Barack Obama for VICE President

I am so tired of how extreme egos are fundamentally changing this Nation. Emphasis on extreme. A majority of Americans can see it.  The rest of the world can absolutely see it. 

We all know Trump for what he is: a massively egotistical, clinical narcissist. A sizable minority of Americans love him for it, primarily because they believe it takes that kind of person to alleviate their fears. But how much better is Joe Biden? 

As an individual Biden is a lot better than Trump…a lot. Yet, as a government servant he is, perhaps, not so much. I’ve heard it suggested several times by pundits that Biden is the only Democrat that Trump could beat. It’s the truth in that frivolous statement that makes it frightening. 

Biden has been a good President; history may consider him excellent, just as it has with Jimmy Carter and George HW Bush. He was handed a Nation in crisis and, under his watch, we out performed every other country on the planet coming out of the Pandemic, with no recession and lower inflation. Unfortunately, his ego will not let him see beyond his successes.

 In the recent South Carolina Primary I watch South Carolina congressman James E. Clyburn, who turns 84 in July with our 81 year old President and shook my head. Many might think Clyburn looks 10 years younger than Biden. I think Biden looks 10 older than Clyburn. 

Biden isn’t just 81 years old, he’s an old 81. I have plenty of octogenarian friends, several I play pickleball with. Unless they have clinical physical issues, none display the aged demeanor of the man who wants to be President until 2029. The doddering nature of Biden’s delivery, not necessarily his capacity, is as obvious as Trump’s buffoonery. Yet Biden’s ego and the cowardliness of the Democratic Party around him may lead us to another Trump Presidency (I chill at writing those words). 

The Trump game plan is obvious to me. They will continually show clips of every faltering and floundering word and movement by Joe Biden followed by an unflattering picture of Kamala Harris, with the caption: “President Kamala Harris. Is this what you want?” It WILL work to their benefit, and with our archaic electoral system they don’t need a lot of benefit. 

Given that Joe Biden’s ego is unlikely to change; I am suggesting an incredibly obvious solution. In April or May, Biden makes the announcement that effective December 1, 2024; he will nominate Kamala Harris to be his next Attorney General, which will be made immediately effective by a Democrat controlled Senate, and he is naming Barack Obama to be his running mate in the 2024 election. 

The 22^nd Amendment to the Constitution is very clear. A two term President cannot be “elected to the office of President” for a third term at any time, but there is nothing that says he or she cannot run for Vice President or have any job which is in the line of succession (e.g. Speaker of the House). As such there is nothing to restrict that individual from becoming President again for a third time due to succession. There have already been published opinions on this scenario, even though the clarity of the 22^nd Amendment makes such opinions unnecessary.

For the good of the Country, all we need are three individuals (four if you add Merrick Garland) to put aside their egos, or at least deflate them enough so they can see the Nation beyond. Such an extraordinary move would not only excite all but the MAGA crowd, but much of the rest of the world…except Putin…and wouldn’t that be nice.

About Abortion

The never ending controversy over abortion is really two distinct arguments. One is over the artificial termination of a pregnancy, right or wrong. I emphasize “artificial” since the natural termination of human pregnancies exceeds the other by considerable numbers, and you can debate what plan, divine or otherwise, is in charge of that. But that would be a third discussion which I won’t address here. 

The second argument is whether a woman should have the choice to end her pregnancy, without questioning notions regarding ethics. It doesn’t presume judgment regarding a pregnant woman’s opinion regarding abortion, right or wrong, should she choose to end her pregnancy. Certainly it is reasonable to conclude that women, perhaps no women, ever get pregnant simply because they’re anxious to get an abortion. 

These two positions make the entire question regarding legality almost intractable. That’s because neither side seeks to enjoin the opposing argument with their own. Add to that the politicization of the issue, where abortion is used as a tool by those who are not burdened by ethics, but by elections. The old gag that says: a married politician opposes “choice” for abortion until his girlfriend gets pregnant, retains humor because of its basis in truth. 

