Citizen Cartwright

Reasons for optimism about U.S. democracy

Columnist David Brooks writes in The Atlantic: "America may well enter a period of democratic decay and international isolation. It takes decades to develop strong alliances, and to build the structures and customs of democracy — and only weeks to decimate them, as we’ve now seen. And yet I find myself confident that America will survive this crisis. Many nations, including our own, have gone through worse and bloodier crises and recovered. 

 

"In 'Upheaval: Turning Points for Nations in Crisis,' the historian and scientist Jared Diamond provides case studies — Japan in the late 19th century, Finland and Germany after World War II, Indonesia after the 1960s, Chile and Australia during and after the ’70s — of countries that came back stronger after crisis, collapse, or defeat. To these examples, I’d add Britain in the 1830s and '40s, and the 1980s, and South Korea in the 1980s. 

 

"Some of these countries (such as Japan) endured war; others (Chile) endured mass torture and 'disappearances'; still others (Britain and Australia) endured social decay and national decline. All of them eventually healed and came back.

"Even now, as I travel around the country, I see the forces of repair gathering in neighborhoods and communities. If you’re part of an organization that builds trust across class, you’re fighting Trumpism. If you’re a Democrat jettisoning insular faculty-lounge progressivism in favor of a Whig-like [Whigs emphasized traditional morality and progressive improvements, Brooks says] working-class abundance agenda, you’re fighting Trumpism. If you are standing up for a moral code of tolerance and pluralism that can hold America together, you’re fighting Trumpism.

"Over time, changes in values lead to changes in relationships, which lead to changes in civic life, which eventually lead to changes in policy and then in the general trajectory of the nation."

 

Laura Gamboa, an assistant professor of democracy and global affairs at the University of Notre Dame, says in Foreign Affairs: "For democracy to survive, it must be protected. In the past few decades, in countries such as Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, and Poland, opposition groups pushed back successfully against leaders with authoritarian tendencies early in the process of democratic backsliding, when they still had institutional levers to pull. 

"The Democratic Party in the United States can make the erosion of democracy visible to the public and costly to the perpetrators. It can obstruct legislation in Congress, compete in electoral districts where Republicans typically run uncontested, and coordinate to maintain a presence, even if only in protest, in as many institutional spaces as possible. Recent attempts to lead town halls in districts where Republicans refuse to hold them are great examples of this strategy.

"Well-organized social movements and civil society groups can shelter democratic institutions, mobilize voters, and increase the costs of antidemocratic behavior."

 

Steven Levitsky, a professor of government at Harvard, and Lucan Way, a professor of democracy at the University of Toronto, write in Foreign Affairs: "Civil society is another potential source of democratic resilience. One major reason that rich democracies are more stable is that capitalist development disperses human, financial, and organizational resources away from the state, generating countervailing power in society. 

"Wealth cannot wholly inoculate the private sector from the pressures imposed by a weaponized state. But the larger and richer a private sector is, the harder it is to fully capture or bully into submission. In addition, wealthier citizens have more time, skills, and resources to join or create civic or opposition organizations, and because they depend less on the state for their livelihoods than poor citizens do, they are in a better position to protest or vote against the government. 

"Compared with those in other competitive authoritarian regimes, opposition forces in the United States are well-organized, well-financed, and electorally viable, which makes them harder to co-opt, repress, and defeat at the polls. American opposition will therefore be harder to sideline than it was in countries such as El Salvador, Hungary, and Turkey."

In a webinar, Levitsky and Erica Chenoweth, a professor of public policy at the Harvard Kennedy School, say the important thing is for individuals to act, to choose the cause that’s most meaningful them. They cite as a resource the website Choose Democracy. 

Trump’s reversal on global tariffs

Hours after the president’s tariffs took effect on nearly 60 countries Wednesday, he said he'd pause them for 90 days, The New York Times reports.

But Trump didn't extend the pause to China, instead raising tariffs again on all Chinese imports, to 125 percent. He made that decision after China raised its tariffs on American goods to 84 percent on Wednesday afternoon.

As a result, nearly every U.S. trading partner now faces a 10 percent blanket tariff, on top of 25 percent tariffs that Trump has imposed on cars, steel and aluminum.

The stock market reversed days of losses, and Wednesday was the best day for the S&P 500 since the recovery from the 2008 financial crisis, the Times says.

Trump said he pulled back on the tariffs because people were “yippy” and “afraid” amid the stock market declines.

He said he had been monitoring the bond market and that people were “getting a little queasy” as bond prices had fallen and interest rates had increased.

