Frank's Musings

When a friend of mine said that most people in the country had by now developed herd immunity to the lies and abusive behavior of Donald Trump, I disagreed that any antibody against being infected by his deformed populism was reliable as a determinant of the 2020 election.  Unfortunately, even in the case of medical vaccines, there is still a risk that they won’t be effective preventers of disease.

It is dangerous only to rely on herd immunity, just as it was in 2016 to rely on herd rationality.  Trump’s greatest strength is the people’s lack of interest in politics.  They prefer to be entertained.  Why vote when TV is so much fun even with our ambivalence?  That’s why it’s so important to increase voter turnout, particularly in traditionally moderate states like Wisconsin, Michigan, Iowa, Florida and  Pennsylvania.

Who do the scientists in the federal government work for?  Doesn’t the entire federal bureaucracy work for the country?  A normal President directs their work; but they have a higher calling than preserving that President in power.  If he is good at leading them to serve the interests of the public, he will be rewarded, for example, by reelection to a second term.  However, is it not also a duty of those scientists to alert the public to inadequate leadership by an incompetent or, worse yet, self-centered President?  

We willingly respect the knowledge of the professional scientists who have been studying and commenting on the COVID-19 pandemic.  However, it is disappointing how submissive they have been to the maladministration of President Trump.  Dr. Anthony Fauci has been markedly reserved in stating his scientific conclusions.  He implies that they are advice that will be taken into consideration by those in the government who are responsible for acting on them.  However, he and the others, including the head of the CDC, Dr. Redfeld, as well as Dr. Birx in the State Department, are apparently afraid that openly contradicting President Trump will set him off on even more egregious statements or actions that endanger the republic. 

This gingerly treatment of a rogue President has also been adopted by other professional members of the federal government leadership, including Secretary of Treasury Mnuchin, Vice President Pence,  a succession of White House chiefs of staff, including John Kelly and Mick Mulvaney, as well as other former Cabinet members, like former Secretary of Defense Mattis and former Attorney General Sessions.  Why did they conclude that quiet subservience to this President or resignation was a wiser strategy than aggressive refusal to comply with his whims?  They all witnessed the failure of the Republican Senate to discipline President Trump by convicting him in the impeachment trial, not to mention the Congress’s abdication of control over his erratic policy moves, particularly in foreign relations (e.g. vis-a-vis China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, North Korea, the EU, Brazil and Iran). 

The frightening explanation is their lack of faith in the constitutional safeguards that the Founding Fathers armed us with for keeping our republic.  You may or may not believe that it was Donald Trump who has orchestrated the transformation of America into a self-centered world power.  However, it is possible that a sufficiently large and serendipitously distributed segment of the country’s population has captured control of the nation’s executive rule.  They have perverted the country’s potential for accomplishing objectives that benefit each of its citizens, as well as the rest of the world. 

Such goals are important to some of us; but their accomplishment cannot happen by itself.  Like the gyroscope of a ship at sea, the checks and balances of the U.S. Constitution must be maintained in good working order in order to prevent our democratic republic from foundering on shoals of neglect (Pardon my metaphor).

Unless the nation elects a President who wishes to use the considerable powers of his office to improve the common welfare, it risks abandoning equitable economic growth and intellectual potency.  Unfortunately, the U.S. is hamstrung by a historically malformed electoral college system that allows less than a majority of its citizens to determine Presidential leadership.  Nevertheless, it cannot be beyond the capabilities of a talented campaign manager to design a winning pathway to election victory for a broadminded President.  The key is to construct a media strategy that presents to sympathetic potential voters that our political system can serve their interests only as long as they participate in its only direct process for influencing policy---election. This recommendation is based on the belief that we have abdicated the selection of our leaders to those who think they can thrive when the President believes that dominating society is the main purpose of life.

Those who choose other more generous purposes for their lives have decided that keeping the republic means acting directly to solve society’s deficiencies.  The Donald Trump administration has made it clear that there is more to government than staying out of everyone’s way.  When our government was formed, thinking people were exasperated by their experience with most of the governments in history that were essentially the tools of authoritarian rulers, selected by some exterior force, whether it be divine right or human conquest.  We have not held steadfast in our commitment to exerting ultimaate popular control over the affairs of state.  Moreover, we have allowed our thoughts to be shaped by showy messaging, something that Donald Trump excels at.



In recent appearances, Stacey Abrams has highlighted her appeal to segments of the voting public that have lost faith in the effectiveness of the election system, particularly in the South.  Unfortunately, in her case it was not enough for winning the Governorship of Georgia just theoretically to fill the bill of desires of women and minority voters.  Something else was missing from her campaign.  It might simply have been making a splashy presentation of the candidate’s qualifications to voters who are no longer motivated by straight facts.  They have to be entertained.  No matter how ideal Ms. Abrams or any other woman would be as a running mate for the Democratic candidate for President, the most important determinant of his or her election chances will be a campaign messaging style that rivets the visual and auditory attention of the usually electorally listless half of the public and inspires their imagination.  Winning the November 2020 election is not going to turn on what the victorious ticket says so much as how they say it.

Upon Donald Trump’s election to the Presidency of the U.S. I said that it really didn’t matter who occupied the White House.  The Constitution and centuries of history had placed the country in the care of a government of institutions.  What some call the “deep state” run by career civil servants prevents radical political elements of society from quickly making drastic changes in the public policy. 



However, there appears to be a large segment of American society that has become disaffected by any interference in their style of life by government agencies.  Moreover, they are not interested in taking an active role in managing the affairs of state.  They have become too lazy, relying on the media to feed their minds and, perforce, make decisions for them.



The Trump Administration has taught us that any democracy is vulnerable to hijacking by an opportunistic, narrowly focused and exclusive group when the contented majority relaxes its grip on society’s direction.  You only have to look at what happened to the Weimar Republic. 



It isn’t Trump who has corrupted the altruistic philosophy of the American constitutional system.  He is only the attention-grabbing and media-centric tool that an individualistic and self-enriching segment of the country have used to adapt the U.S. electoral mechanism to install an easily managed administration of the government.  It is necessary to diminish the reliance of the public on information and opinions spoon-fed by inadequately countered media-savvy right-wing  pundits.



The current and likely Democratic opponent of Donald Trump in the next general election has shown his ability to lead a U.S. government that returns to our democratic principles.  However, it is not clear that he is sufficiently effective as a dominating presence in the channels of communication that a winning majority of the voting American public allow their political decisions to be shaped by.  It apparently is not enough a qualification to be elected President to be the most qualified for the job; one must also be able to manipulate public media to shame a winning majority of voters into rejecting a candidate who places his  personal interests above those of the general public.



If Joe Biden is to accomplish that goal, he must do at least two things:  He must enlist and follow the advice of a successful public relations/campaign manager, and he must rely on that person’s judgment to choose a running mate who counterweights his weaknesses, e.g.in  sex, age, and readiness for succession. In fact, hiring that campaign manager is actually Mr. Biden’s most important task at hand.