The issue of abortion is not new. In fact, abortion has been part of the human condition since ancient times, probably since humans first understood the rudimentary nature of procreation. However, politicization of abortion, where opinion or even discussion on the subject is hard wired into political camps (Conservative or Progressive) is new. On a timeline of recorded human history it is brandy-new. 

There was a time, not long ago, where a person could support choice and oppose abortion at the same time, regardless of their political affiliation. However, it appears that train has left the station…empty. 

The history of abortion is long and varied. Although interesting, it doesn’t add much to the present day controversy. The simple takeaways are that abortions, even with their adverse effects on women’s health, have never been forcibly ended, and that attempts to restrict or outlaw abortions had little to do with ethics, even when spearheaded by churches. A notable reality to those attempts was that their instigation was by men, primarily for economic reasons, in their control and veritable ownership of women. The primary restriction to abortion historically was science, or rather the lack of it. 

The hullabaloo about the Supreme Court is so steeped in foolishness that it is nothing short of embarrassing. Now with the prayed for “Conservative” majority on the bench, those that envision the outlaw of abortion are elated, as much as those that support choice are apoplectic. Neither should be. The Supreme Court is not outlawing abortion, they’re simply elevating the “choice” for abortion from the individual to the collective. It’s actually an oxymoron to traditional Conservatism. The net result will only be that poor women in certain states will find themselves either restricted or have major difficulty in obtaining an abortion. They will become the coat hanger women. Wealthy or middleclass women in those states will essentially have no restrictions, just greater inconvenience and cost. Not much will change regardless of the hoopla and high fives. 

For Samuel Alito to write for the “Conservative” majority that there is nothing in the US Constitution that protects the right to have an abortion is such a contrived position that “Roe” under another name will undoubtedly return. That human behavior in the United States which only involves the individual can be outlawed because it is not specifically provided for in the Constitution is absurd. 

But that’s the rub…isn’t it? Is abortion the act of a single individual? Is a woman and a fetus a single entity or not? If a woman is hurt in a negligent car crash, whether it’s her fault or not, and loses an embryo, or even a zygote, is it a homicide? A forward thinking Conservative God might well have designed the human female to lay eggs, to be carefully nurtured to maturity, probably by white men. 

A reality for Progressives is that there comes a point where the cause to protect the life inside a woman become righteous, in a secular sense. Instead of embracing an intractable position that didn’t allow for validating those that find abortion ethically wrong, they could have actively advocated common ground.  But like Conservative “purists” who have come to support the banning of pregnancy termination right up to conception, they are simply steeped in the politics. It’s all wrapped up with guns, immigration, healthcare, voting rights, and you name it. 

We were actually pretty much there. Abortion was available as a choice for all women, not just the wealthy, but restricted to pre-viability. Science and healthcare became the determining factors for viability and something that reasonable men and women could agree to.  But then in the latter half of the 20^th Century, Republicans picked up abortion as an issue to garner support from Christian Conservatives, and the fight was on. 

What a waste.

Covid-19 Is Not Deadly Enough

“…nothing in this world is certain except death and taxes”, so Benjamin Franklin penned as one of his last great quotes. He could have stopped with “death”, but his nature and wit could not ignore that a social structure demands participation, something “taxes” embodies, and was also an undeniable reality. Yet we live our lives year after year as if reasonable certainty, beyond physical laws, was everywhere and anywhere. To do otherwise is to live in constant fear and indecision. However, in this century it appears that fear and indecision are winning. 

I find myself absolutely intolerant of the 40% of Americans who have decided not to participate in the inoculation of our population against the Covid-19 virus. The fact that this has developed almost entirely in the former Confederate, deep South and Conservative rural communities everywhere makes it even more infuriating. This may become the most divisive behavior yet contrived by those who profit from misinformation. It may ultimately decide the contest between emotion and intellect, between fear and knowledge. 

