people of integrity and vision who could lead us, not necessarily as elected leaders, but mobilizers who can help liberate us all from our pasty, weak democracy and the rise of soft fascism.
Get busy, and don’t be afraid.
And plan a cocktail party!
Update, and a new solution:
Read this #FacePalm piece, and look at this:
