cover of episode Jon Meacham on How the Trump Fever Breaks

Jon Meacham on How the Trump Fever Breaks

2023/3/31
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Kelefa Sanneh
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David Remnick：特朗普对民主的蔑视是事实，他煽动叛乱企图阻止合法选举，至今未受到任何惩罚。他再次竞选总统，这关系到美国是否会有近半数选民投票给一位公开的独裁人物。特朗普公然表示法律规则不应适用于他本人，如果他输掉选举，就不应该遵守自由和公平选举的结果。 Jon Meacham：美国历史上出现独裁人物并不新鲜，但令人震惊的是，如此多的人愿意放弃他们的良知去支持他。很多人错误地认为，在上次大选和1月6日事件之后，威权主义的势头会消退，这是一种巨大的幻想。当前的政治形势与以往不同，它关乎本质上的差异，而非程度上的差异。特朗普主义并非不可避免，共和党长期以来对特朗普主义的纵容并非必然。他认为特朗普主义是对美国核心价值观的根本威胁，并愿意为此贡献力量。他认为当前的美国局势类似于1933年或1968年，也可能类似于1850年代，存在着对现实本身的竞争性观点。美国内战表明，一些问题无法通过政治手段解决，需要通过武力解决。拜登面临着与林肯类似的历史重担，其成功与否关系到美国的未来。战胜特朗普以及纠正美国的错误，需要全体美国人民的努力，而非仅仅依靠总统一人。他认为特朗普对共和党基层的控制力很强，德桑蒂斯很难赢得提名。一位面临指控的前总统寻求连任，这在美国历史上是史无前例的。打败特朗普需要为宪法秩序和人类平等的承诺而奋斗。他对于共和党人为了维护美国实验而投票给其他党派的候选人感到困惑。只有特朗普及其支持者失败，"特朗普热"才能消退。美国民主的维护是一场持续的斗争，需要不断努力。 Jon Meacham: Having a dictatorial figure is not new, either in human experience or American history. What is new is that so many people are willing to suspend their better judgment to support him. This is not 1976. This isn't 1980. This isn't a difference of degree, which is what presidential elections tend to be. Trumpism was not inevitable. I believe that Trumpism is a fundamental threat to the things that we have long held dear. So I thought that our current moment was like 1933 or 1968, where there were proto-fascist forces. I am increasingly concerned...that this is the 1850s, that in fact there are competing visions of reality itself. It was not settled by a congressional debate. It was not settled by a brooking seminar. It was not settled through the ordinary protocols of politics. It was settled by the sword, by the Civil War...The fever only breaks if they lose.

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The discussion focuses on the gravity of Trump's threat to democracy and the implications of his potential presidency, highlighting the vulnerability of American democracy and the willingness of many to support an autocratic figure.

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In 2018, at the midpoint of the Trump Presidency, the journalist and historian Jon Meacham wrote a book called “The Soul of America,” warning of the gravity of Trump’s threat to democracy. This was hardly a unique point of view, but Meacham’s particular way of putting things, steeped in a critical reverence for American history, hit home with one reader in particular: Joe Biden. In the years since, Meacham became an informal adviser to Biden, helping him recently with the State of the Union address. Meacham, who has written biographies of Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, George H. W. Bush, John Lewis, and, now, Abraham Lincoln, reflects on the vulnerability of American democracy in the current moment, with an overt autocrat as the leading Republican contender for the next Presidential election. “Having a dictatorial figure is not new either in human experience or American history. What is new is that so many people are willing to suspend their better judgment to support him,” he says. “I am flummoxed to some extent at the durability of partisan feeling.” Plus, the music critic Kelefa Sanneh on a fleet of artists bringing fresh sounds to what has become the least cool genre: mainstream rock. He shares tracks by HARDY, Giovannie & the Hired Guns, AVOID, and Jelly Roll.