Cowboy Authoritarianism in America
We are at an inflection point. A chill is sweeping the country. We ignore it at our peril. The warning signs are everywhere. Alaska GOP Senator Lisa Murkowski says, “We are all afraid.” Massachusetts Democratic Governor Maura Healey says, “The fear is real.” New York Times columnist Masha Gessen writes, “America’s Police State Has Arrived.” A Columbia University dean told students, “Nobody can protect you. These are dangerous times.” Conservative PBS commentator David Brooks calls for “a civic uprising to fight back and adds: “We have nothing to lose but our chains.” Dissent is being criminalized. People are being deported without any kind of due process. Court rulings are being ignored. Democracy, civil liberties and free speech are all under attack. What can be done to reverse cowboy authoritarianism in America?
Recorded at the University of British Columbia.
Speaker
Heather Cox Richardson
Heather Cox Richardson is a professor of history at Boston College. She previously taught at MIT. She is the recipient of the Baldacci Award for Literary Activism. Her newsletter, Letters from an American, reaches more than a million readers. She’s the author of many books, including How the South Won the Civil War.
American –
Black is not a race.
The word ‘cowboy’ came from the Spanish ‘vaquero’.
I’m from Texas, and we love our cowboys.
Leave my cowboys, alone.
Steven R. Satyavan krolik –
Fear is the result of totalitarianism. Spiritual Democracy is the pathway to internal freedom. Fear is a form of attachment to the illusion that one is not free. Wake up America. Bring us the daily bread and not the idiot’s bullshit. Read Mind Control in the USA by Steven Jacobson. In solidarity. Satyavan Steven.
Daniel Chauvin –
These are indeed some scary times for America. Our system of checks and balances are in the toilet, along with American pride. The USA used to be the ‘gold standard’ and we were respected all over the world. I fear that now we are a laughingstock in most countries. I am very, very sad at what is happening, and I also fear that our programs that the poor (me) rely on are going away. I’m an 83-year-old man, and if the social programs I live on are taken away, I will parish.
James Duncan –
Current times need contextualization, history. HCR, a far cry from HRC, provides it succinctly, completely and beautifully.