“The people have spoken – the bastards.”
I do not understand my country. I do not understand the motivations of a large number of American citizens. To be fair, I never loved Hillary. I thought Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders would have been far better. But Donald Trump is a gasoline fueled dumpster fire. He is a liar, who cheats his contractors and employees, games the system, and abuses women. The closest thing I can find to a redeeming feature is that he changes his positions so often, no one really knows what he believes or wants.
The GOP campaign was a deluge of lies. Trump would utter falsehoods at the slightest excuse – and his followers believed or excused them. He would deny he said things for which there was clear proof that he had said those things. Non-partisan fact checks found that his statements were more often false than true – but too many people never seemed to care, or accused the fact checkers of bias.
I heard Clinton called ‘Lying Hillary’, though fact checkers found her to be the most honest candidate in the election, followed closely by Sanders. They called her ‘Crooked Hillary’, though some 25 years of investigations have found nothing to even warrant charging her, much less convict her. There is no doubt she was the candidate of the establishment, and this was very much an anti-establishment election.
People want to “Make America great again.” But what really made America great? To my mind, it was a willingness to embrace the new – a willingness to look forward – a willingness to work for the common good – a willingness to work together in spite of party.
Today, all that has been thrown aside. Worse yet, it has been thrown aside by an archaic electoral system. Hillary won the popular vote by 165,000 as of the last I checked. I guess I should be slightly reassured by the narrow popular vote victory, but the election was still lost.
Where do we go from here? The biggest problem is that the election and Trump’s rhetoric has emboldened and empowered bigotry, racism, misogyny, xenophobia, homophobia, and anti-Semitism. These are the people who have ‘taken their country back’. But what about the rest of us? What about those of us who believe all of us were created equal? What about those of us who believe we are all entitled to equal rights, equal opportunity, fairness, and a justice system that does not discriminate against anyone?
As of January, the Republican party will control the presidency, the Senate, the Congress, the Supreme Court (as soon as they can approve his pick), a clear majority of state legislatures, and a clear majority of governorships.
What happens next? We know that Trump and the GOP want to repeal Obamacare, but have no clear program to replace it. We know that Trump and the GOP want to slash taxes on the wealthy, which will either mean soaring deficits or higher taxes on middle and working classes. We know that Trump and the GOP want to repeal marriage equality, though that would take at least two Supreme Court justices to do. We know that Trump and the GOP want to overturn Roe vs Wade, which may only take one justice to do.
They have already shown their hand in many ways. Under the guise of voter fraud, which in truth is virtually nonexistent, they have curtailed voting rights for minorities – and even bragged about their success in keeping blacks away from the polls. They’ve passed laws requiring welfare recipients to take drug tests, even though that has been both costly and ineffective. They’ve passed so-called religious freedom laws, to allow people to freely discriminate against gays and minorities.
They are firmly opposed to an increase in the minimum wage. They want to break unions and reverse laws and regulations protecting workers. They want to gut environmental protection, though Republicans were among the notable people establishing those laws. They want to gut Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. Education will only be those who can afford it.
Today I can only weep for my country and despair over where it was headed.
No comments:
Post a Comment