There is no longer a “new normal” in American politics. The practices, assumptions and traditions that long guided our electoral process and allowed our experiment in representative democracy to careen through 250 or so years have been ripped away. Some may say that’s a good thing. But the dangerous and uncharted waters in which we are now sailing pose a particular threat to our nation and the world.
It is now clear that Donald Trump’s presidency is the product, at least in part, of an organized, sharply focused campaign of cyber-terrorism perpetrated by Russia, a foreign adversary of the United States and approved, if not directed, by Vladimir Putin himself, for his and Russia’s own nefarious purposes.
Donald Trump, for his part in response to the conclusions by the U.S. intelligence establishment, has attacked the intelligence agencies of this country with characteristic venom for their conclusions and praised Putin, the foreign oligarch.
Blaming Democrats’ “weak” cyber security for the scheme continues Trump’s calculated habit of disregarding the truth in denial and viciously attacking someone else as balm for his emotional wounds. Why is Trump so unwilling to accept reality? The reasons may seem unclear but recent press articles exploring Trump’s ties to Russian oligarchs and mobsters illuminate a decades-long business entanglement between Trump and those with corrupt ties to the Putin regime, which suggest that his love for Mother Russia has a basis in his lust for profit.
But whatever the reason for Trump’s bizarre reaction to a foreign plot to undermine the presidential election, the consequences for the rest of us are severe. Our country has generally been, and has been held up to the world as, a bastion of free and fair elections.
Can any thinking person now say with confidence that this past election was free and fair?
The Russian scheme took advantage of a new digital landscape. In this brave new world, campaigning is by tweet, and the electorate must adapt to an information barrage in which truth and fiction are almost indistinguishable.
Russia, which has for years made cyber forays to hack our institutions, finally was able to poison the free flow of information with a stream of fake news and propaganda striking at the very heart of our cherished freedom of the press. Fair? The foreign scheme targeted one candidate in order to support the election of another. That is what happens in the oligarchies so admired by Trump, which Webster’s defines as “a government in which a small group exercises control especially for corrupt and selfish purposes.”
Trump has appointed to his Cabinet a group of billionaires whom the Republicans wish to see seated without adequate time for vetting. Trump refuses to disclose his taxes, reveal his conflicts and appears to be prepared to govern by tweet. The emoluments clause of the Constitution compels that Trump be held accountable for whatever connections to, knowledge of or role he had with respect to the Russian plot to undermine our democracy.
Otherwise, the new normal could look an awful lot like a Vladimir Putin puppet show.
(Paul Hodes of Concord is a former U.S. representative for the Second Congressional District.)