There are armed troops on the streets of the nation’s capital. A growing number of sick and aging Americans are without access to meaningful healthcare. Medical and climate science are in retreat. What is left of the cultural heartbeat of the nation is under attack, while millions of immigrants face the prospect of masked thugs dragging them from their lives. And America sleeps.

As the cesspool that is US President Donald Trump’s administration grows deeper each day, corporate greed and corruption are gushing forth in an unrepentant torrent while any semblance of good governance is tossed into the bonfire that is today’s America. And America sleeps.

But wait, what about the sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein evidence, former US President Barack Obama’s treason, supposedly doctored economic numbers and the Alaska summit? Each is a shiny object meant to distract attention from those purposefully tearing apart the institutional framework of America. That framework was surely flawed before Trump and his cabal showed up, but now what was deeply flawed is fully dysfunctional. And America sleeps.

The shameful quest by an ignorant fool for a Nobel Peace Prize and the shocking story of a wealthy sex trafficker and pedophile, his accomplices and the scores of sleazebags who paid the freight for sex with trafficked girls still seem to grip the national media. Meanwhile, the images of government officials mindlessly untethered from delivering humane public service have all but faded from view. Distraction is the goal, and America sleeps.

Where, amid the deepening morass, are those with an amplified voice? Most, if not all, are sitting on the sidelines armed with silent megaphones. No voice can be heard that chooses to be silent. No one who chooses to be compromised can deliver a message worthy of respect.

Absence of accountability

For me, I don’t care about a Swedish peace prize, Epstein, celebrity lowlife and the like. But it is way past time for some measure of accountability to have emerged from the stench if the resistance was having any meaningful impact. Although accountability can take many forms and is easily diluted, without some substantive accountability, there will be no chance of stopping the complete erosion of the moral foundation required for good governance and solid public policy.

The accountability that I want to see is specific and personal accountability for the brutal undermining of the US government and the pervasive cruelty that process has embraced. I want to see Trump and his cabal paraded through the streets in shame. I want the Justices of the Supreme Court who now cower behind a secret shadow docket removed from office in disgrace. I want to see the vermin at the head of today’s Department of Justice, Health and Human Services, the State Department and the Department of Education, to name a few, each ensnared by the rule of law they so callously have ignored.

There should be a special measure of accountability reserved for those in America’s governments, old and new. They now stand by silently as children continue to die of preventable starvation in Gaza’s genocide, as America continues to arm those who are directly responsible for the demented disaster they have fomented together.

Amid all of this, the nation’s Democrats wallow in platitudes and mutually masturbatory indignation. They seem utterly incapable of a cohesive call to action, or even to identify actions that might aggressively confront an immoral, mendacious and motivated adversary. It is clear to me that Trump is an incompetent and woefully ignorant leader, devoid of empathy and moral grounding, yet he never misses an opportunity to put his megaphone to “good” use. Why is there no loud and convincing response?

America’s pathetic pantheon

Meanwhile, where are Joe Biden, Obama and George W. Bush, our three most recent presidents not named Trump, who each told us of the nation’s greatness and sold us on their devotion to its constitutional framework and their capacity to steward the reins of government? Each in his own way is nowhere to be found in defense of the very institutions he once led and the oaths he once took. Obama, at least, is good now and again for an entertaining moment, but then seems to rapidly disappear after again putting nothing on the line. Forget the Republicans who have individually sworn an oath that each, I believe, never had any intention of honoring.

It doesn’t stop there. Where are the labor unions, past masters of organizing human capital for a cause? Where are the women’s groups, ever eager for a good march, but never eager for a real fight? Where are black and brown leaders, whose followers have so much to lose?

And where, Lordy where, are the collective clergy, watching America torn apart in the name of white Christian nationalism by white Christians? Sure, everyone from a pastor to a Pope can conjure up a good Christian homily, but actually challenging their flocks to reject the Christianity of hate is hard to find. Just as hard to find are the Jewish and Muslim leaders who are committed to fighting antisemitism and anti-Muslim sentiment in our midst, who have the clarity of conscience to fully examine some uncomfortable aspects of its actual causes.

It is easy to add others to the pathetic pantheon of those with reason to confront the dismantling of governance in America and the nation’s freefall to kleptocracy, but who, so far, have failed to find a collective voice. There are academic institutions worried less about teaching morality than discarding it, and big law firms so ready to fight for the rich and powerful yet so timid in fighting against them. Also, add the restaurants, retailers, contractors and childcare providers who are quick to employ and underpay the immigrants who sustain their businesses, but absent themselves from any resistance to the cruelty in their midst.

Where are also the voices of resistance and those with the courage to resist among the fired, demoted and disgusted federal employees? There is a megaphone ready for each and every one of them to tell the American people their story and about the often-unseen impact their work had on the quality of our lives. It could be a truly powerful collective message of the real human toll being extracted every day at the hands of Trump’s legions.

Finally, where are the voices of those charged with curating and preserving the nation’s cultural heritage and presenting the nation’s history in all its glory and shame? The absence of these voices now may tell us more about our future than any of those voices has ever told us about our past.

America sleeps as it descends

There will be more to this fetid story, but none of it will lead to a happy ending. While America sleeps and nightmares mount, the nation’s promise slips ever further from reality. Unless there is an awakening that foments an uncompromising insistence on accountability that cannot be ignored, there will be no going back anytime soon. Even then, what if simply going back has little to do with America’s promise and much more to do with America’s delusions of grandeur?

America is on a clear path to the worst that it can be. Someday, if resistance somehow prevails, there might possibly be a fleeting moment to critically examine the delusional morass that spawned today’s America. And we might actually strive to create an America of promise for all who choose to live there.

[Hard Left Turn first published this piece.]

[Lee Thompson-Kolar edited this piece.]

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy.