Dipshit Insurrection, Elections, Jamie O, Political Crack, The Darnold

Yes, November Is About Democracy

Recently, I had a discussion/light argument with a friend who is a Biden supporter. He thinks the stuff about Trump ending democracy if he wins is overblown. After all, he says, this is America.

Now, he’s not a dumb guy, but merely an example of what Gore Vidal talked about: Americans never learn anything because they never remember anything, we are the United States of Amnesia. My counter to him was respectful, the guy’s a friend, and I’ll lay it out here.

January 6, 2021, was the first time since the Civil War that a transfer of power was not peaceful. So, we’ve already seen violence around Trump, and the question isn’t will there be violence, the question is will there be MORE violence?

Trump has not exactly backed down on a threat of more violence in 2024 if he loses. The legal system has done well responding to the attack itself, nailing the leaders of the Oathkeepers and the Proud Boys. But it’s been incapable of containing Trump himself. His counter was basically the strength of our American system, but our American legal structure is rotted from within. We have two openly seditionist Supreme Court justices, possibly more. We have another judge in the Trump classified documents case that’s more or less another defense lawyer. We do have the election interference case currently in the hands of the jury, but my concern is despite this being a huge scandal in a normal time, people view it as “just paying off a porn star.” Not to mention, it reveals yet more proof that Trump is a serial rapist.

Congressional oversight and executive branch internal checks have failed as well. Surviving the Ukraine extortion impeachment and the second impeachment taught Trump that Congressional action is not only weak, it’s also really toothless. There were enough Republicans who are not Liz Cheney to enable Trump to skate past with little consequence (notice how often “twice impeached Donald Trump” is mentioned in the media anymore?). Executive branch internal checks were largely ineffective and will be even less effective in a second Trump term. Going on about The Glorious Glory of Our Glorious System (Angelic Choir) throughout Trump’s term became not only obviously wrong but at a certain point rather pathetic and detached from what was occurring.

I will add that the people lecturing everyone in 2017 that our system’s guardrails will control Trump so he cannot do much damage are also the same people now lecturing us that Congress, the DOJ, and the courts can’t really do anything.

That leads me to the Republican Party, which is now completely infected with the Trump virus. Almost all anti-Trump Republicans have been purged from the party, in fact, as you might have noticed, the RNC is now run by Trump’s Other Dumb Blonde Daughter, Lara. He also has the full backing of their administrative apparatus. There will be no General Kelly or Rex Tillerson calling Trump a moron and trying to tamp down his worst urges. In fact, MAGA has gone full think tank, with Project 2025, an organized plan to install an American version of fascism. Even Trump’s most vocal critic in the primary, Nikki Haley, fell into line.

Despite all this, my friend also clings like a person clinging to a tree caught in a flash flood to the idea that “everyone’s nature is to be good” so it will be okay and my goodness, have we rolled snake eyes in America on that one. That Trump is in a dead heat right now speaks to a large part of the American people either being dumb, misinformed and yes, not very good. I will also add that we failed a huge test of communal goodness during COVID, when we saw firsthand what happens to a nation that is addicted to the concept of rugged individualism and has to make sacrifices to protect each other from a deadly virus.

But really, I can’t blame my friend for thinking this. He’s a low-information voter, mainly paying attention to the New York Times, NPR, and similar sources for news. For example, Trump annihilated post-election norms, which includes a concession speech, an orderly transition, and an outgoing president hosting the incoming president. None of this happened in early 2017, an extraordinary occurrence in our history, yet it’s rarely discussed in the media as a factor in 2024.

I will get more into this media malpractice in a future post, but the New York Times is openly hostile to Joe Biden, and at times it seems decisions are made to protect Trump. Here is just one glaring example:

So, I think I gave my friend a lot to think about. He was always going to vote for Biden, but there probably are people who are not aware of Biden’s achievements and plans for the future and think the threat of Trump is not that big of a deal. It’s important that when we encounter people like this, we make the case to them why Trump’s threat is very real. Hopefully, I gave some ammo for that discussion.

We need everyone we know to go out and Vote Against the Crook.

 

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