Fifteen percent of Americans trust the government “to do what’s right almost always or most of the time.” Last September that figure was at 25 percent.
It is no coincidence that during the presidency of John F. Kennedy (JFK), public trust rose from 73% to 78% until January of 1964. That JFK touted an informed openness in government and opposed withholding information from the American people, even giving a speech against secrecy and secret societies, can readily account for that trust.
The precipitous drop in trust corresponds with not just JFK’s assassination in November of 1963 but an aftermath of Oswald’s murder and a perceived secrecy and nondisclosure by succeeding leadership. Even with the Warren Commission Report, which seemed less than exhaustive in citing a lone assassin, a full 75% of Americans continue to believe a conspiracy was involved. A continuing drop was fed by more incredible claims of lone gunmen responsible for the Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King assassinations. Even current media figures – progressive and conservative – chide, even mock, those who believe in a conspiracy.
Somewhere near the beginning of the 1980s, the small surge in trust came with the leadership of Ronald Reagan whose engaging and can-do personality gave Americans a lift, that is until deregulation led to the Savings and Loan debacle, which taxpayers bailed out, and we witnessed a demonstration of Reagan’s arrogant sense of self-righteousness in the illegal arms-dealing with Iran and unauthorized aid to the Contras.
The drop in confidence continued with relentless Republican attacks on government and attacks on Bill Clinton in the 1990s, the latter leading to Clinton’s impeachment for having out-of-wedlock sex.
Another spike in trust came with a unified, patriotic reaction to the 9/11 terrorist attacks and dissipated rather abruptly thereafter, first with the reluctance of the Bush administration to investigate 9/11, followed by a succession of feints: a plethora of unanswered questions, exploitation of fear by Bush leaders, and a seeming attempt to stymie debate with jingoistic obfuscation. The result again was a large percentage of Americans who still believe that the 9/11 attack involved some kind of nefarious scheme.
Thus spanning the period after JFK’s open government is the deception, failures, conservative-spun government derision, and secrecy of several administrations: Lyndon B Johnson’s (LBJ) deceptive launch (Gulf of Tonkin ploy) into the Viet Nam War and the lies and subterfuge during the war; Carter’s inflation woes and hostage rescue failure; Reagan’s claim of government incompetence, the S&L taxpayer bail-out, and the Iran-Contra caper; Bush’s fraudulent march to the Iraqi war and his deceptions accompanying the war and a general political ruthlessness; and finally Obama’s continuation of Bush’s shadow government, an extension of clandestine CIA operations, and a continued favor toward Wall Street.
Couple all this with the Republican strategy to hamstring government at all costs, control of the rich over government at all levels — local, state and federal — and the continued conservative propaganda campaign against government in general, and big-government specifically. Along with this, you have a continual, unthinking state of government ridicule among the people and the media.
Additionally, it doesn’t help the government has excused all of the foregoing criminality in government and Wall Street, especially when government is ill-used to stifle and abuse a citizenry of protest (Occupy Movement), using the militaristic tools that the Bush regime assembled to supposedly fight terrorism.
Republicans are elated to directly contribute to besmirching government: Gingrich shut down Clinton’s government; Bush spent two terms proving the incompetence of his government, including unpardonable FEMA ineptitude regarding Hurricane Katrina deaths; and Republicans uniting in obstructing any government progress during the Obama first term.
People are swept to believe that nothing good can come out of government, but where else are the people going to turn for their safety net, protection against abuses of capitalism, and investment in public endeavors?
Most engaged Americans agree that an enlightened and activist citizenry must exert an informed control over government, voting for their own interests, not against themselves, something vast sums of plutocratic money aim to accomplish through lies and subterfuge in 30 second commercials?
Perhaps in this way we can force the return to an open and truly representative government we once had trust in.
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