In the summer of 1982 I resided in Ocean City, MD. One night a friend and I, after several hours at an uptown bar, were awaiting a city bus to take us back downtown. My friend had recently been injured and was on crutches. As the bus came into view several streets north of us, a stranger approached and asked some inane question, to which we responded innocuously. The bus had now arrived and I turned my attention to helping my friend negotiate its steps. Suddenly I was taking a barrage of punches to the head. Stunned, I helped my friend into the bus while fending off blows.
The attack was fierce but I somehow made it up the steps and, standing next to the driver, who appeared indecisive on what to do, looked down at my nemesis, now joined by two of his friends, all demanding I exit and take more of a beating. I will never forget the wild, rabid look of hate on their faces, and as the driver mercifully closed the door and sped away, my buddy and I looked at each other bewildered at the senselessness of what had just occurred.
Time has dulled the painful recollection of that incident, except for the look on my assailants’ faces. I hoped to never see such visceral malice again, but have continually recognized it watching Trump rally goers gesticulating toward those in the press pen their champion has repeatedly labeled enemies of America, “evil” liars, the worst of his always expanding list of the worst.
There simply is no sugarcoating it; if Republicans are not decisively rebuked this Tuesday, America is well on the way to ruin. Anything less than a national rout of candidates unconcerned with mimicking one of US history’s ugliest politicians, will confirm the worst of us now defines and guides our body politic.
To watch a recent Trump rally is to withstand a torrent of blatant lies and racist tropes. Anybody who disputes this contention has checked rational discernment at the door. Of course that doesn’t include attendees, they are not bashful about embracing the President’s every word….the nastier, the better.
The best nations, the most successful nations, cultivate processes that promote public officials dedicated to creating community. The greatest asset to any country, the very lifeblood of its national identity, is the common bonds of its citizens. That this sensible conclusion is now lost on so many is fully the result of duplicitous efforts by opportunists, headed by the POTUS, who prefer division for reasons aligned only with their personal ambitions and emotional frailties.
Nothing happens in a vacuum, and past is often prologue to present, but in America, right now, the assaults on our commonality are overt and very easy to identify. Seeing old friends this weekend and regaling in shared experiences lent full appreciation for what is truly most important. Yet and still, the reality that we now so often make conscious and prolonged efforts to cordon off treasured friendships, even family ties, from national discussions critical to our country’s well being strikes me as a crisis.
The DR has noted often the luxury American politics so long afforded us… a meadow between how our leaders are chosen and our daily lives. The enduring reality we could take the most important component of governance – the peaceful, indeed cooperative, exchange of power – for granted ensured the piece of mind required to organize life priorities independent of any preoccupation with national events. The other edge of that sword was the accompanying apathy and indifference fostered by false certainties it could not be lost was permitted to evolve. Such false security became fertile ground for manipulation.
Fox/AM recognized what was in front of all of us and siezed the opportunity. We now live with the devastating consequences. The difference between pre-Ailes and today lies wholly in our perceptions of what our common bonds should be, what should nurture them, and what causes them to fray.
That millions of our friends and neighbors have been beguiled into disdaining previously shared and established presumptions of our civic commonality is a testament to powerful, intensely focused and relentless messaging that eventually succeeded in crowding out unifying premises with resentful proclamations of exclusivity.
Instead of a thoughtful consensus that heterogeneity benefits us all, we now have debates guided by an obligation to prove to xenophobes that those who look or worship differently don’t threaten their safety. Where once we all casually accepted that military weaponry was for… er, the military; now it is intertwined for millions with twisted interpretations of constitutional principles, despite the AR-15 repeatedly being employed in mass shooting after mass shooting. Even basic civic no brainers like the paramount importance of our children’s education are immersed in a toxic brew of “competing agendas” and, incredibly in states like Kansas, whether state tax relief should be allowed to compromise school resources. When grievance and resentment overwhelm common sense all bets are off. That is where we are.
Of course these examples seem subtle compared to the hourly assault that is the Trump Presidency. That we now have to parse his constant lies indicts our situation more than any reflection on shared beliefs that have fallen by the wayside. Considering what we may again be able to agree on assumes we will survive a nihilist President’s determination to irreparably alienate us from each other, which comes part and parcel with the end of our democracy. That that presumption itself is now openly questioned says everything one needs to know about our predicament.
Make no mistake, these mid-terms are a referendum on whether or not America doesn’t mind at all becoming fearful and bigoted. Those who claim “it’s the economy, stupid” are disingenuous and have purposely stuffed cotton in their ears. Those who spin Trump gibberish and contend he has a point are simply the racists they constantly whine “leftists” unjustly label them as. Meanwhile, those who don’t care a wit about the optics, wearing unbridled enthusiasm for Trumpist nihilism on their sleeve are our future if the GOP, who they now steer, is not forcibly rebuked Tuesday.
Not since the Civil War has America faced a crossroads so proximate to cataclysm. What happens tomorrow will both reflect and fully determine our future prospects as a united people. One side, on display in the now daily conscious sedition of an enemy of state we somehow elected our President, is prepared to scrap once and for all virtually every lesson our national experience has ever taught us in favor of a noxious river of inclinations fully responsible for virtually all of our past calamities.
They aspire to nothing but some momentary satisfaction their latest narcissistic complaint is being addressed by a cadre of cowardly frauds, completely indifferent to this nation’s enduring interests. The other side is now simply geared toward resistence, as they should be. Content to make the statement that it stops here, come what may. The choice could not be clearer. A pivotal moment of national reckoning is upon us! BC