Global investors ordinarily move to the perceived safety of U.S. debt in times of market tumult, The Washington Post notes. But people around the world were selling U.S. Treasury bonds.

Mohammed El Erian, chief economic advisor at Allianz and former boss of the biggest bond manager Pimco, says there had been an "erosion" of bonds being seen as a safe haven, BBC News reports.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent says the 90-day freeze on Trump's "reciprocal tariffs" was the plan all along to bring countries to the negotiating table, Reuters reports.

“Economists are puzzled to see Trump trying to overhaul the existing economic order and doing it so soon after inheriting the strongest economy in the world,” says The Associated Press.

“There is a deep irony in Trump claiming unfair treatment of the American economy at a time when it was growing robustly while every other major economy had stalled or was losing growth momentum,” says Eswar Prasad, professor of trade policy at Cornell University.

The Trump administration accuses other countries of erecting unfair trade barriers to keep out U.S. exports and using underhanded tactics to promote their own, AP says.

And it’s true that some countries charge higher taxes on imports than the United States. Some countries manipulate their currencies lower to ensure that their goods are price-competitive in international markets. And some governments subsidize their industries to give them an edge.

But the United States nevertheless is the second-largest exporter in the world, after China, AP says. 

Voters and a senator have big messages for Musk, Trump

The results of three elections on Tuesday are “early warning signs” to Republicans and President Trump, says The Associated Press.

In the race for a Wisconsin Supreme Court seat, conservative Judge Brad Schimel — who was endorsed by Trump and backed by Musk and his groups with $21 million — lost to liberal Judge Susan Crawford 45 percent to 55 percent in a state the president won in November. 

And while Florida Republicans held on to two of the most pro-Trump House districts in the country, both candidates also significantly underperformed Trump’s November margins, AP says.

Republican Jimmy Patronis, the state’s chief financial officer, fended off a challenge from Democrat Gay Valimont to win Florida’s 1st District seat vacated by Matt Gaetz by 15 points. Trump carried the district by about 37 points in November. 

And Republican Randy Fine won his special election in Florida's 6th District to replace Rep. Mike Waltz, who stepped down to serve as Trump’s national security adviser. But Fine’s Democratic challenger, Josh Weil, lost by 14 points, less than five months after Waltz won the district by 33 points.

The elections — the first major contests since Trump’s return to power — are seen as an early measure of voter sentiment “as Trump works with unprecedented speed to dramatically upend the federal government, clashing with the courts and seeking revenge as he tests the bounds of presidential power,” AP says.

Also on Tuesday, Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., broke the record for the longest speech on the Senate floor. He spoke about his roots as a descendant of both slaves and slave-owners as he spoke for 25 hours, breaking the record of Sen. Strom Thurmond, the avowed segregationist from South Carolina who filibustered the Civil Rights Act of 1957.

Throughout his speech, Booker read letters from Americans about the impact Trump’s agenda is having on their lives, drawing historical parallels and warning that the country faces a “looming constitutional crisis.”

“This is a moral moment,” Booker said. “It’s not left or right; it’s right or wrong.” 

Booker invoked the words of his mentor, the late congressman and civil rights icon John Lewis: “He said for us to go out and cause some good trouble, necessary trouble, to redeem the soul of our nation.”

Protests of Trump actions are scheduled for April 5 in 1,000 places around the country.

Why ‘Trump voters love him more than before’

This is the online headline of a New York Times opinion article involving four of its conservative columnists — David Brooks, Ross Douthat, David French and Bret Stephens.

 

They were asked why more registered voters think America is on the right track than at any point since 2004, according to a recent NBC News poll (90 percent of Republicans like his performance; 4 percent of Democrats do).

 

Here are some excerpts:

 

David Brooks says: “Sixty percent believe ‘the system is broken.’ Sixty-nine percent believe the ‘political and economic elite don’t care about hard-working people.’… They get this from media consumption. ... If those are your priors, then you’re going to be happy with a president who wields a wrecking ball.”

 

“Trump policies are not 100 percent wrong; they are just overreactions. Destroying an agency rather than fixing what is wrong and saving what is right.”

 

“As a matter of principle, Democrats should be screaming bloody murder about Trump’s threat to the Constitution. As a matter of political tactics, I think they’re better off emphasizing Trumpian incompetence. Determining the constitutionality of some act requires a law degree, but incompetence is something we all recognize — and there is a lot of it.”

 

Bret Stephens: “The sort of inside-the-Beltway moves that feel like political earthquakes to a certain kind of Washington insider leave Trump voters somewhere between indifferent and pleased.”

