Trumped up
Subtitle: how criminalization of political differences endangers democracy
By: Alan Dershowitz
Publisher: Bombardier Books, an imprint of Post Hill Press
Published: 2017
Language: eng
Number of pages: 193
ISBN-13: 9781974617890
Subjects: Politics and government; Political culture; Public opinion; Polarization (Social sciences); Right and left (Political science)
Description: "In our current age of hyper-partisan politics, nearly everyone takes sides. This is especially true with regard to the Trump presidency. It has become difficult to have a reasonable discussion about the most controversial president in our recent history. For Trump zealots, their president has not only committed no crimes, he has done nothing wrong. For anti-Trump zealots, nothing Trump has done--even in foreign policy--is good. Everything he has done is wrong, and since it is wrong, it must necessarily be criminal. This deeply undemocratic fallacy--that political sins must be investigated and prosecuted as criminal--is an exceedingly dangerous trend. Hardening positions on both sides has been manifested by increasing demands to criminalize political differences. Both sides scream "lock 'em up" instead of making substantive criticisms of opposing views... The vibrant center is weakening, with traditional liberalism and conservatism becoming further apart, not just in approach, but in their respect for Constitutional norms that have served us well for more than two centuries. While Donald Trump is not the only cause of this profound division, his election drew it to the surface and made it the dominant paradigm of political debate. Unless we as a nation begin to focus again on what unites us rather than on what divides us, America might not survive the next decade."--Publisher description.
Notes: "A Bombardier Books book"--Title-page verso.
Table of contents: title: Introduction; title: The run up to the campaign: Bernie Sanders vs. Hillary Clinton; title: The campaign: Donald Trump vs. Hillary Clinton; title: The transition; title: The Trump presidency.