For those of you who aren’t boomers, back in the day there was a TV show with that title, that challenged a panel of celebrities to guess what line of work the mystery guest was engaged in. Good fun and if you decide to go down a YouTube wormhole a pretty interesting pop culture mid-century history lesson. But, not the subject of this newsletter.
The line I speak of is the personal one we all have where we say, “enough”. In politics it’s frequently described as a “red line”, the point at which the speaker or writer declares that they will not tolerate movement beyond a boundary that had to that point, been held sacred. When breached, serious consequences are believed to follow.
As we witness the unfolding of Trump 2.0 with all of its resulting boundary pushing actions and in many cases resultant chaos, we’re challenged to ask ourselves where the line is for each of us before we voice or demonstrate our opposition. For some true believers perhaps there is no line, “I could shoot someone in the middle of 5th Avenue and not lose a vote” now doesn’t seem as crazy a statement as when it was first pronounced years ago.
For the rest of us on both sides of the traditional political spectrum there are actions and policies that challenge us to question or perhaps dissent. Is it cozying up to a murderous Russian dictator at the expense of our role as leader of the free world? Is it allowing an unelected billionaire with his own powerful social media platform to take control of governmental agencies, often in breach of federal statutes to haphazardly slash and burn programs that in the main have kept us and the world safer and more secure? Is it putting unqualified loyalists in every position of power where physical force is legitimate to insure that that force will only be used at the whim and caprice of one man? Is it antagonizing our allies and neighbors with bullying tactics that not only put us at odds with them but also roil global markets? Is it defying decisions of Federal Courts? I could go on and on…but for now at least I won’t.
In my note after the election, I wrote that I hoped that my Trump supporting family members and friends, whose character and decency I admire and support would be the ones whose limits about how much support they would continue to provide if and when things went off the rails would protect the rest of us. I still believe that for the most part, they are our best hope. One of the reasons I have tried to maintain a level of silence during these past few weeks is that I feared that my own sensibilities would sound too alarmist, that it was too soon to worry and that the potential for good outcomes were just as possible as the worst. But now, I feel that my reticence will be misconstrued as approval…and NO I do not approve.
We are told that all of these radical moves by this administration and its billionaire sugar daddy and his adolescent cohort of groupies were necessary to rescue us. From what exactly? My very conservative brother in-law reads and considers The Economist as a reliable source of news and opinion and I for the most part agree with him. They have reported and opined that the post Covid US economy, though hardly perfect, was the envy of the rest of the world. Inflation was decreasing, unemployment was under 4%, and yes prices were still too high for a significant percentage of our population but our path was positive and with a little time the rewards would be shared more broadly. In their search for lower prices more immediately for daily items (eggs!) a large enough segment of our voters believed that all of that would be solved “on day 1” if they voted accordingly and now not only has that not happened but prices are moving further out of reach. So now what?
I have no quarrel with attacking government waste, fraud and abuse. I supported efforts of past administrations on both political sides who had the courage to root out those problems. I also support having secure borders, and having a strong domestic and national defense. I believe that our deficit is reaching dangerous levels and needs to be addressed but also believe that increased revenue, especially in taxes for the wealthiest is also a necessary means to do so. I believe that identity politics that were too fervently embraced by Democrats were poisonous to both their “brand” and a turn off to people who want to believe that we have made great strides in making our society fairer and more equal for all and that merit more than identity should factor into advancement. So in these regards I’m at one with many who supported the President.
Where I depart is when they declare that while they “don’t like the way he’s doing these things”, they maintain their support, in an “ends justify the means” perspective. In my opinion, that flies in the face of everything we hold dear and that we’ve used as justification for the concept of American Exceptionalism. What makes us who we are is HOW we do what we believe is necessary. Yes, our history is full of sometimes tragic instances where despite our words, we deviated from those values, but it appears that now we don’t even seem to pretend that those values are important.
So I’ll leave with the question that I started with, “What’s your line?” At what point will you say no, enough…this is not what I voted for and NO this cannot continue in my name…because at the end of the day it is all truly that personal.
Fantastic, Peter. Great to hear your sage writing voice.
Nice essay Peter. Remember What’s my line? Arlene Francis, Bennett Cerf, Dorothy Kilgallen. To answer when some of these obstinate Republicans will gain some sanity..,,one answer is when the Republicans raise their taxes.