Former Clinton Secretary of Labor and Chancellor's Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley Robert Reich is providing an incredible service to defenders of American democracy: he is posting daily (weekday) videos on his facebook page to help us navigate through the torrent of insanity flowing from the Trump administration and the GOP controlled congress. I discovered this treasure trove yesterday and have now watched three of his videos, originally posted live on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday of this week. In the videos, Mr. Reich speaks directly to the camera in a lecture/conversation style that manages to be both urgent and calming, as well as critically informative. His profound decency is evident throughout.
There is no way that I can properly summarize what’s in the videos, nor do I want to. But I will give a brief description of some of the main points in the Report from Thursday, February 16, which aired after Trump’s insane news conference that day. The main thrust of this video can be summed up in one profoundly important sentence:
The truth is the most essential common good in any Democracy.
Reich then proceeds to describe five techniques, with examples, that Trump has been using to erode the truth. They are all critical, but number four really got my attention.
1. Trump tells Big Lies, over and over again, about what is happening in our Democracy.
— Not only will some people eventually believe the lies, others will become confused or doubtful about what the truth is. Meanwhile, this “confusion” helps lay the groundwork for further erosion of democracy— for example, voter suppression laws enacted in the name of massive voter “fraud”.
2. Trump tells his Big Lies directly to the people, through tweets and televised rallies, without the ability for intermediaries (i.e., the press) to question their veracity.
3. “The Trump administration is making it harder for Americans to get access to scientific facts.”
— For example, gag orders imposed on employees of the EPA and of the Department of Energy; removing data from government web sites.
4. Trump is “attempting to control agencies that are directly responsible for coming up with facts, particularly facts he doesn’t like.”
— For example-- and this especially critical-- "reviewing" intelligence agency information.
He’s having his own loyalist, Wall Street billionaire Stephen Feinberg, lead a broad review of American Intelligence Agencies.
As Reich points out, Feinberg has no qualifications or background to conduct such a review, so this exercise cannot credibly be for any legitimate purpose, such as improving efficiency or threat preparedness. The true aim is clear:
Protecting Donald Trump, that is what this review is all about. Protecting him from facts that he doesn’t want. Protecting him from the possible leakage of facts that he doesn’t want emanating from the Intelligence Agencies at all. In other words, this is about curtailing the independency of the Intelligence Agencies…
What do you think the Intelligence Agencies are telling him [about Vladimir Putin] that he doesn’t want them to investigate or know about?...
The trail is coming closer and closer to Donald Trump— he wants that trail stopped.
5. Trump berates the media, and attempts to undermine public confidence in their reliability.
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There is so much more in this one video, and the others I’ve seen so far are also incredible.
Thank you, Robert Reich, for this gift to democracy. I look forward to tuning in.