OP/ED: Clear Signs of the USA’s Descent into Dictatorship

Posted on by Editor

Compiled by Michael Randall

When university presidents, corporate C.E.O.s, public media, mayors, governors and other prominent organizations and citizens quietly and passively change their behavior in order to avoid being targeted and hurt by the Trumpian government, that means we have crossed the line and are moving toward tyranny in the USA.

A sampling of Trump’s actions that will have transformative, tyrannical consequences:

  1. Appointed a largely unqualified confederacy of dunces to his cabinet;
  2. Initiated mass deportations;
  3. Abandoned NATO and European allies;
  4. Ended USAID programs to the world’s most suffering people;
  5. Pardoned those convicted of January 6 violent crimes;
  6. Embraced Russia and abandoned Ukraine, leaving Ukraine to Putin’s destruction;
  7. Fired watchdog inspectors general from federal agencies;
  8. Fired thousands of federal workers, throwing key services into jeopardy and chaos;
  9. Fired prosecutors who worked on investigating and prosecuting him;
  10. Began tariff wars with largest trading partners and major allies;
  11. Withdrew from World Health Organization and the Paris Climate Accord;
  12. Cut off federal funds to states and local governments that do not obey his orders;
  13. Destroyed the 80 year old international order that has fostered much prosperity and peace;
  14. Republican congress threatened to impeach federal judges who oppose Trump’s exec. orders;
  15. Working to perpetuate tax breaks for the wealthy by cutting key social services;
  16. Threatened to invade Greenland and Panama;
  17. Barred the 180 year old Associated Press from its news space in White House and Pentagon;
  18. Threatened media outlets that don’t report the way Trump wants;
  19. Crushed federal DEI programs & threatened states and private sector to follow suit;
  20. Showed the world that the USA is curling up into a fetal position and ending its support for freedom of expression and personal liberty both at home and abroad.

Massive peaceful protests and acts of peaceful civil disobedience are justified responses to the Trumpian government’s attempts to change the USA into a dictatorship. So, by what active means can resistance be undertaken so that protests grow in their number and effectiveness?