Recent Trends in Restrictions on Freedoms by a Totalitarian State
Two and a half centuries ago, the Founding Fathers of the United States forged what has become regarded as a “living document” with the U.S. Constitution that has managed to weather numerous conflicts, including a civil war, two world wars and dozens of regional clashes over the years. This foundation in liberty is being threatened by some politicians today to the point of making the United States a totalitarian state, including most especially the current occupant of the Oval Office. For example, in their article, “Three warning signs of ideological totalitarianism” (September 8, 2020), Sharansky and Troy make the point that more than 3 decades after the collapse of the former Soviet Union, “embers of the kind of totalitarian thinking that spawned the Communist Revolution are inflaming Western debate — and inciting Americans” (para. 2).

In truth, not all Americans are being thus incited, and the so-called “silent majority” continues to muddle along, hoping things will get better soon. There are a sufficient number of “incited” Americans that are advocating totalitarian rhetoric, however, to generate significant concern from domestic and international observers that the United States is headed down an irreversible path that leads to outright totalitarianism. In this regard, Sharansky and Troy (2020) emphasize that, “America remains light years away from a culture of secret police, informers, kangaroo courts and Gulags. But the stakes are too high not to react to the slightest drifts in that direction” (para. 3).

Indeed, the stakes are high but the republic has been down this road before where civil liberties have been limited and totalitarian methods used to maintain domestic control. Since the nation’s founding, the level of civil liberties afforded the American public has tended to ebb and flow as circumstances dictated,...…people that the nation’s ideals and values are worth saving and even fighting and dying for if necessary, irrespective of what the commander-in-chief might think about such supreme sacrifices to the contrary. In fact, this is the essence of what spelled the end of the Soviet totalitarian regime. For example, according to Sharansky and Troy (2020), “No matter how loud they shouted, many Soviet citizens thought such exercises absurd. But they hid their real thoughts because speaking honestly was dangerous” (para. 6).

Today, the American electorate has the opportunity and profound responsibility to place the nation back on course by “speaking honestly” at the ballot box this November and providing the United States with another chance at redemption. The United States has achieved and contributed far too much to humankind to allow the nation to spiral down a Trumpian totalitarian toilet. Although it may take several generations to restore America’s credibility…