All the President’s Goons

Summary

The president is deploying militarized agents to American cities with high crime rates, raising concerns about the potential for violence and the erosion of democracy.

Abstract

The article discusses the president's plan to send federal agents to cities with high crime rates to restore order, a move that has been met with apprehension and criticism. The author expresses fear that this aggressive approach could lead to someone being killed, which might trigger widespread unrest. The situation is likened to historical events where government actions led to significant civil unrest. The author points out the irony that the agents, meant to uphold law and order, are creating an atmosphere of chaos and anger, akin to the tactics of a dictatorship. Despite the current tension and the risk of encroaching fascism, the author remains hopeful for a future "new birth of freedom" but acknowledges that the path to getting there will be fraught with challenges and potential ugliness. The article calls for resistance against what is seen as a dangerous man's attempt to undermine democracy, asserting that America belongs to its citizens, not the president.

Opinions

The deployment of federal agents in the guise of restoring order is seen as a dangerous and potentially deadly strategy.
The author believes that the current situation is not a movie but a real and volatile moment in American history.
There is a concern that the federal agents, though perhaps not instructed to use lethal force, are creating a scenario that could easily escalate into violence.
The use of federal agents in this manner is equated with the presence of secret police in a dictatorship, spreading chaos rather than restoring order.
The author warns of the risk of encroaching fascism and criticizes the political status quo for dismissing such concerns.
Despite the grim outlook, the author maintains hope for America's future, believing that the nation will emerge from this period stronger and more free.
The article emphasizes the importance of standing up against the president's actions, which are perceived as an attempt to destroy democracy.

All the President’s Goon

The president has announced he’s going to go into American cities with high crime rates and fill them up with militarized agents who will fix all that. How, exactly? Well, no one is sure, because violent criminals don’t wear signs that say, “Me! I’m the bad guy! Come get me!” Our esteemed crime-busters from DHS will presumably do what they’ve done in Portland: pretty much take anyone around and grab them into unmarked vans, in one of those “proactive arrests” meant to make people aware that they should not and will not do anything criminal…such as …standing around in public after 10pm.

The situation would be funny if it weren’t so dangerous. My biggest fear — I’m sure everyone’s biggest fear if they think about it — is that someone’s going to get killed in all this. And then, my fellow Americans, expect all hell to break loose. The giant of the American spirit has been slow to awaken to the deeper problems in our midst, but it’s awakened now. And she’s pissed.

Just as Bette Davis took to the stairs at her party and said, “Fasten your seat belts, it’s going to a bumpy night,” all of us are aware there’s a lot of tension in the air now. Yet unfortunately this isn’t a Hollywood movie. It’s as real as real can be, more like the scene that started the Bolshevik Revolution when women and children approached the Winter Palace begging for food and the Czar’s soldiers started shooting them.

That wasn’t a good idea.

I don’t think the president’s goons from the Department of Homeland Security (I always thought that name was creepy), untrained though they apparently are, are being told to shoot lethal weapons at protestors. But that’s not the point. Situations like this are volatile and they shouldn’t even be happening. Only in a dictatorship do squads of secret police invade cities, presumably to establish “law and order” but doing nothing but spreading chaos and fury.

When running for president, at my CNN Town Hall I said we needed to be aware of the risk of encroaching fascism. No wonder the political status quo didn’t think those the words of a serious candidate, huh? But what an insane system calls crazy might not be, and what it calls sane might be what is bound to drive all of us crazy. Such is the state of America today.

Am I hopeful? Yes, because hope is a moral imperative. Am I cynical? No, because to me that’s an excuse for not helping. In truth, I think that in the long run we’re going to be more than okay; I think we’re going to be magnificent. I think we’re going to have Lincoln’s proverbial “new birth of freedom.” But not immediately, not easily, and not without pain. Not in the short term, and perhaps not even in the middle term. There’s no reason to expect things will not get ugly very, very soon. The president is sending his troops to cities whose citizens simply will not have it.

Nor should they. This has gone too far. There are times when you have to draw a line, and now is such a time. A dangerous man is trying to destroy our democracy and we must not let him. America does not belong to him; it belongs to us. And millions of us are buckling up.