What Now?

 Today is

Wednesday.

The

Day

I like to call my;

Rant & Rave Day.

I have found out,

over time,

that if I talk about certain subjects,

such as

Politics,

people like to classify me as a

Left Winger

or

Radical.

I even had one person say they would no longer read my

Blog

because I expressed my opinions on all sorts of subjects
and that I like the hacker group

Anonymous

because of what they stand for.

My original intent was never to alienate anyone,

but to start a conversation among my readers

and myself.

Except for a short stint with a character I called

"The Jeff,"

no one has left

Comments

consistently to have a debate.

And if you have read any of the banter between

"The Jeff"

and myself awhile back,

you would have seen that I would admit to my mistakes when I was wrong.

That is what debating is all about.

I will also admit that sometimes I would make outlandish statements to stir some action up,

but I have found,

I don't have that kind of readership.

That is why I have gone back to my original intention of telling stories on this

Blog.

But,

with that being said,

I have also invited people to use my

Blog

as their forum if anyone has something they would like to tell the

World.

Well,

one of my oldest living friends has taken me up on it.

We played together in different

Rock Bands,

with different names,

but basically as the same group.

  He will always be known forever by his stage name;

"Electric Dave."

And now,

a few words from

"Electric Dave."

What now?


     We’re only about three weeks into the Trump Presidency, and if nothing else is certain, of this we can be sure: Trump is exactly who we thought he was. The only part of the electorate who were genuinely duped were those who voted for Trump believing that his bluster, bigotry, and authoritarianism were simply campaign tactics that, under the watchful eye of the adults in the room, would soften into a circumspect and morally legitimate Presidency. Well, so much for that wishful thinking.
     The rest of us went into this with eyes wide open knowing that the man has not a shred of common decency, nor, as diplomacy and leadership often require, the patience to pretend to have any. If “you’re fired!” is one’s mantra, one has become accustomed to having sycophants immediately jump upon command, and business adversaries tremble before one’s threats and bullying, it must be hard to make the leap into the idea that the office of the President is that of a public servant whose job it is to serve the entire country, not just white billionaires, even if it is billionaires and millionaires who routinely put people into office on the pretext that campaign money is the equivalent of free speech and corporations are, after all, people, too, God bless us every one. Trump’s reaction to the Women’s March is indicative of his hostility to the idea that opposing viewpoints are what actually make America great: he is genuinely pissed off that he can’t fire more than half the nation who think he’s a perfect ass.
     Though it’s not my intent here to re-litigate the failures of our two party system, it should be apparent to anyone paying attention that its dysfunction has reached the point where it is no longer supportive of a democracy. And while it is tempting to lambast the poor, benighted mob who voted for Trump for their stupidity, I have a suspicion that many of them (and, unfortunately, the rest of us too) will feel the burn soon enough as the warm glow of his faux populism becomes the scorched sand of his bloody-minded Realpolitik and smash-and-grab economics. I wonder what the Trump crowd will say when the repeal of the Affordable Care Act causes significant portions of them to lose their health coverage; when Trump’s disastrous trade policies (such as his proposed tariffs) make even their, yes, quasi-jobs go away and the cost of consumer goods rise exponentially; when the self-fulfilling prophecy of terrorist recruitment begins to rise in response to his tirades and ill-informed foreign policies and erstwhile allies begin to abandon us; and when corporations, already riding the whip hand, are further empowered to increase the economic imbalances that make this country the plutocracy that it is. Perhaps that it’s Obama’s fault. Or Hillary’s fault. Or Mexicans. Or Muslims. Whatever.