How do you get through to people? My son, who is sensitive and understanding, made the point to me that you can’t knock people over the head. He suggested we need to listen and understand their point of view in order to show and convince them that their views can change without compromise. I used to think that as well. No more. 

Republican politicians who are addicted to the wealth of power and Conservative organizations and media who are mostly addicted to simply wealth have spent nearly four decades building a solidly cohesive voting and spending bloc through the creative use of fear. They have become desperate not to lose it. Their primary tool is the twisted amplification of Benjamin Franklin’s old quote. They advance the certainty of uncertainty, to instill the fear they need for control. 

How do we know for sure that the Covid-19 virus is really a pandemic? How can we be certain that the vaccine will prevent the virus? Does anyone really know how dangerous the vaccine is? Can we really trust government to provide safe medical solutions? How can we truly believe the FDA, CDC, Fauci, Biden, or the local school board? Isn’t it possible that Liberals are really just Socialists, who are really just Communists, and support pedophilia?  If we let anyone into this country isn’t it feasible they’ll use up our resources, corrupt our elections, steal our liberties, take our money, confiscate our weapons, burn our churches, and rape our daughters? It’s possible, isn’t it? 

There are no answers to these questions or many questions like them because they are grounded in fear, and that fear is preserved by those who profit from it. It is only when an individual gives up the fear that they can open themselves to reasonable certainties, if not absolute certainties.

That the fears created have been vastly political in nature is particularly infuriating. As of today, 21 of the top 25 states showing increased vulnerability to Covid-19 due to the unvaccinated are "Red" states, including the top 14. The 14 least affected are all "blue". Yet the folly and absurdity of this fact is not touch by a single Republican leader.  

So what do you do without the support of leadership and media that deals with their own fear of losing control or money? Perhaps to handle a unique situation like a pandemic we have to fight fear with fear. Efforts to get individuals to be vaccinated with soft cajoling, pleas, or financial rewards absolutely turn my stomach. 

If the Covid-19 virus is not deadly enough for people to have one or two degrees of separation from it, then start the campaign to instill the likelihood that if they don’t get the vaccine they WILL die, or at the very least be tragically ill for the rest of their lives. Not true? Well…anything is possible…right? 

Perhaps the virus and its offspring will inflict that fear on its own. That would be such a sad alternative, but it could happen…right?

After the Shots

What is normal? That’s not an unusual question and undoubtedly overused. How many parents have looked at their child and thought why can’t (he) be normal? The older we get the less “normal” the world appears, as the “normal” we understand shrinks before our eyes. 

Perhaps not in three generations, since World War II, has there been such a call for returning to “normal” as what has come out of this last year of radical change. Additionally, for the past four years a majority of the American people have been yearning for something they could call “normal” coming out of the Federal Government. 

The problem is that “normal”, as we use it, is an emotional construct. It is essentially how we feel things should be. An analogous adjective, and far more useful, is the term: predictable. What we want is the reasonable expectation that a wagging dog will gratefully accept our petting, not the uncertainty that at any moment we could be bitten, because everybody knows dogs can bite. 

If it is not entirely obvious, let me put it plainly. “Normal” is not simply a state of being with definitive constants and minimal change. Change, and sometimes dramatic change, is always happening. “Normal” is how we seek to live without fear driving our actions and our choices. 

I’m am two weeks since I received my second shot (or as the British say: my second “Jab”). My initial normal will be to have unfettered contact with my children and grandchildren, but with the rest of the world…I may be challenged. 

Even if I feel inoculated from Covid-19, would my unconstrained behavior cause distress in others?  What about the slight chance of infection even with the vaccine, or what about those poorly explained variants?  Worst of all…what kind of guard is necessary against other deadly infections floating about in the public sphere? 

Many, perhaps most people in the United States and around the world have spent the last year looking at other people as if they were a clear and present danger. It’s almost been like a spinoff from the television series The Walking Dead. 

