An overview of U.S. history goes like this. Once they were sufficiently armed and protected by the army, settlers were assured a measure of survival would follow. Slavery, initiated in 1619 and woven by the founders into the Constitution, would eventually bind Southern plantation production with cheap labor in cotton mills in the North to provide means for accumulation of exceptional personal and national wealth. A great war was fought to end slavery, but the peace arranged allowed former slaves to be used to continue the cotton business. A hundred years passed before ex-slaves found measured freedom.
It’s the nature of capitalism that gathered wealth resides in the hands of the few. Imperial advance to control the West and beyond involved subduing and killing the native population and investment in transportation to extract the resources there. A class called the Robber Barons held economic control into the present.
Lincoln’s new party of freedom and equality soon evolved into one for Jim Crow southerners, big business, and the wealthy. Their excesses eventually led to global depression. Democrats, led by Franklin Roosevelt seized the process of recovery as opportunity to enact progressive, people-centered legislation like the minimum wage, maximum hour work day, protections against child labor, and Social Security.
This liberal era was marred by a legacy of World War II. The war’s emphasis on arms business, intelligence, and the military energized a Cold War and a government directing force that President Eisenhower observed and famously warned against.
John Kennedy confronted these interests, as well as the threat of nuclear war, and for that reason was assassinated. The conspirators had their war in Vietnam, killing Malcolm X, Dr. King, and Robert Kennedy to maintain their secret control. They transformed postwar United States into a global-controlling power that actually incites terror in order to respond to it.
Republican scheming for resumption of exclusive national power began with presidents Nixon and Reagan, funded by the billionaire brothers David and Charles Koch. In June 2014, Lauren Windsor reported in The Nation on the gathering of 300 billionaires organized by the Kochs. The aim of the gathering was to raise $1 billion in support of candidates to take control of the Senate in 2014, and to defeat Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. This must be considered a purchase of the first Trump presidency. Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders has long critically centered on the Kochs for their determination to end Social Security.
Republicans also were quietly and successfully scheming to dominate national politics through control of offices from school boards to state legislatures.
They welcomed erratic Donald Trump as a bold and noisy party leader.
Ten months into this dictatorial reign, Republican shepherds and members of Congress sit back quietly, knowing they have the power to manage the presidency if they need to. They allow and aid Trump in appointing incompetent persons to run departments of government, his shunning of climate change, denial of independence of the Attorney General and Justice Department, and ridding the country of regulations that control operation of businesses. They don’t mind if he lies on various subjects on a daily basis and runs amuck with tariffs designed to punish individuals and countries.
They support his grabbing Latino-looking people off the streets, illegally occupying Democratic managed cities, and directing states to gerrymander districts, because each of these actions help steal future elections, especially when it becomes necessary for troops to seize ballot boxes.
They are indifferent to his indiscriminate orders to bomb small boats on the high seas, threaten war against Venezuela, and failed promise of peace in Ukraine and the Middle East.
Their guy’s a skilled grifter steadily scheming to enrich himself and members of his family, but he won’t support efforts to stop their own illicit trading of stocks. The tax cuts they wrote for him will personally benefit themselves.
Republican congresspersons looking forward to cooshy retirements snooze comfortably in their secured offices, caring little if Trump tears down part of his White House to build a ballroom where he can entertain rich friends. Some of them expect to be invited.
They’re confident a deliberately stacked Supreme Court will rule issues in their favor. They expect Newsmax, Fox, and a host of right wing commentators to go on keeping the public misinformed about the failed economy.
A bunch of former Republican officeholders are impressed by this power and control of government. Incomprehensibly, they’ve managed to garner the loyalty of many voters. They’re all impressed with Trump. He has been very useful.
Charlemont resident Carl Doerner is an investigative journalist and historian, currently preparing his newest work, “Revisioning the American Narrative” for publication.