     No, the question I wish to ask is, what do we (and I do mean we) do now? First, we must refuse to give in to the defeatist attitude that resistance is futile. It is tempting to do so in a situation where the GOP holds the Presidency (OK, sort of—is Trump even a Republican?), the House and Senate, and will soon, amidst the fracas of the nuclear option, install a reactionary Justice on the Soo-preme Court, tipping it back into neo-con control. But despite these factors, the truth is, resistance is not only possible, it is our duty. We cannot afford to buy into the trope that resistance to Trump and the craven GOP is un-American. (The hypocrisy of the GOP crowd, who fought Obama tooth and nail every inch of the way and who now claim that wanting Trump to fail in his demolition job of American values is un-American is exquisite.) No, dissent and critique are as American as apple pie and NASCAR. I was told by friends in 2003 that my resistance to Bush II and the War in Iraq was unpatriotic and I was un-American, and we all saw how that turned out. And despite some state legislators who are trying to turn protesting into a crime, civil disobedience and peaceful demonstrations are also very patriotic, especially when they cause Trump to get pissed off. Then you know you’ve struck a nerve. (Admittedly, it isn’t hard to do with Trumplethinskin.) Every time he lashes out irrationally at people who won’t love him, he depletes his own strength by further diminishing his credibility. I don’t buy this notion that we lend him credence when the media cover his Tweets and rants; his credibility is being weakened daily, and the more he wastes political capital, the more he makes unsound soundbites, the sooner even his supporters will have to abandon him, and therefore the sooner we can impeach him and remove him from office. Trump-baiting is a fine art, and, if it weren’t so sad that we cannot have an ounce of respect for the President, it would be fun. I know someone who used to say during the Bush II days, “Well, if you can’t respect the person, at least respect the office.” I haven’t heard her say that lately.
     So, continue protests, continue to write your elected representatives and voice your opinion, and continue to throw sand in the gears of this dangerous political machine. They can’t ignore us all and all the time. And certainly Trump can’t.
     But we must also reach out to those who did vote for Trump or otherwise made it possible for Trump to be elected and convince them that we have a common interest in rejecting not only Trump and Trumpism, but this bogus political system established by the rich for the rich. Yes, the Democrats are spineless jerks and corrupt, too, but they may yet come to their senses. The Republicans, however, have fallen in line behind the rough beast that now slouches into Bethlehem, so resist the equivalence arguments. So, even while pointing out the corruption that plagues the whole system, we need to help people develop a perspective. We must do what we can to bring the facts to light—the real facts, not the bullshit that passes for truth on Fox, Breitbart, and the other media trolls. Only then will the façade begin to crumble. One of the reasons that Trump and GOP are so hostile to public education (Betsy DeVos for Sec of Ed—really?) is that an educated electorate is a less easily manipulated electorate. With this in mind, defunding public education is one of the top priorities of the neo-cons.
     The whole point is that unless people are educated, they cannot make informed choices. And yes, I know that to certain ears that smacks of elitism, but if you don’t believe in the difference between knowledge, fact, reason, and expertise on the one hand and “alternative facts” and foolishness on the other, the next time you need major surgery, go to an unlicensed quack for treatment. You’ll be doing us all a favor. I’m simply suggesting that we all need to do what we can to keep Trumpism from becoming the new normal by calling out lies and speaking truth to power. This is not elitism, it’s common sense and self-protection. If maintaining that science and facts do matter is elitist, what have we come to? In George Orwell’s 1984, in opposition to the party of Big Brother, which sees truth as fungible and adaptable to the political needs of the moment, Winston Smith thinks to himself that there are truths and untruths, and so long as we understand this, we can remain human. And so one of the ways we maintain our freedom is to oppose a Trump administration that lies and lies and lies, and knows only power. We must agitate for facts and reason and truth, and educate people to tell the difference.
     One of the ways you can become an educator-agitator for the common good is to continue to have conversations with people, and not just those who already agree that Trump is an asshole and needs to be stopped. While I sympathize with the attitude expressed by some of my friends about Trump supporters—“Well, there’s just no talking to those people”—I would suggest that since most people are not as deluded and depraved as Trump himself, but feel desperate (or were made to feel desperate) exploit this gap between their beliefs and those of Trump himself, who is more on an island than he’d like you to think. So talk to people and give them actual facts and true personal stories. The more examples you can present where actual people are adversely affected by Trump’s actions and policies, the more genuinely decent folk will be willing to listen to the other side. Bill Clinton perfected the art of bringing up an individual’s story during town hall meetings and