När demokratin blir som ett ruttnande löv.

Foto: Håkan Eklund. Åbo 2017.

Läser min dagliga New York Times där  en undersökning som gjorts i 37 olika länder visar den himmelsvida skillnad av respekt man har mellan sittande, och föregående president i USA.

Siffrorna beträffande vad de anser om att " - - - the U.S. president to do the right thing regarding world affairs", talar ett tydligt språk.

Av dessa länder är det bara i Ryssland och i Israel där man litar mera på Trump, dvs. gillar honom bättre än Obama.

I 35 länder är man av helt motsatt åsikt. I Sverige ansåg 93 % att de litade på Obama, endast 10 % litar på Trump. I Storbritannien är motsvarande siffror  79 % för Obama, 22 % för Trump (troligen från olika, eftersom 100 inte är det totala).

I samma artikel (The Self-Destruction of American Democracy) av Thomas B. Edsall tar han med några utdrag ur nya böcker som beskriver hur demokratin i USA snabbt monteras ner av trumpen och hans anhang.

" - - - In the introduction to their forthcoming book, “How Democracies Die,” Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt, political scientists at Harvard, write:

Over the past two years, we have watched politicians say and do things that are unprecedented in the United States — but that we recognize as having been the precursors of democratic crisis in other places. We feel dread, as do so many other Americans, even as we try to reassure ourselves that things can’t really be that bad here.

Their attempt at reassurance is not comforting:

American politicians now treat their rivals as enemies, intimidate the free press, and threaten to reject the results of elections. They try to weaken the institutional buffers of our democracy, including the courts, intelligence services, and ethics offices. American states, which were once praised by the great jurist Louis Brandeis as ‘laboratories of democracy,’ are in danger of becoming laboratories of authoritarianism as those in power rewrite electoral rules, redraw constituencies, and even rescind voting rights to ensure that they do not lose. And in 2016, for the first time in U.S. history, a man with no experience in public office, little observable commitment to constitutional rights, and clear authoritarian tendencies was elected president.

In an email, Levitsky argued that “it is important that we understand that the U.S. has largely been doing these things to itself,” before adding, “obviously we should investigate Russian meddling to the fullest, but to blame Putin for the mess we are in today would be ridiculous. We Americans created this mess.” - - -

2017-11-30 19:51   Dubbelolle

Mycket intressant läsning, undrar vad som ska hända, känns som att utredningarna om Rysslands inblandning bara får fortsätta utan att leda nån vart, ett mycket märkligt land är det som bara låter Trumpen hållas, det räcker nu, han riskerar världsfreden.
Fin bild på ruttnande löv, såna motiv gillar jag! Hälsn, LO