In addition to these, have you been watching Judy Woodruff’s ongoing series on the Newshour?
One particular story of interest regarding attempts at bridging the gap…
One thing I wonder about… these initiatives are great, but does it matter if people keep voting for the GOP? People can bridge divides all day, and be nicer to each other across the political divide, but how much does that matter as long as the GOP keeps leaning into the culture wars and they keep getting votes? I worry that we might already be in a place that’s incredibly difficult to get out of without an increase in bloodshed…
Not really no. It assumes it’s only old people that are the problem. That’s just not the case. Ideology is handed down, and while some people move away from their parent’s ideology, plenty of people do not do that, but embrace it has part of their heritage. The Charlottesville march was led by millennials and older Gen Zers. Same with the insurrection on January 6th - that wasn’t just boomers doing that. It pulled from across the generations.
We only get rid of this ideology by building strong, resilient institutions that people know they can trust… that means holding them accountable. Since the 70s, there is a major mistrust of our government institutions (for very good reasons). Accountability got buried in favor of moving forward, so mistrust just built since then and it was weaponized by the far right.
But if we look at the New Deal era, and how those changes were made, we can see a major shift in how many Americans felt about the government. The reason we had a strong embrace of government in the postwar period, was in part because the government became responsive to the people to a greater degree than ever before. It was the cynical movement conservatives, coupled with a growing dissatisfaction over events like the Vietnam war, COINTELPRO, and Watergate, that led to the current anti-government mindset that has opened up the way for a far right take over.
And cynical movement conservatives exploited these events to blame “the press.” We would have won Vietnam except that liberals and the liberal media convinced people otherwise. Nixon was hounded by the media, he didn’t do anything wrong. Exposing COINTELPRO was unAmerican; likewise the Pentagon Papers.
And then the coup de grace, Reagan ended the fairness doctrine. Now, to be fair, that never applied to cable news (Fox), but it did apply to radio broadcast, and who benefited from the end of that doctrine and went on to push out endless amounts of vitriol and hatred at the Democratic party, and especially the Clintons? Almost every single person I know who is older than, say 45, and voted for Trump, started by listening to Rush Limbaugh…
Absolutely. And this was a concerted, planned effort, beginning with Roger Ailes and Tricky Dick and extending through Reagan, the Bushes, and into the Tea Party.
Thanks for the series link. I hadn’t been following that one!
I think we’re making progress and should keep working toward the GOP getting fewer votes for various reasons. That’s how we turned a lot of PA purple, and then blue. There are conservatives who disagree with the direction their party has been taken on various policies, those who no longer like the leadership, and others who are horrified by the increasingly authoritarian activities at all levels. There are also scenarios where the GOP is making it more difficult for their own members to vote while they are attempting to make it harder for Democrats. Whatever we can do to encourage those folks to stay home on election day helps our cause.
Personal disagreements are one thing, but letting the GOP’s goal of oppression continue to gain power is something else. I don’t mind being flexible on the former. Folks who overlook oppression while claiming all they care about is maintaining (or restoring) conservative values isn’t just a divide. That’s the Grand Canyon, IMO.
Lose the language that describes our world, lose the connection to it. Some one decided what words were important enough to include, and which were removed. What changes were they expressing in these choices? What choices were they expressing with these changes? The human-made replaces the natural, information replaces the physical. What can no longer be seen, known and shared because the very idea is no longer named in language?
I have resigned myself to the reality that a large minority of the citizenry believes it is their God-given right to harm or kill the majority, by various means.
I am Midwestern nice to people, because that’s how we are. But I do not believe people like that will ever even look at me as a full human being, so I have no interest in groveling for their attention.
They can leave the country, die, or at least shut up and stop causing harm. Of those three options, the only one that will actually happen, as it has been happening, is that they’ll die off quicker due to the consequences of their hate.
Living in rural Indiana has been a big wake-up call.
Whatever we can do to encourage those folks to stay home on election day helps our cause.
