The Former President's Policies Pose a Threat to Our Social Fabric.
The national and international strategies – from the effort to overturn the election in the past to recent incursions and statements – undermine both national and global jurisprudence. But that’s not all.
These actions jeopardize the very concept of what we mean by.
The ethical foundation of civilized society is to forestall the dominant from preying upon and using the vulnerable. Failing that, we would be locked in a brutish war where survival of the strongest wins.
This ideal is central of America’s founding documents. It’s also the heart of the modern framework of international relations supported by the United States, emphasizing international cooperation, democracy, fundamental freedoms, and the rule of law.
Yet, it is a vulnerable ideal, easily violated by those who seek to abuse their influence. Maintaining it requires that the powerful have the moral fortitude to abstain from seeking temporary advantages, and that the public ensure they answer for their actions should they falter.
Unchecked strength does not equal right. It leads to uncertainty, upheaval, and conflict.
Each instance people or corporations or countries that are wealthier and stronger prey upon those that are not, the fabric of our shared norms weakens. If these actions are allowed to continue, the structure collapses. Allowing it to persist, the world can fall into chaos and war. We have seen this pattern previously.
Our current reality is a global community with deepening divides. Influence and wealth are held by fewer hands than in modern history. This encourages the powerful to leverage their position against the less fortunate because they perceive themselves as omnipotent.
The fortunes of certain billionaires is difficult to fathom. The influence of global industrial giants covers much of the globe. Advanced technology is likely to consolidate economic and political clout even more. The destructive power of the major powers is unmatched in human history.
Supported by complicit legislators and an accommodating high court, the presidency has been made into the supreme and answerable-to-none agent of state power in the modern era.
Consider this confluence and you grasp the threat.
An unbroken thread connects past transgressions to current threats. Both were premised on the hubris of absolute power.
One observes a similar pattern in other global contexts: in military conflicts, in expansive ambitions, and in the rampant monopolization by powerful corporate entities.
However, unfettered might does not make right. It makes for fragility, upheaval, and armed conflict.
The lessons of the past reveal that frameworks designed to check the influential also safeguard them. Without such constraints, their relentless pursuit for more power and wealth in time lead to their downfall – taking down their corporations, nations, or empires. And pave the way for global conflict.
This blatant lawlessness will haunt the nation and the world – and indeed a rules-based order – for a long time.
