Are we better off?

Hillary Clinton understood the nasty guy from the start and, like most women truth-tellers, she was ignored. She is still describing what she sees. She wrote an essay for The Atlantic titled American Democracy Is in Crisis. She begins with five assaults on democracy.
* The nasty guy’s assault on the rule of law.
* Doubt of the legitimacy of our elections.
* The nasty guy is waging war on truth and reason.
* Breathtaking corruption by the nasty guy and his administration.
* The nasty guy undermines the national unity that makes democracy possible.

She then connects these destructive actions to their source – the GOP and its billionaire backers.

There is a tendency, when talking about these things, to wring our hands about “both sides.” But the truth is that this is not a symmetrical problem. We should be clear about this: The increasing radicalism and irresponsibility of the Republican Party, including decades of demeaning government, demonizing Democrats, and debasing norms, is what gave us Donald Trump. Whether it was abusing the filibuster and stealing a Supreme Court seat, gerrymandering congressional districts to disenfranchise African Americans, or muzzling government climate scientists, Republicans were undermining American democracy long before Trump made it to the Oval Office.

Clinton even talks about what to do.
* Mobilize a massive voter turnout in the 2018 election.
* Do some serious housecleaning, similar to what was done after Nixon abused power. She intends for this housecleaning to be thorough because she starts the next sentence with, “After Trump…”
* Reforms to include requiring all presidential candidates to release tax forms, secure voting systems, repair the Voting Rights Act, enact a voter Bill of Rights, overturn *Citizens United* to get corporate money out of politics, and abolish the Electoral College.
* Restitch the fraying social fabric through civics education in schools, expanded national service programs, reforms to reduce inequality, give a strong voice to working families. And all of us reaching across the divides of race, class, and politics.

Several election cycles ago the question we were to ask ourselves was, “Am I better off than I was four years ago.” Clinton challenges that.

We have to ask, “Are we better off? Are we as a country better, stronger, and fairer?” Democracy works only when we accept that we’re all in this together.

I’m delighted that Clinton has not disappeared (even though Republicans – and many Democrats – wish she had). And I’m delighted with her analysis of the problem and the solutions.

Alas, I think she missed a key point.

She missed the force behind what the GOP and the nasty guy are doing – the enforcement of social hierarchy. Yes, I write about it a lot. But until that is included in the equation about 30% of Americans (known as the nasty guy’s base) are going to be really annoyed that the guy who validated their racism and misogyny has been removed. They want the social safety net to be frayed if it helps those people. They want suppressed voting to make sure those people can’t vote. And these are the people who like the Second Amendment because guns are the best way to enforce the social hierarchy. 30% is a sizable chunk of the citizenry. Until we talk about this need for hierarchy and start taking steps to lessen it, we’re not going to get very far on all those wonderful reforms Clinton talks about.