There's no escaping Trump -- or the imperial presidency that preceded him

In 1974 Arthur Schlesinger Jr. wrote a book about the “Imperial Presidency” – an anti-constitutional trend toward a robust executive. The two presidents who preceded Trump pushed the envelope on executive power further than any since FDR. George W. Bush’s post 9/11 security state was followed by Barack Obama’s “pen and phone” strategy to advance his agenda without help from a Republican Congress. Thus continued the inexorable trend toward imperialism, where no president of either party took it upon themselves to reverse it and constrain their own power.

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Neil Postman has become a Trumpian Nostradamus of sorts, with his prophetic 1985 tome about how television has a corrosive effect on politics and public discourse. In Amusing Ourselves to Death, he wrote about how the written word requires rational argument and nuance whereas television demands a higher entertainment value with a greater emphasis on images. Social media has exacerbated this, making our discourse not only grounded in images but in brevity. Gifs, 140 characters, meme lords.

Enter When he orchestrated a massive rally, the Air Force One theme song echoing over the loudspeaker, and delivered the message that “I alone can fix it” – his voters believed him, in part because over time they had been socialized to the idea that presidents can act alone and that Trump was a boardroom CEO who could make executive decisions.

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