speeches in order to illustrate or prove larger points. So don’t simply assert things, however true they may be, like “Trump’s across-the-board federal hiring freeze is a stupid policy!” Back it up with examples. Talk about the person you met recently who is a translator and analyst who received security clearance for a job doing intel work for the Army, but whose job was frozen indefinitely by Trump’s mandate. Not only does this policy adversely affect the individual in question, but it could put our troops further in harm’s way by denying them the intelligence they need to protect themselves, and who wants to take unnecessary risks with the lives our fine young men and women who stand ready to make the ultimate sacrifice for our country every day? So find these stories and be prepared to give chapter and verse if challenged.
     This of course will not work on Trump himself and others who, like him, have no shame and no capacity for reflecting on the possibility that they may be in error. However, I believe with Anne Frank that most folks are decent and agree generally on the principles of democracy, fairness, and equality. If this were not the case, then we’d be in even deeper shit. Demagogues like Trump are successful in winning over these otherwise decent people through fear and scapegoating and pretending that self interest is a zero-sum game: I win means you lose. But those of us who live and work in communities, businesses, schools, etc. know that we are successful to the extent that we all cooperate, and we know that we need buy-in from everybody. You can steamroll some of the people some of the time, but you can’t steamroll all of the people all of the time. 
     But you can sure try by gerrymandering, denying people the right to vote, and by engaging in other tactics of intimidation. This is where we also need to rise up in our districts and demand that rule of law be maintained. Clearly, the mentality of Trump and the GOP is that they will do whatever they can in order to extend and maintain their dominion. Travel bans, racial targeting for suppressing the vote, and, of course, the mind-boggling stupidity of proposing the wall are all intended to bolster the support of those who are as racist and bigoted as Trump and his advisor, Steve Bannon, but these policies are not embraced by the majority of Americans and their adverse repercussions for all Americans are patent. The metrics of political calculation may have been off for the General Election, but the changing demographics of the country suggest that such a male chauvinist, white supremacist political philosophy cannot be sustained indefinitely. And, it will take even more authoritarianism to enforce this philosophy in the short term. 
     However, the mere presence of women and persons of color will not assure true diversity and inclusion in our representation unless we make this a central part of our mission. White Americans of good faith who thought they were burying the spectre of racism with the election of Barack Obama have ignored or apologized for the seedy underside of portions of middle America, whose own fears have been used against them. Jobs have been lost to technology and the necessity for global capitalism to maximize profits at the expense of people, but rather than recognize the true sources for the shrinking of the middle class, Trump and his ilk appeal to a savage tribalism of blaming the other. The lukewarm and even apathetic reception Hillary received from black voters was owing in part to the fact that the Democrats have taken the black vote for granted for too long, and people are fed up with the failed policies of neo-liberals, who have made their Mephistophelean pacts with big money. This is why the Democrats were foolish to torpedo Bernie Sanders, whose real populism actually stood a chance against the faux populism of Trump. 
      Which is why we need to find a different political way, and a way to talk about all this. The trolling of fake news and the President’s attacks on the media and free speech need to be rebuffed in the strongest possible way. Trump and his surrogates—both external (yes, Putin, I mean you!) and internal--cannot be allowed to control the media and the narrative or we are lost. There has never been such a threat to the Republic by a sitting President in our history, and it is up to us to expose the lies, denounce the divisiveness, and stand up for our rights. 

-- Electric Dave

 

 This is,

I Applaud The Electric One For Taking The Time Out Of His Busy Schedule To Pen A Few Words For Us,

And I Believe Sometimes These Things Need To Be Said,

Even At The Cost Of Losing Readers,

Jim Hauenstein,

And,

“Generally it must be stated that realpolitik has been better at dividing than at ruling. Take it as a whole since Kissinger called on the Shah in 1972, and see what the harvest has been since.”
- Christopher Hitchens, -

That is my story and I am sticking to it!

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