A lot of the ideas in this blog were inspired by the article A Warning from Europe by Anne Applebaum, in the October Atlantic.

Americans, at least middle class Americans, have always viewed history as an arrow, with each generation increasing in prosperity, knowledge, tolerance, and freedom, or at least we did until it stopped happening. Now we are variously confused, angry, discouraged, apprehensive, or indignant. Europeans, though, realize history is circular, possibly because they have more of it. They’ve seen Fortuna’s Wheel spin more than once.

History doesn’t think much of liberal democracy, because humans don’t either. Poland has made a remarkable transformation since December 31, 1999. Remember that hopeful, joyous night? Everyone was so happy the Y2K turned out to not be a thing. Poland was pretty much in the tolerant, fact-based, rule-of-law-oriented, liberal democratic camp. Now it is firmly in the in-group/out-group, alternate fact, corruption-funded, autocratic camp. Hungary is even worse.

You may know a few other examples.

The news is not that this sort of thing is happening, but why. When the water is rising but only some boats float, people in the boats left behind feel the system is not fair. History shows us that humans have no preference for democratic systems,  or for inclusive values like tolerance. What we have a preference for is the well-being of us and ours. If democratically-elected leaders aren’t improving my life, who needs ’em?

After you grasp this simple truth, it seems to be everywhere. If you’re one of the beneficiaries of corruption, supporting a corrupt government is a no-brainer; the previous in-group didn’t do anything for you, so it’s ok to screw them. Loyalty will be rewarded. Believing something that is obviously not true is not a sign of irrationality, but a signal to the in-group that you belong, and deserve to share in the spoils.

The embrace of Us/Them politics feels twisted when it’s endorsed by clerics, and sickening when it’s driven by racism, but only to those of us who bought into the democratic ideal. But did we really? Homes near ours sport Not My President signs, but unless you think the election was rigged, Trump actually is your president. Democracy is all about letting the majority–or in the case of the US, the Electoral College–decide.

Would those of us touting liberal values cling to them if we didn’t have funded retirements and successfully-launched kids? Surely it is possible our success was due to being knowledge workers and investors during the period in which white-collar work displaced blue-collar work and markets exploded. We were sad that others weren’t having the same results, but instead of fixing that, we allowed massive race-weighted incarceration, income inequality, falling real wages, and corporate corruption to burgeon on our watch.

We may be about to feel the pain. Short of divine intervention, Kavanaugh will start work in the Supreme Court on Tuesday, so shortly after the Mueller investigation is shut down and the President officially declared to be unindictable, we may face pay-as-you-go health care, re-direction of social security benefits to corporate tax relief, wholesale environmental destruction, and loyalty oaths.

Will the Trumpettes with their coal and steel jobs be better off?

Somehow we all have to breathe the same air.