In the classic movie, All About Eve, Bette Davis, famously stated, "Fasten your seatbelts, it's going to be a bumpy night." Well, for America, and possibly the rest of us, it may indeed be a bumpy four years and longer.
There is a disconnect between President Biden speaking of "Unity", and what is actually taking place in American life. There is almost a frenzy concerning removing all vestiges of the previous President and anyone affiliated with him. It's a slap in the face to half the country who didn't vote for the current President.
We think that cancel culture is new, however, as they say, history repeats. We need to go back to the 1940s and 50s to find anything similar. In the 50s, Senator Joe McCarthy started hearings to investigate his belief that communists had infiltrated the U.S. State Department. It was a time of hysteria with "a Communist under every bed". In time, his name became a noun, associated with government-inspired, anti-communist attacks with little concrete evidence.
We can, however, go back even earlier to the 1940s to see the cancel culture fervour. Then we had the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) which investigated Communist infiltration of Hollywood. There were indeed some Communists in Hollywood by their own admission. Others had to renounce their political viewpoints while some even committed suicide because of the persecution.
The irony is that today Fascist and Marxist tactics target anyone on the conservative side of politics. It is becoming apparent what the goal of the Democratic party is in America. They want to destroy the Republicans, conservatives and anyone who doesn't have the same worldview. This is on its face dangerous. America may be on the road to a one-party state.
History is replete with countries electing supposedly, well-intentioned leaders who turned their countries into autocratic states. Fidel Castro, a lawyer, by profession, initially wanted a democratic form of government. That quickly disappeared once he took power in Cuba. Hugo Chavez was democratically elected in Venezuela, but once he acquired power, he dissolved the Congress and set up his own National Assembly, then nationalized industry and ultimately made himself leader for life as he turned Venezuela into a socialist state. His successor Madura has continued the authoritarian regime and now Venezuela––though rich in oil––is a basket case.
Then there is the case of Adolph Hitler. Many don't realize that Hitler's Nazi Party came to power even though they only received 37% of the vote. Within a year he was pronounced Chancellor of Germany, and soon after, when extremists set fire to the parliament, Hitler and the Nazi Party was made the only official party.
In America today, there is a witchhunt going on as we have never seen before. The fact that one party, the Democrats, are going after Trump with an impeachment trial, speaks to the body politic's derangement. Impeachment is to remove a sitting government official. Trump is no longer the President.
The turmoil is spreading to other areas. There is a concerted effort to banish some Congressional members from the government because they have viewpoints that don't comport with the official narrative. Also, there is a view by some that Trump supporters need to be purged. Free speech apparently is no longer tolerated. People, including government officials, are being banned from social media sites, even losing advertising dollars. The level of censorship and purging is something we have never seen before in the U.S.
Perhaps the most disturbing thing to occur is "respectable people" proposing re-education camps for those who voted for Trump. Where have we seen this before? China today, and the ex-Soviet Union are good examples. Is this America anymore?
Gordon Chang, a well-known journalist and expert on China, wrote a book in 2001, The Coming Collapse of China. He was wrong. If he creates a sequel, The Coming Collapse of America; that is closer to the target.
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