Trump's Approach Constitute a Threat to Civilized Society.
The internal and external policies – including the challenge to the democratic process in the past to current incursions and statements – erode not only domestic and international law. But that’s not all.
They endanger the core idea of what we mean by.
The guiding principle of any advanced culture is to stop the more powerful from harming and taking advantage of the less powerful. Failing that, we risk being trapped in a conflict of all against all where might makes right wins.
This ideal is central of the Declaration and Constitution. This is also the core of the global system established after WWII championed by the United States, which stresses collective action, democracy, fundamental freedoms, and the legal authority.
However, it is a delicate construct, frequently ignored by those who would exploit their power. Maintaining it requires that the those in charge have the moral fortitude to abstain from seeking short-term wins, and that the rest of us hold them accountable when they fail.
Unchecked strength does not make right. It makes for uncertainty, upheaval, and conflict.
Each instance people or corporations or countries that are wealthier and stronger prey upon those that are weaker, the fabric of our shared norms weakens. Should such behavior are allowed to continue, the fabric unravels. Allowing it to persist, the world can plunge into disorder and conflict. We have seen this pattern previously.
We now inhabit a international landscape grown vastly more unequal. Influence and wealth are increasingly centralized than ever before. This creates conditions for the powerful to exploit the less fortunate because they act with a sense of omnipotent.
The fortunes of a handful of tycoons is difficult to fathom. The influence of global industrial giants covers much of the globe. AI is poised to further concentrate wealth and power even more. The offensive capability of the major powers is without parallel in recorded history.
Enabled by complicit legislators and a pliant high court, the highest office has been transformed into the supreme and answerable-to-none agent of government in the modern era.
Put it all together and you see the looming crisis.
A direct line connects past lawless actions to present-day menaces. Both were founded upon the overconfidence of absolute power.
You see parallel dynamics in other global contexts: in territorial invasions, in strategic threats, and in the worldwide exploitation by powerful corporate entities.
However, strength without restraint does not create right. It makes for instability, upheaval, and armed conflict.
Historical evidence demonstrates that frameworks designed to check the influential also shield them. Without such constraints, their insatiable demands for increased control and resources eventually lead to their downfall – along with their corporations, nations, or empires. And threaten global conflict.
Such disregard for rules will plague the nation and the world – and the very idea of civilization – for a long time.
