There are moments in history which are earthshattering and then there are quiet ones, the ones that go by so fast you might miss them, and they carry their own level of import. We actually live in an era, the year 2023, where none other than Mr. Bridgegate himself, Chris Christie, is the moral conscience of the Republican party. Seriously.
How can it be that the creator of a scandal which closed off lanes of the George Washington Bridge during rush hour in order to punish a small town mayor for not supporting him politically, can be the lone voice in the wilderness, one of the last few conservative voices? I don’t even pretend to know. The simple truth is, Christie is one of four Republican primary candidates left, and the only one of those four who did not raise his hand and state that s/he would support a felon for president, namely Donald Trump.
A felon is the least of our concerns – @realDonaldTrump is echoing talking points from HITLER! pic.twitter.com/FZX67Pb85b
— Woke as Fuck! (@dumptrump68) November 13, 2023
And yes, Ramaswamy, Haley and DeSantis all raised their hands before Trump went on his Veteran’s Day rampage spewing Adolph Hitler quotes, but in point of fact, they probably have not changed their minds about voting for Trump. When he’s on the ballot, they’ll vote for him, because they’d rather throw democracy down the tube than vote for a Democrat. That’s a profound statement and unfortunately it is true. Better to have a lunatic fascist in office and take the judgeships, whatever can be gleaned in the bargain, then to safeguard the American way of life. Wow. Never thought I’d live to see this day dawn, but here I am and dawn it has.
I don’t think Trump will win again because I believe he will be convicted and unless right-wing media has utterly saturated this country with lies, I think there are enough fed up former Trumpers, i.e., regular Republicans, who are not going to sell the country down the tubes. Or, such is my devout hope. That said, I recall only too well back in 2016 saying, “I have to believe in the goodness of the American people,” meaning that our “goodness” as a culture would keep Trump out of the White House and the shock of learning I was wrong about that made me a different person.
I say that in all seriousness. I was one human being on November 7, 2016 and somebody else on November 8, 2016. And the somebody that I morphed into, in that 24 hours, is a person who watches what’s going on in all the dark corners of the internet and American life. I realized after the fact that had I been paying attention to places like Right Wing Watch and Fox Radio, seeing how the crazies and the enraged were gathering together to share vitriol with one another, I would have seen a Trump election coming.
A few people did. Michael Moore was one. He was in the minority but he was by no means the only one.
And a lot of the people who voted for Trump, Capitol Police officer Michael Fanone, a sterling example, did not do so again in 2020 and will not do so in 2024. They had to learn the hard way. America had to learn the hard way.
The Republican party, on the other hand, seems to be unteachable and I don’t know what that’s about. Maybe this is how a political party in its death throes behaves. The Whigs were totally committed to the preservation and preferably, the expansion, of slavery in these United States. They carried that banner until the very end. It was the hill they died on.
Currently, there are twin hills that I see the GOP choosing to die on, one being abortion and the other Trump. Abortion is the car that the dog finally caught — and didn’t know what to do with when he got it. As to Trump: he’s the freak show that they just can’t quit. Lindsey Graham, in one of his moments of lucidity, dubbed Trump “a combination of Jesse Helms, P.T. Barnum and Ronald Reagan.”
I’ll go along with Helms and Barnum, but as much as I loathed Ronnie Raygun, I think it unduly harsh to compare Trump to him. Reagan, whatever his faults, was a real politician, beginning his career by becoming president of the Screen Actors Guild. For Reagan to be Trump, he would have had to walk straight off the set of Bedtime For Bonzo and into the Iowa Caucus and he did not do that. But who knows? If he had had a hit TV show, say if he played the lead in Father Knows Best, maybe he would have decided to run for Governor of California right out of the gate. I don’t think it would have washed in that era, but I can tell you this: when Paul Newman used to appear to speak for Eugene McCarthy, back in 1968, he sensed the incredible draw of celebrity appeal in politics. Thank God Newman wasn’t a lunatic like Trump, or we might have experienced this phenomenon before.
And that said, look at Volodymyr Zelensky, as fine a president and war time leader as Ukraine — or any country — could ask for. He was an actor before he got into politics. Al Franken was an entertainer. He was a fine senator. Arnold Schwarzenegger did a credible job as California’s governor. But for every one of these guys there is a Kanye West or a Dr. Oz, rotten apples who quickly spoil the barrel.
We’ve gotten a bit out in the weeds here but the point is: democracy is a big tent. It can accommodate candidates from every walk of life. Diversity is part of democracy’s strength. But now America’s way of life could be lost, due to the GOP continuing to follow and enable a showbiz conman. And it looks like you can’t dissuade them from doing so. They are in it until death them do part — either Trump’s mortal death or the GOP’s demise as a party; at least as the party it used to be.
“unless the media has saturated the country with lies”–too late.
It’s a lovely thought, Trump’s mortal death, even for one (ie me) who tries very hard to not even speak ill of the deceased, never mind dance upon their graves. Dance on Donald’s I will.
Dance? My dream is to have enough of a financial windfall to be able to indeed travel to Trump’s grave but not to dance on it. No, I will fire up my gut with certain foods and guzzle down as much liquid as I can so as to via copious amounts of “bodily functions” make a mess. And for good measure once I’m emptied out I’ll pull on a set of chest waders and stomp all over said mess. Hey, a guy can dream can’t he?
Awwww, and here I was, planning to post a “Go Fund Me” page to put in a dance floor on rhe grave…..
There may be rules about how many people can dance on a grave site at one time, certainly would be VERY crowded, ME THINKS !!
Ronald Reagan was host of two TV shows: GE Theater and Death Valley Days.
It was his association with GE that turned him into the conservative that he became. He went around the country in the 1950’s where GE plants were (in many cases where they are no longer) and gave speeches. Owners and shareholders, good. Unions bad.