Americans have now had eight years of Donald Trump and Trumpism. He has fostered the extremist MAGA movement that imperils our democracy as attested to not by Democrats, but by people who worked closely with him in his administration. His former chief of staff, General John Kelly, has called Trump “the most flawed person I have ever met.”
Trump faces 91 felony charges. He has been designated as a “rapist” by a judge. He has already been judged a “fraudulent businessman” and he will lose all the money his father left him. The Trump Organization businesses he offered to the American people as proof that he was a savvy businessman prove to be fraudulent.
Disengaged Americans are finally taking interest and are saying “no thank you” to extremist MAGA policy proposals. In election after election, Americans are rejecting very extreme abortion laws passed in red states. Kentucky, Ohio and Virginia are the three most recent states to have voted for women's healthcare and against draconian abortion restrictions.
Florida governor and 2024 MAGA/Republican presidential hopeful Ron DeSantis says he would institute a policy that sets up machine gun nests along the Rio Grande River to shoot and kill drug dealers as they cross into the United States. How will he know who is a drug dealer? Does he propose to shoot everyone wearing a backpack that is crossing the river?
Donald Trump says if elected, he will invoke the Insurrection Act on his first day and deploy the U.S. military to fire on protesters. He suggested he will execute his former head of the joint chiefs, General Mark Milley. He promises wholesale revenge and retribution against anyone he perceives has slighted him. He says the Constitution should be terminated. It is plain as day who wants to take away our freedoms. Of a second Trump presidential term, General Kelly says, “God help us.”
Inspired by Dear Leader Donald, MAGA now uses the phrase “come the retribution.” That is the same phrase used by the KKK knight riders after the Civil War as they terrorized newly freed former slaves and anyone who tried to help them. It is one of the most odious phrases in American history.
The MAGA folks say they care about their children and grandchildren, but they embrace total denial when it comes to climate change. Almost every month this year breaks an all-time temperature record.
The recent Hurricane Otis that battered the Mexican west coast at Acapulco should be a powerful warning. It was a 50 mph, nondescript tropical storm one day and 24 hours later it had strengthened into a monster Category 5 hurricane with 165 mph winds. Meteorologists had never witnessed anything like it. It grew so fast and became so powerful because the waters off Acapulco are 91 degrees.
The divisions we suffer from are the divisions of historical myth from historical fact. George Washington would laugh at the historical caricature he has become.
Marty Ansley
Cinebar
