we need to talk about Donald.

Clinton v Sanders is important. they have crucial differences and those differences are worth litigating in the public square by passionate advocate-types and dispassionate referee-types. further, the resurgence of socialism as a legitimate political philosophy in american discourse is a development as surprising as it is inspiring, and worthy of its own discussion.

today, though, we need to talk about Donald.

i will not catalog his total disregard for the truth, which has been extensively covered elsewhere. he would also be the first major party presidential nominee in american history with zero political or military experience, but that's not what we need to talk about. the experience he is running on--managing real estate holdings, creating a celebrity persona, and licensing his name to various enterprises--is a parade of failure, fraud, and government bailout, but that's not the real issue.

Donald Trump is a gun to the head of Democracy. while his primary opponents continue under the delusion that they are running for president, Trump is appointing himself General and raising an army. he is drawing the support of the desperate and the frustrated, who believe themselves politically and culturally outnumbered. no conversation, no negotiation or compromise, will turn the tide in their favor. the only course of action is to smash their enemies to bits.

violence erupts regularly at his rallies, violence which he refuses to condemn, and in most cases actively encourages. in this he is clever but deeply unwise--the ghosts he summons have more power than he can possibly hope to control. conventional political constraints do not seem to apply: since the 60s, a vague awareness of the judgment of history has tended to check the racial pyromania of all but the most fringe politicians. Trump, however, appears unconcerned at his historical role as a warrior for white supremacy in the age of the first black president in a nation founded on black slavery. he is the political equivalent of a suicide bomber, an enemy you cannot defeat politically for political death is meaningless to him.

it's the violence that unsettles me most, for political violence is the death of Democracy. Democracy can best be understood as a concession to a rather bleak reality: that any group of people will necessarily disagree on questions large and small. when governments are founded on force and violence, it is the faction with the strongest and most ruthless army that will rule over the rest of us. disagreements are settled with blood. the winners are not the most righteous or deserving or persuasive or intelligent, but simply the most heavily armed. Democracy is the only governing system in human history that acknowledges the inevitability of our disagreements and devises a system to resolve them without violence. in theory, the weakest have as much voice as the strongest. this is the ideal, and while it has never fully been achieved, it is an ideal that we have tried to get closer and closer to as our own democracy has matured over the past 235 years. i am not a religious person, but the ideal of Democracy is as close to a sacred ideal as i hold.

Democracy is also very hard work, infuriating and unsexy work, full of half-loaf compromises and concessions to dastardly opponents. partisans of all stripes can easily find themselves daydreaming of a strongman who will bulldoze the opposition and enact our personal political wish list. the problem remains that there are 320 million of us and not one of those wish lists is alike. Democracy requires our acceptance of the fact that none of us will get exactly what we want, but each of us will have a say in the laws that govern us. the right of self-government was purchased with the blood of patriots from Lexington to Gettysburg to Selma. this right is precious, and it is not inevitable.

i don't believe Trump will win. i believe a majority of voters are embarrassed by the grossness of his racist and sexist persona, and do not wish to be represented on the global stage by his words and actions. what worries me is that the seal has been broken, that future politicians will be tempted to open the same poisonous toolbox when building their ladder to power. Trump, i believe, is not the end of a chapter but the beginning of one.