Do you recall the scene in “Cool Hand Luke” when the prison captain (Strother Douglas Martin Jr.) smashes Luke (Paul Newman) in the head with a truncheon.
As Luke is lying semiconscious in the dirt, the captain memorably drawls, “What we’ve got here — is failure to communicate.”
That line resonates in our political life today. Many Americans believe, correctly, that President Donald Trump is an inveterate liar. But some 40 percent believe that Trump’s utterances and tweets are true. Whatever Trump says or does — it’s all good. The profound differences surrounding Trump have created an unbridgeable communication chasm.
Give Trump his due. He intuited this phenomenon. When in 2016 he said, “I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot someone, and I wouldn’t lose votes,” liberal commentators mocked him for his bluster and arrogance. But those pundits got it wrong. Trump had it right —an early example of his genius at exploiting the meanness of the mob.
Trump’s ability to manipulate and control that minority of voters who believe him and believe in him and who put him in power has put the American democratic experiment at great risk. To be sure, this president cannot destroy democracy on his own. Congress and the courts would need to be complicit.
And they are being exactly that. Witness the sycophantic Republican Congressional majority. And although some courts still exhibit independence, the Senate is busy stacking the federal judiciary with Trump loyalists.
Throughout our history, there have been other centers of power in America — corporations, for example. But you’ll find no solace in that sector and need look no farther than this week’s The Economist with its cover story, “The affair: Why corporate America loves Donald Trump.”
Another counterpoint historically has been the power of workers. No longer. Federal and state court decisions and legislative actions, exacerbated by overt attacks by the president and governors on public sector unions, have stripped them of much of their economic and political power.
Place little faith in the Fourth Estate. Much of the media — Fox, Sinclair and Russian bots, for example — is devoted to promoting Trumpism. And Trump has neutered much of the effectiveness of the independent press with his mantra of fake news, repetition that has programmed his cadre of followers to ignore or disbelieve quality journalism.
Here’s how this confluence of factors played out last week. The National Football League owners bowed to pressure from Trump and issued an edict forbidding the players to kneel during the national anthem. Trump in turn received wild adulation from his (let’s note, 98 percent white) base.
The players by kneeling sought to call attention to racism and police brutality. Trump redefined the protest, accusing the players of being disloyal and disrespecting America and its flag. His frame prevailed — at least with the corporate owners and his base.
The NFL’s edict violates union-management law, which prohibits a unilateral change of working conditions without negotiation. The prohibition also guts freedom of speech. Perhaps worst of all, the order rewards Trump’s white supremacist values, which have been on full display in this vendetta against the 70 percent black NFL players and their union.
Let’s be clear: This fight in the NFL is a proxy race war that Trump declared. Make America White Again! Keep those black and brown people in their place and out of sight, except when they’re providing entertainment. That subtext is not subtle. Trump has called on the team owners to fire players who protest and for the country to deport them. His bellicosity and venality in this fight has animated — indeed, thrilled — his base.
Trump, of course, is not the first president to jawbone a business. I still remember, for example, what President John Kennedy did in 1962 after U.S. Steel reneged on its promise to not raise prices if the steelworkers union would drop its demand for a pay increase. The union indeed gave up its wage demand, but then the company raised steel prices anyway.
President Kennedy lambasted this corporate double cross and the ” tiny handful of steel executives whose pursuit of power and profit exceeds their sense of public responsibility.” The president’s public recrimination forced the company to roll back its prices. Can we agree that the president’s use of the bully pulpit has changed?
Trump’s attack on the NFL players has not surprised most Americans. Recent polls reveal that 57 percent believe that Trump is a racist.
But 40 percent think he isn’t. And it is that 40 percent plus a little that elected him and could re-elect him — thanks to the Electoral College, which was designed to enhance the political power of the slave states. Those former slave states now constitute Trump’s base.
Nothing guarantees a democracy’s continued existence, and what we’ve got here is failure to appreciate the existential threat.
Consider the blueprint. An elected leader exploits and inflames racial or religious differences. He effectively pulls levers of power and efficiently utilizes his propaganda apparatus. Elections become largely predetermined, legislatures and courts are relegated to window dressing and opposition is silenced.
This is how an authoritarian gains power. This is how a democracy dies.
Bill Newman, a Northampton lawyer, writes a column published the first Saturday of the month. He is director of the Western Regional Office of the ACLU of Massachusetts. He can be reached at opinion@gazettenet.com.