This country’s descent into authoritarianism was inevitable. Both major parties have treated blue-collar workers in this country as second-class citizens for over 50 years, giving them nothing but lip service as their incomes declined to a fraction of what they were. Many of them feel angry and powerless and for good reason. 

As a result, many of them were ready to support anyone who promised to improve their lives, so were easy prey for a demagogue.  

Seeing videos of ICE dragging people out of their homes without warrants and disregarding the rule of law is chilling. The president offered colleges a deal: in return for giving up your First Amendment rights, we’ll give you money. This is a blatant violation of the First Amendment. Such examples of how the country has descended into authoritarianism leave me confused, angry and sad.

Aren’t we, as a country, better than this? Do the words of “America the Beautiful” not still move and inspire us? We’re not a perfect country and never were, yet there is so much to applaud in “the American Experiment.”

My mother was a second-generation American, my father first-generation. They had good lives here, much better lives than they would have had they stayed in their countries of birth. I remain immeasurably  grateful that America took them in.

Let us not throw away the good with the bad that, as a nation, we’ve worked so hard to achieve!

Daniel Strauss
Brunswick