The health of American democracy, as measured by those who study it most closely, has settled into a diminished state – stabilizing after a sharp decline last year, but still well below the levels recorded at any point before the start of Donald Trump’s second term, according to a new survey released on Tuesday.
The findings, by the nonpartisan democracy-tracking project Bright Line Watch, which surveys hundreds of US scholars at American colleges and universities, suggest that the erosion of norms detected after Trump’s return to the White House last year has hardened into a new baseline. The public also holds a dim view of American democracy, the most recent survey found, but are sharply divided along partisan lines over how well the system is functioning.
It goes beyond “charitable interpretation” and into magical thinking to argue that it has somehow stabilized.
A paramilitary death squad is “helping out” with security checks for travel, we’re marching right along the path to the end of any premise of privacy or anonymity on the internet, and the Pentagon just threw the press out of the building. And that’s just YESTERDAY.