Words matter. We need to pay close attention to the words used by the president and his advisors, and we need to understand that how they use words tells us a lot about how the administration thinks.
Take Stephen Miller’s appearance on Face the Nation yesterday. Miller is a senior advisor to the president. In response to a question from host John Dickerson about North Korea’s missile launch this way (I’ve highlighted the important language):
So you saw the president following through on exactly what he said he would. He went out last might in front of the TV cameras and stood shoulder to shoulder with the prime minister of Japan and sent a message to the whole world that we stand with our allies. But we’re going to be sending another signal very soon, and that signal is when we begin a great rebuilding of the armed forces of the United States. President Trump campaigned on this. President Trump has led the effort on this. And President Trump is going to go to Congress and ask them to invest in our military so once again we will have unquestioned military strength beyond anything anybody can imagine.
Miller answered a question about his boss’ immigration executive orders this way (again, I’ve bolded the important language):
Well, I think that it’s been an important reminder to all Americans that we have a judiciary that has taken far too much power and become in many case a supreme branch of government. One unelected judge in Seattle cannot remake laws for the entire country. I mean this is just crazy, John, the idea that you have a judge in Seattle say that a foreign national living in Libya has an effective right to enter the United States is — is — is beyond anything we’ve ever seen before.
The end result of this, though, is that our opponents, the media and the whole world will soon see as we begin to take further actions, that the powers of the president to protect our country are very substantial and will not be questioned.
He then goes on, when answering questions about recent immigration raids, to repeatedly use versions of the phrase “keeping the public safe.”
These phrases, taken alone, might seem innocuous. Take them together, however, and the philosophical underpinnings of the current administration come into focus in the broader outlines of the rhetoric. Trump and his team speak in extremes and, in doing so, echo the kind of language used by autocrats throughout history. He doesn’t just envision a military expansion, but a “great rebuilding” to create “unquestioned military strength beyond anything anybody can imagine.”
Forget for a second that we already possess that level of weaponry, the glorification of military strength in this language should trouble all of us. It signals not just that the Trump administration views the power to make war as holding higher value than the value of diplomacy, or that safety is his goal, but that unparalleled military power is a goal unto itself. This kind of marshal attitude can’t help but infect domestic political discourse and the administration’s approach to critics. The administration is sending a signal to “opponents, the media, and the whole world” that the “powers of the president to protect our country are very substantial and will not be questioned.”
These are dangerous words. We are lucky that we live under a Constitution and Bill of Rights that enumerate the powers of each branch of government and the rights we hold as individuals, but that document is only effective as a brake on power if we, as a people, demand that the administration live up to the document’s words. Presidential power already has been inflated and abused — by Kennedy, by Johnson, by Nixon, by Reagan, by Clinton, both Bushes, and Obama. Those presidencies were marked by executive overreach that ultimately was only stemmed by protests and/or by political action. We may have assumed good will on the part of previous presidents — liberals, for instance were lulled into inaction on foreign affairs because they trusted that Obama was honorable — but presidents always push the envelope, seeking to expand their authority, and they leave their successors in a stronger position than they were in when they first entered office. Trump, as I think his language indicates, has an expansive vision of presidential power that, unchecked, will leave the Constitution in tatters.
Our only hope is to push back — through civil disobedience, through the arts and in the media, with our pens and laptops and bodies, by working at the precinct and community level to protect those who are vulnerable and to remove from power those unwilling to stand up to a president who teeters on the precipice of authoritarianism.
“Power, “as Frederick Douglass wrote, “concedes nothing without a demand.” We need to keep making our demands loudly, clearly, and continuously.
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Hank Kalet 