 

Ross Douthat: “This sense of things may change as Trump pushes the envelope of presidential power or as the right embraces its own forms of censoriousness. Indeed, already you can see some factions that aligned with Trump because they were anti-woke start to break away or critique MAGA excesses.”

 

David French: “There’s a strong undercurrent of raw animosity in our politics. Republicans and Democrats have very negative views of each other, and many Republicans (sadly!) want their opponents to suffer. They’re actually happy to see people lose their jobs or to see nonprofits lose funding if those people are perceived as part of the ‘deep state’ or RINOs.”

 

“Many Republicans dislike foreign aid. Or loathe elite universities. Or hate big liberal law firms.”

 

“If you’re watching Fox News or other right-wing outlets, you’re hearing a lot of stories about strange, ‘woke’ programs funded by USAID. They don’t know about the lives that are saved or the lives that are at risk.”

 

“I sincerely doubt that most Republicans think or believe that Trump has done anything illegal so far. Right-wing media is full of legal talking heads telling their loyal audiences that the various district judges are lawless. The right is even attacking Amy Coney Barrett, calling her a grifter or a RINO for exercising her independent judgment.”

“That means they won’t know, much less care, about any given political controversy until it affects them personally.”

 

“If the economy tanks, MAGA will stay with Trump, but we know from the 2020 election that enough voters will step off the Trump train to swing the balance of power back to the Democrats.”

What citizens need to know about government shutdown votes this week

House Republicans unveiled on Saturday a bill to fund the government at current levels through Sept. 30, “daring Democrats to oppose it and risk being blamed for a government shutdown that would start after midnight Friday,” says The New York Times.

 

While conservative House Republicans in the past have opposed such spending bills, forcing Speaker Johnson to rely on Democrats to keep the government open, President Trump has called on Republicans to unite and push this bill through so he and Republicans on Capitol Hill can focus on their new budgetary and tax-cutting plans.

 

“Great things are coming for America, and I am asking you all to give us a few months to get us through to September so we can continue to put the Country’s ‘financial house’ in order,” Trump wrote on his social media site on Saturday after Republican leaders unveiled the bill.

 

Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn., who has voted against these bills throughout his career, told reporters that he was “open” to possibly supporting this one after Trump reassured him that DOGE would implement cuts.

 

Leaders of the congressional spending committees had been in bipartisan talks to find a way to pass the traditional spending bills, which would give Congress more say in how federal funds are spent and test how far the Trump administration was willing to go in defying lawmakers on spending issues.

 

But as the March 14 deadline has neared, Johnson and administration officials have made the decision that it would be to the White House’s advantage to freeze funding for the year and push through whatever changes they could convince Republicans to accept on mainly party-line votes.

 

House Democrats aren't expected to help pass the bill this time, The Washington Post and other media report. 

 

Democrats are worried that a long-term funding patch will give Trump and DOGE more control over how money is spent, The Post says, citing multiple lawmakers and aides.

 

“Congress — not Trump or Musk — should decide through careful bipartisan negotiations how to invest in our states and districts — and whether critical programs that support students, veterans, families and patients get funded or not,” says Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, the top Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Committee.

 

So Democrats are standing up.

 

What citizens can do:

 

The Constitution gives Congress the power of the purse. But Republican lawmakers appear to be too afraid of Trump to follow through on their oath to protect the Constitution and check presidential power. 

 

Yet DOGE isn’t popular, according to a PolitiFact article being run by Texas’ Austin-American Statesman newspaper.

 

Olivia Troye, a first-term Trump White House official who broke with him and spoke at the 2024 Democratic National Convention, says about former members of the “Never Trump” movement:

“We’re in a moment when there’s self-preservation, and I don’t blame people for that. But we need to remind ourselves that we have the power. The only reason that they have the power and are continuing to do what they do is that people are going silent.”

 

But members of the public are protesting nationwide. Reporters are reporting. Current and former officials are speaking up. For example, In a letter to lawmakers last week, five former defense secretaries who served under Republicans and Democrats — Lloyd Austin, Jim Mattis, Leon Panetta, Chuck Hagel and William Perry — condemned Trump’s firing of senior military leaders last month and asked that the House and Senate hold “immediate hearings to assess the national security implications of Mr. Trump’s dismissals.”

 

“We the people,” who the Constitution put in charge — can weigh in this week by calling and emailing our lawmakers. We can let those lawmakers who are standing up know that we support them and encourage them to do it more.

 

And we can urge the others to defend the institutions they pledged to defend.

 

If you type your address in this form on the Congress.gov website, you’ll get the contact information for your House representative and your two senators.

