George MonbiotThe more I think about it, the more I reckon the 2003 Iraq War began the process that let Trump win. The blatant lies we were told by our governments, the disregard for public opinion and mockery of international law created a rupture that never healed. Trust, consent and cohesion were smashed.🧵 1/3
Yes, things were rotten before. But it was such a breathtaking breach of trust and display of impunity that it broke something subtle but crucial: a belief that, for all their faults, our societies are broadly democratic. The breach has only widened since. As trust collapses, demagogues prosper. 2/3
Many of us warned - repeatedly - before it occurred that the Iraq war would be a huge and fatal shift. We were ignored or shouted down. But I don't think any of us realised just how many monsters would come through the breach. 3/3 www.monbiot.com/category/war...
war – iraq – George Monbiot
war – iraq – George Monbiot
RegTaking economic, social and environmental liberties has been diagnostic trait of neoliberalism since its imposition in the 70s, and the fact that the technology-driven state in Chile was deismantled by those same powers invalidates the claim that neoliberalism is responsible for the recent advances in technology.
I'd say 2008 was the event that led to Trump tho, because the crash raised the spectre of economic reform that authoritarianism avoids.
Stephen Elliott~BuckleyYes, broadly democratic, with asterisks for 19c, 20c and 21c imperialist machines like england
...and the usa, and genocidal, colonial failed states like the c/a/n/a/d/a project.
#cdnpoli #canada #mexico #fascism #antifa #antifascist #elbowsup #bcpoli #vancouver #burnabybc #canlab #bcgreens #bcndp
Michael Graaf@georgemonbiot.bsky.social The first (1991) laid the foundation for the second. It laid to rest the high hopes many had, that the end of the Cold War would bring a peace dividend. And it demonstrated "shock & awe" on live TV.
Simon Johnson@georgemonbiot.bsky.social I agree it was a critical inflection point through which any semblance of rationality or a code of rules was shattered
But I still think 1979/80’s elections if Thatcher & Reagan was the start of the process, systematically and deliberately breaking the postwar consensus, lauding inequality & greed and attacking institutions
I don’t believe Bush & Blair could have shown such utter contempt for the popular will& international law without those foundation
Mirishuli@Simon318ppm @georgemonbiot.bsky.social Simon, you are right. I was 18 when Reagan and Thatcher arrived. They were a force we truly didn’t understand. Susan Faludi’s book Backlash gave me the first clue of how wrong I was.
I thought modernity brought with it the certainty that women and people of color would never be forced out of public life ever again. I was so wrong. Our very lives are on the table now, eclipsing the threat to our right to vote or hold office.
Luca Salgarelli@georgemonbiot.bsky.social I would go back even further, in search of a rupture. I'd go back to the snippet of the famous David Frost's interview to then President Nixon, where the latter stated that "...when the President does it, that means that it is not illegal, by definition". The equation between power and freedom (in this case, to transform illegal acts into legal ones) is at the base of what the US society has transformed itself into.