America: Land of Fears and Nightmares

Otherwise the darkness now eclipsing the edge of town will become permanent.

My wife and I saw Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band on April 7th at the KIA Forum in Inglewood. After the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis, Springsteen channeled his outrage into a protest song, “Streets of Minneapolis,” and a quickly arranged Land of Hopes and Dreams American tour. It’s a big production, with a quartet of backup singers, a horn section, percussion, and the addition of Tom Morello on guitar and vocals. The band has lost saxophonist Clarence Clemons and keyboardist Danny Federici over the years, but Nils Lofgren, Steven Van Zandt, Garry Tallent, Max Weinberg, Jake Clemons, Roy Bittan and Soozie Tyrell are still playing as well as ever. Bruce is 76 now but played for three hours, one song coming on the heels of another. It was an incredible performance that delivered the goods; as Bruce shared when he came out on stage, the purpose of the tour is to use the righteous power of art, music, and rock & roll to protest our Mad King and the dangerous decline of our institutions. Job done in Inglewood.

I’ve been a Springsteen fan and admirer for nearly 40 years. I read his autobiography and have a book of his song lyrics, and have long felt that he speaks to a specific sensibility that I happen to share, even though it’s being severely tested by Donald Trump and his MAGA cult. Never let anyone convince you that ethics, morality, truth, compassion and decency don’t matter, said Bruce at one point, because they do. These are the values and practices that make a country worth living in, that make life’s possibilities achievable. If you don’t believe this, look around, see what our government is doing to our 250-year-old republic, and what it portends for the next generation.

As an idea of self-government America was always risky and tenuous, dependent on an educated and engaged citizenry. This was its genius and its fatal weakness. Our basic ideals — freedom, liberty, justice for all — ran against the grain of history, of popes, barons, monarchs and dukes. Yet, for 250 years, even the worst American presidents at least paid lip service to our foundational ideas. Until Donald Trump. Our Mad King, who threatened to destroy Iran and its people in a single night, in a blazing act of genocide; I read Trump’s threat as a declaration of his intent to use nuclear weapons, and no longer can this be seen as alarmist. All the guardrails, restraints and systemic governors are gone, broken by the wayside, trampled and smashed.

By now, after ten years of madness and desecration, Trump’s cycle of action should be well understood: he makes a terrible decision that produces immediate negative consequences, then rushes in with some tepid and half-baked solution — sometimes tangible, sometimes a total fabrication — declares the problem solved, then launches a self-congratulatory media blitz. It’s the old story of an arsonist playing the role of fire chief, perpetrator and hero. The corporate media falls for it every time, as if reporters and their craven editors have never before seen the gambit.

Time will prove the destructive consequences of Trump’s illegal War of Choice against Iran. The United States has already lost — the world order we created, primarily for our benefit — is over and we find ourselves in an interregnum, between a dying order and one yet to be born. On February 27th, the Strait of Hormuz was an international waterway with free passage for all nations; now, this vital economic chokepoint is controlled by Iran. On February 27th, Iran’s leadership wasn’t hellbent on enriching uranium for military purposes; they now have every logical incentive to do so, and they will. On February 27th, Iran was subject to crippling US economic sanctions; today those sanctions are a bargaining chip. Through stupidity, madness, arrogance and self-delusion, Donald Trump has strengthened the oppressive Iranian regime.

Well played, Dumb Donny, well played.

And here’s something else. Our bosom ally, Israel, a regime even more murderous than our own, has its own incentives and reasons for undermining any agreement the US and Iran might negotiate.

For one evening at least, I felt my spirit and soul reinforced by the righteous power of art, music and rock & roll, and when Bruce Springsteen assured the sold-out Forum that the American people would survive this dark time, I believed him. I still do, but people, we’ve got to get to work, otherwise the darkness now eclipsing the edge of town will become permanent.