 

Here are other ways to help, from Robert Reich, author, professor and former secretary of Labor under President Clinton, including contacting the White House at 1-202-456-1414 (switchboard) and 1-202-456-1111 (comments).

 

Here are more suggestions from Reich.

Trump’s speech to Congress

“President Trump, in his address to Congress Tuesday, celebrated the whirlwind of changes he has brought to the federal government. His success from this point on will depend largely on whether Americans believe the unease caused by his speedy actions — an unsettled stock market, a trade war with allies and uncertainty over the extent of federal job and spending cuts — will lead to the American renewal he promised,” says The Wall Street Journal.

 

Much of the 100-minute speech — the longest presidential address to Congress in modern history — “was filled with grievances about his treatment by Democrats and exaggerations about his accomplishments,” says The New York Times.

 

AP says the speech “added up to a defiant sales pitch for the policies that Trump promised during his campaign and leaned into during his first weeks back in office. Trump pledged to keep delivering sweeping change to rescue the nation from what he described as destruction and mistakes left by his predecessor. He seldom addressed his comments directly to the American people, who are trying to keep up with the recent upheaval, while repeatedly needling the Democratic lawmakers seated before him.”

 

Republicans chanted “USA! USA!” as Trump stepped to the lectern.

 

Rep. Al Green, D-Texas, who pushed to impeach Trump dating to his previous term in office, stood and shook his cane toward the president in the opening minutes of his speech and subsequently was removed from the chamber.

 

Some Democrats held black signs that read “save Medicaid,” “protect veterans,” “Musk steals” and “false."

 

Michigan Sen. Elissa Slotkin, who delivered the Democratic response after Trump’s speech, said “America wants change, but there’s a responsible way to make change and a reckless way, and we can make that change without forgetting who we are as a country and as a democracy.”

 

Here is reaction to the speech from experts at the Atlantic Council.

 

My thanks to my husband for compiling fact checks of Trump's speech:

 

AP

 

NYTimes

 

Washington Post

 

PolitiFact

 

ABC News

 

CBS News

 

NBC News

 

NPR

 

CNN

 

BBC News

Trump tariffs against Canada, Mexico take effect

Imports from Canada and Mexico now are to be taxed at 25 percent, and Canadian energy products are subject to 10 percent tariffs. 

 

The 10 percent tariff President Trump put on Chinese imports in February is now doubled to 20 percent.

 

China retaliated on Tuesday with tariffs of up to 15 percent on an array of U.S. farm exports, says The Associated Press. China also expanded the number of U.S. companies subject to export controls and other restrictions.

 

Canada Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says his country will put 25 percent tariffs on more than $100 billion of American goods over 21 days. 

 

Mexico is expected to announce its response on Tuesday, Reuters says.

 

Trump’s moves raise fears of higher inflation and the prospect of a trade war even as he’s promised Americans that taxes on imports are the easiest path to national prosperity, says AP. 

 

“He has shown a willingness to buck the warnings of mainstream economists and put his own public approval on the line, believing that tariffs can fix what ails the country,” AP says.

 

“It’s a very powerful weapon that politicians haven’t used because they were either dishonest, stupid or paid off in some other form,” Trump said on Monday. “And now we’re using them.”

 

The Wall Street Journal editorial’s headline: “Trump takes the dumbest tariff plunge.”

 

The tariffs are “somewhat of a surprise, given that Mexico and Canada have gone to great lengths in recent weeks to convince the president that they were stepping up enforcement of their borders,” says The New York Times. Trump initially threatened in November to impose the tariffs, saying the three countries weren't doing enough to stop the flow of drugs and migrants into the United States.

 

On Monday, Trump appeared to change his terms, saying Canada and Mexico need to relocate auto factories and other manufacturing to the United States, the Times says.

 

Here are some imported goods whose prices may be hit first, according to AP.

 

Trump's “America First” agenda, to change trade relationships in favor of the United States, is expected to be a centerpiece of his Tuesday night speech to a joint session of Congress, Reuters says.

European 'coalition of the willing' to guarantee Ukraine peace

Leaders of Europe and Canada have stepped up after the Friday Oval Office video that shot around the world of President Trump, Vice President Vance and Ukraine President Zelensky.

 

By the way, The New York Times reports that the outburst of Trump and Vance at Zelensky wasn’t planned; they were triggered by the United States not being thanked enough.

 

Zelensky subsequently went to London for scheduled talks with European leaders. 

 

There, he participated in a summit of 18 countries, including Britain, France, Poland, Sweden, Turkey, Norway, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Romania, Finland, Italy, Spain and Canada. 

