Frederick Longacre is a resident of Hockessin.
The question many are asking is “What happens now?” This question is brilliantly set up by Jonathan Rauch’s and Peter Wehner’s Opinion piece, “Trump Has Finally Lost the Plot” (The New York Times, Saturday, Sept. 19).
They begin by describing Donald Trump’s January 2025 goals in all their brutal simplicity, which they sum up as the creation of “patrimonialism,” i.e., a state run as if it were the personal property of the leader and his family. For Trump, this means self-enrichment, his weaponization of the Justice Department and the sidelining of Congress. Perhaps more important, it means the “renorming” (“unnorming” might be a better term) of political standards, replacing these with the wholesale use of “bullying, cruelty and hate,” and “lying on an industrial scale.” Thus defined, “patrimonialism,” to me at least, means the utter destruction of our democracy, institutions and other attributes that have made us great, especially our university system, our scientific and medical research establishment, our rule of law, our media and our values.
Rauch and Wehner conclude that the Trump makeover program, while coming dangerously close to succeeding, has finally shown signs of weakening. Noting the happenings in Minneapolis (I would add the protests at the Kennedy Center) and the collapse of Trump’s approval ratings, they conclude: “America’s civil society is harder to intimidate and rewire than (‘Make America Great Again’ followers’) cultural revolutionaries hoped.”
Back to the question “What now?” The president has two-and-a-half years left, and we know he never gives up. We also know that he has powerful allies, especially Vladimir Putin; homegrown oligarchs, like Elon Musk; his MAGA sycophants; paramilitary groups, like the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement; and religious extremists, like Christian nationalists — all of whom hate democracy as our founders envisioned it and who seem to be at Trump’s beck and call. Could this be the motley crew that Trump plans to use, in whole or in part, to steal the next elections?
We lovers of democracy are not out of the woods yet, even for the midterms. But we outnumber the bad guys, and we seem more highly motivated. We need to concentrate on getting our side out to vote, especially our friends, relatives and neighbors. Let’s turn a blue wave into a blue tsunami! To be safe, let’s vote early!
Reader reactions, pro or con, are welcomed at civiltalk@iniusa.org.
