EP 754 Is MAGA Really About America First?

 

Viktor Orban?  Vladimir Putin? Turkey’s strongman Erdogan?  Is that the traditional leader America wants to hold up as an exemplar for a nation built on universal principles of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all?  Maybe we’ve never achieved those lofty aspirations, but we never said let’s take our form of government–a democratic republic–and trade it in for a dictatorial approach, which excludes those who do not fit in. Yet, a serious analysis suggests to many that the MAGA movement has a more dated vision of America which yearns for a past built on supremacy of white ethno-nationalism and Christian Fundamentalism. And this fervor has engulfed one of the two major parties in America. While history informs us that this strain of bending at the knees of dictators has a long tradition in the Republican Party(look up the appeasers to Hitler in America in the lead up to WWII)but never has it taken over the party root and branch. Jacob Heilbrunn in his new book “America Last: The Right’s Century-Long Romance with Foreign Dictators” reminds us of the strong tie between those in the GOP who want to maintain the rules-based international order that has served America so well since 1945 and those, like Trump, who want to let Russia “do whatever the hell it wants” with NATO allies who don’t pay their fair share.  The inmates have taken over the asylum of the GOP.  Is the country next?

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