David M Perry: Trump team is trying to bury the evidence against them
I believe
that the Trump administration runs Washington as a classically
corrupt authoritarian regime, using the power of the federal government not
only to funnel resources to its cronies, but also to conceal its activities.
The Washington Post recently reported on the pulling or replacing of photo
documentation critical of Trump at the National Archives and Library of Congress, and a recent New York Times op-ed by Columbia historian Matthew
Connelly sounded an alarm about the urgent need to preserve key documentation
of the Trump administration and its actions.
What's more, beyond
the intentional destruction of records, impeachment has demonstrated the
intensification of a deep epistemic crisis in which Americans are not only
divided by our political affiliations and policy preferences, but basic beliefs
about what's really happening. This separation is intensified by the right-wing
media ecosystem and a Trump administration that deems the very principle of
legislative oversight unconstitutional. What can we do?
Countries trying to
recover from such periods of chaos or misrule have often, in recent decades,
turned to truth commissions designed to counteract the deceit
and historical revisionism of oppressive regimes. Often associated with the
overthrow of South African apartheid, these types of bodies in fact are
surprisingly common. The ability to promote healing varies -- often based on whether they have the power to put recommendations into effect, but at the least they
often provide what political scientist Elin Skaar has called a "rudimentary sketching of a common narrative."... read more:
