American Curios / Eclipse

They say that the eclipse is a slight interruption of the entire normal order, where day turns into night – some nocturnal animals even come out, other diurnal animals remain silent, stars appear in broad daylight, the temperature drops briefly – only to be rescued shortly after by the solar fire and thus everything returns to how it was but different due to the collective experience that something extraordinary happened.

Maybe that kind of disruption in the political and social sphere will awaken something different in this country, where the threat of something obscene, absurd and dangerous is casting a long shadow over the United States.

Here, without intermission, a tragicomic work proceeds with the potential to be a devastating political earthquake with lethal consequences inside and outside the country. Once again a businessman and star reality show who faces dozens of criminal and civil charges in multiple trials, who promoted an attempted coup d’état, who raped at least one woman and who is accused of sexual abuse by at least 25 others, and is a proven liar and fraudster, He is the presidential candidate of the Republican Party, who for now leads the polls to repeat as president of the most powerful country on the planet. That is, the candidate who openly talks about being a dictator (for a day, he says), who promises to place millions of immigrants – whom he accuses of poison the blood of the country – in concentration camps, which threatens to persecute and repress its critics and opponents with all the force of the State, could have the apocalypse button in its little hands (they say they are very small) again.

This man who repeatedly proclaims himself the savior of America is now selling Bibles for only $59.99; emphasizes that these are the only Bibles endorsed by him (it is worth remembering that after then-President Trump ordered the repression of protesters in front of the White House, he went out to the reconquered park, proceeded to the church on one side, and posed for the cameras with a Bible that he held, without realizing it, upside down).

Here President Biden, human and civil rights organizations, analysts and even several traditional conservatives warn that democracy itself is at stake in the next election. The word fascism has returned to the political vocabulary – even some of the living World War II veterans have declared that they did not go to fight fascism in Europe only for it to now break out here at home – and not only in the mouths of liberals, but of Republicans and traditional conservatives.

If that’s true, perhaps what’s most alarming for now is that this has yet to provoke a massive, ferocious response. Of course, there are initiatives and protests – for example the Women’s March, which organized massive marches for women’s rights in the past, is calling for a week of action of feminists against fascists At the end of this month and in various parts of the country, forums are held to confront the threats fascists– but there is still no national resistance movement beyond calling to vote against Trump and his allies. But once again the question of whether passarán o no.

Sometimes one can imagine those movies and novels about the rise of European fascism, and why more was not done at the beginning to stop it, that people said that Hitler and Mussolini were clowns and that danger should not be exaggerated, until suddenly, it was too late. Those movies where the Nazis arrested those they suspected of being untrustworthy with that chilling phrase: your papers please. The new state anti-immigrant law of Texas, for now frozen by the courts, is just that, and has the nickname of the law Show me your papers.

I wish that a total political and social eclipse could interrupt what is happening here every day, and with it the possibility of another light (or at least better lenses) reappears.

Cabaret: Welcome. https://open.spotify.com/track/4y2lE9LIfJIgdtCqRBkOGA?si=ae434096aab74379 y Cabaret. https://open.spotify.com/track/7AFy1aN1RQVgGOXzCtrK87?si=1d417d62ef2249ab.