Don't Cross the Streams
Electing Donald Trump will not end the “establishment” governance by either party. What it will do is install a new “establishment”, this one the GOP version on steroids – a mirror image of the Obama administration, one possessing arrogant, authoritarian tendencies of its own that will continue the rapid erosion of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
I’m accepting the real possibility that Trump will not be denied the GOP nomination by the only two candidates with the power to do so – Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio (I'm not a Rubio fan). I don’t think the Democrats have a real chance, no matter how hard the media works to prop them up – Hillary is a flawed candidate with little real appeal outside a very narrow constituency and she promotes the same progressive agenda her husband ran on in 1992, almost a quarter century ago. She is an uninspiring campaigner, a proven liar and stained with just about every scandal imaginable. She now has little other option than try to completely obliterate Haight-Ashbury Bernie after his win in New Hampshire (and likely win in Iowa) and to do so means attacking the very basis for her own platform – remember she said she is a “progressive Democrat”. There is likely to be a third option for progressives who see both candidates tainted by the fallout from Hillary’s nuclear attacks – either Michael Bloomberg as an “independent” or perhaps the disaffected Democrats will be Ridin’ with Biden – but either option will come too late in the cycle to gather much support. The Democrats will be holding their collectivist noses and voting this time against President Trump rather than for a Democrat, much as many Republicans did against Obama in 2008 and 2012.
When you consider how fashionable the socialism of Sanders has become and that the basis for all Democrat polices since FDR have been socialism, it seems that a significant segment of America has become quite comfortable with the authoritarianism (or at least ignorant of it) that has accompanied socialism throughout its history. In the past, there has always been someone on the political right who, to paraphrase William F. Buckley, is standing athwart the flow of history, screaming “Stop!” Not this time. The leading candidate of the GOP is an authoritarian, promising to do “right leaning things” by coercive diktat with little concern for the limitations of the Constitution – as a matter of fact, he rarely even mentions the Constitution or any limits it would place on his promised actions. When he promises to do this thing or that thing, notice his language – rarely does he ever mention any other entity except himself. “I’m” going to do, be, cut a deal, make Mexico pay, etc. Me, me, me. Not Congress – “me.” “I” will destroy the losers, the low energy and the no-talented people on the other side!
As the team prepared to do battle with the ectoplasmic world with their proton packs, the noted paranormal researcher and Ghostbuster, Dr. Egon Spengler once said, “Don’t cross the streams.” His compatriot, Dr. Peter Venkman indicated he was a bit unclear on the concept, Dr. Spengler clarified, “It would be bad.” Pressed harder, he continued, “Try to imagine all life as you know it stopping instantaneously and every molecule in your body exploding at the speed of light.”
“Right. That's bad. Okay. All right. Important safety tip. Thanks, Egon,” replied Dr. Venkman.
Today, one can imagine there are several streams in danger of being crossed:
- There is a segment of the GOP electorate salivating over the chance for the same kind of revenge that Obama voters wanted over the Eveeeel Boooooosh regime in 2008 and 2012 and they see Donald as just the guy to hand out that flavor of ass whuppin’.
- Free speech and access to information is being concentrated by private companies with crony capitalist relationships with government – Google, Twitter and FaceBook are all tied tightly to global governments and have already shown in China that they are willing to self-censor to maintain access to those markets.
- Banking and finance has rapidly become virtual, with physical cash now being a minor medium of exchange. The majority of transactions are now done electronically and through sites like Amazon, Ebay, and other virtual commerce and financial institutions, some of which only exist in the cyber/virtual world.
- “Big Data” knows and predicts everything about us and that data is fed into government databases via the IRS and other agencies – the DMV, health insurance companies, etc.
- Government has become ubiquitous – from going to a national park to starting a lemonade stand, there is little you can legally do without their permission in the form of a license, a permit or some sort of fee.
It is not difficult to contemplate what permanent damage could be wrought when the streams of authoritarianism, revenge, ubiquity of government and crony concentration of the control of speech, finance and information are crossed. In Ghostbusters, it destroyed the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man - but in the real world, the merging of the aforementioned streams of control usually strengthen authoritarian impulses, making the Marshmallow Man all the more powerful.
In this election cycle, many think the GOP is choosing the form of the Democrat’s destructor - but we could well be choosing the form of our own, an all-powerful Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man named Donald J. Trump.