 

Speaking at a news conference shortly after the summit, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said there had been agreement on four points, according to BBC News: 

 

— To keep military aid flowing to Ukraine and keep increasing the economic pressure on Russia

— That any lasting peace must ensure Ukraine sovereignty and security, and Ukraine must be present at peace talks

— In the event of a peace deal, to increase Ukraine's defensive capabilities to deter any future invasion

 — To develop the "coalition of the willing" to defend a deal in Ukraine and guarantee peace afterward

 

Starmer also announced an additional $2 billion in British export finance to buy more than 5,000 air defense missiles. That's on top of a $2.8 billion loan to provide more military aid to Ukraine backed by profits from frozen Russian assets, BBC News says.

 

"Europe must do the heavy lifting," Starmer said, adding that the agreement would need U.S. support and had to include Russia — but that Russia couldn't be allowed to dictate terms.

 

After the summit, Zelensky met with King Charles III. He later spoke to reporters at a press briefing where he said he was ready to sign the minerals deal with the United States.

 

After leaving the Oval Office on Friday, Zelensky posted on X his thanks to Trump, Congress and the American people for their support, The Hill reports.

 

After leaving Britain, Zelensky again expressed his gratitude for U.S. support on X, BBC News says.

 

Here are 33 previous examples of Zelensky expressing gratitude to the United States, from CNN fact checker Daniel Dale. "This is not a comprehensive list," he says. "Notably, we did not review Zelensky’s many domestic remarks in Ukrainian."

 

Here are reactions to the Oval Office video of House and Senate lawmakers from both parties, from The Associated Press.

Oh, Jeff

Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos said on Wednesday that the newspaper’s opinions section now would be focused on “personal liberties and free markets” and won’t publish anything that opposes those ideas. With the shift, opinions editor David Shipley resigned, reports The Washington Post.

 

Shipley told Bezos that the new approach would violate the Post's pledge to hold power to account, NPR reports.

 

The announcement led to immediate and public pushback from members of The Post’s opinion and news staff, says The New York Times:

 

“Jeff Stein, The Post’s chief economics reporter, called it a 'massive encroachment' on The Post’s opinion staff that made clear 'dissenting views will not be published or tolerated there. I still have not felt encroachment on my journalism on the news side of coverage, but if Bezos tries interfering with the news side I will be quitting immediately and letting you know,' Mr. Stein wrote on X.”

 

As I type this at 6 a.m., the Post article has 8,510 comments. An AI-generated summary of the comments says: “The comments express significant dissatisfaction with The Washington Post's new focus on 'personal liberties and free markets' in its opinion section. Many readers perceive this shift as a move towards a more conservative, right-wing stance, aligning with corporate and political interests, particularly those of Jeff Bezos. This has led to numerous subscription cancellations, with readers lamenting the perceived loss of journalistic integrity and diversity of opinion that they valued in the past.”

 

“Jeff Bezos is muzzling the Washington Post’s opinion section. That’s a death knell” is the headline of Margaret Sullivan’s column in The Guardian.

 

“Bezos set out to save the Washington Post from financial ruin when he bought it, and, for a time, he did that and more. But the best thing he could do now would be to sell it to someone who understands the stewardship of a national treasure,” she says.

House passes ‘big, beautiful’ budget bill Trump wants

The president spent hours lobbying Republican holdouts on Tuesday to pass the fiscal 2025 budget blueprint, on a 217-215 vote, with one Republican voting no, Roll Call reports.

 

It’s just the first step toward passing the reconciliation bill, with $4.5 trillion in tax breaks and $2 trillion in spending cuts, that House Republicans are seeking to enact Trump’s agenda. The plan is at odds with Senate Republicans, who are pursuing their own budget blueprint focused on border security and defense, while deferring tax legislation until later in the year.

 

The House budget resolution had gotten criticism from both wings of the Republican Conference. 

 

Ultraconservatives, mainly from the Freedom Caucus, said an initial draft calling for $1.5 trillion in spending cuts was insufficient. 

 

And GOP moderates expressed concern about the impact spending cuts could have on Medicaid, the health insurance program for low-income families. The budget would instruct the Energy and Commerce Committee to find $880 billion in savings over a decade, and Medicaid is the likeliest target for cuts in that panel’s jurisdiction. 

 

But they got assurances from House leaders after a late-night meeting Monday that cost-cutting would focus on Medicaid fraud, while not touching benefits for people eligible for the program.

 

Rep. Mike Lawler, R-N.Y., noted that Trump has promised he wouldn't allow Medicaid to be cut.

“The president was clear about that. I was clear about that,” Lawler said. “We will work through this, but the objective today is to begin the process.”