To the Decisive Year Ahead

“You must not weaken in any way in your alert and vigilant frame of mind.  Though holiday rejoicing is necessary to the human spirit, yet it must add to the strength and resilience with which every man and woman turns again to the work they have to do, and also to the outlook and watch they have to keep on public affairs. …

[W]e have yet to make sure … that the words, ‘freedom,’ [and] ‘democracy’ … are not distorted from their true meaning as we have understood them.  There would be little use in punishing the Hitlerites for their crimes if law and justice did not rule, and if totalitarian or police governments were to take [their] place ….”

• British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, May 13, 1945

Before our last 4^th of July holiday, I quoted these remarks by Mr. Churchill in these pages – which he delivered to the British people on a date after the fall of Nazi Germany but before the defeat of Imperial Japan, and as the indications of Soviet Russia’s designs for eastward European territorial domination were first appearing – and there’s at least an even chance I’ll cite them at least once more before another of our 2024 national holidays.  There has not been a time in over 75 years in which they have been as relevant as they are today, as former President Donald Trump, unabashedly using rhetoric that is often a direct lift from Adolf Hitler, seems poised to win the presidential nomination of a major American political party whose adherents now consist of the fascist, the poisonously tribal, the cowardly, or the blind.

For most of my lifetime, presidential elections have been won by the candidate that was most effective at obtaining the votes of those in the political middle of our electorate.  More recently, given a closely-divided, hyper-polarized polity in which virtually all of our citizens have hardened leanings either right or left, winning has involved turnout – i.e., which side is better able to squeeze more votes out of its supporters.

This year, if democracy is to be preserved – assuming that Mr. Trump does win the Republican nomination – the supporters of the Democrat opposing him – overwhelmingly likely to be President Joe Biden – will need to be good at both.  Democrats will need to persuade enough of the disaffected and disappointed – particularly among minorities and the young – that it does matter for their futures to go to the polls to vote against Mr. Trump.  At the same time, Democrats will need to convince enough older voters who would in normal times lean toward a traditional Republican candidate that what matters in 2024 is preserving democracy — that there will always be another election in 2028 if Mr. Biden is reelected, no matter what he does.

It must be faced:  Mr. Trump’s cultish supporters will not leave him, and will show up on Election Day.  Mr. Biden’s seemingly increasing physical infirmity and what certainly appears to be a mishandled situation at our southern border clearly hurt his prospects.  The animating issue of abortion, together with what increasingly appears will be a soft economic landing and Mr. Trump’s chilling fascist rhetoric, are obviously powerful political assets to help Democrats persuade the open-minded.  Foreign policy (our apparently waning willingness to continue to support Ukraine, and our clearly dwindling patience with Israel’s manifestly indiscriminate destruction of Gaza) and the outcomes of Mr. Trump’s criminal and civil court proceedings are political wildcards.

It’s going to be that close.       

So as we celebrate the dawn of another year that has been given us, and amid whatever other New Year’s resolutions you may be contemplating, let me offer this:  consider how you might, as Mr. Churchill suggested over 75 years ago, apply your strength and resilience in the coming year to the work we have to do to preserve our democratic way of life. Don’t let exhaustion win.

Thank you for the honor of allowing me to share these posts with you again in 2023.

May you, your family and friends have a Happy and Healthy New Year.