Not just strangers, for which we have successfully (and unfortunately) taught generations to view first with suspicion, but also we have seen our friends and relatives as personal threats. There have been times this past year when I’ve mindlessly drawn near to an individual only to be reminded as they suddenly backed off, their eyes looking slightly alarmed. 

“Social distancing” has been the norm now for a year and I wonder just how easily will it be to undo. You might think the light has changed from red to yellow, and when it turns green it will be kum-ba-yah all around. Don’t be too sure. 

Fear is the foundational emotion which not only drives behavior, but it is frequently used as a means of control, notably for mercantile and political purposes. We have been inundated with it for a couple of decades and now supercharged with it during 2020. 

Multiple studies of American social structure have shown that a majority of the Conservative voting public is literally afraid of Liberal voters, and that Liberals are equally fearful of Conservatives. That's just crazy. This impacts friendships, families, marriage, and business. If everyone’s political orientation were properly labeled across our chests would it also cause people to take wide swaths around each other in the supermarket? 

Most fear is irrational and almost all of it is created in the mind, not outside it. The “normal” we want is not the world of 2019 and before. The normal I want is to feel comfort in being able to reasonably predict that those I come in contact with have more in common with me than not and that they feel the same. To that end we have see beyond those who are empowered by making us think otherwise.

Limbaugh Remembered...One Last Time

Learning of the death of an individual you’ve never met is a tricky thing. It can be a cause for ambivalence, reflection perhaps, or even empathy. For most of us, nearly all of us I suppose, the death of a stranger, famous or otherwise, is rarely a cause for delight. Death and delight seem just so incompatible for those of us who don’t run with, say, the Russian Mafia. 

I have written several posts to this blog over the years with a focus on Rush Limbaugh. One I wrote eleven years ago was titled The Most Evil Man in America . Prior to that and ever since my opinion never varied, although became increasingly etched in stone.  I hated Rush Limbaugh, but not like I might hate someone who callously killed my dog. I hated Limbaugh like I could hate a disease. 

I believe most of the people who loved Limbaugh, and there were millions, never understood exactly what he was. If they understood without it affecting their devotion, it was due to envy.

Rush was an entertainer and an opportunist. The black sheep ne’er-do-well in a family of distinguished jurists, he was unleashed in 1987 (at the age of 36) by Ronald Reagan’s ending the 38 year old FCC regulation called The Fairness Doctrine. He realized he could apply his glib talents by being able to say and broadcast words appealing to the dark side of the American mindset without contradiction. 

Who were these devotees? I would bet my meager fortune that every one of the mob that formed on the Capital Mall January 6^th , to the last Man or Woman, were faithful listeners. Take that and extrapolate. 

Was Limbaugh an opportunist because he found a medium to relay a political and social philosophy he held dear? Not a chance. Nothing in his first 36 years indicates he had an activist bone in his body.  Like Roger Ailes, who in 1996 saw the same opportunity to create a news network that would make him and Rupert Murdock hundreds of millions, Limbaugh was motivate first and foremost by money…and succeed he did. 

Rush Limbaugh’s personal fortune is estimated to be well north of $500 million. Not bad for a college dropout disc jockey. I suspect we will find out specifically one day since his ego would never allow the degree of his success to go unappreciated. It is his happy legacy. 

Will his followers ever realize that he was milking them with every racist, misogynist, homophobic, hate laden, and conspiratorial utterance he made? Not likely. Perhaps their children will. 

So how does one deal with the death of someone as objectively dissolute and immoral as Rush Limbaugh? I almost reluctantly have to admit that delight was not the first reaction I had to the news. Had there been a compatriot nearby I might have high fived them, but it would have been without enthusiasm. 

Perhaps the only thing left is to survey the damage and move on.  The only real joy is the satisfaction of living long enough to see it happen. 

Be a RINO

How do you get the word out to solve an obvious problem? It’s becoming clearly evident that the Republican Party is at a crossroads…long in coming. It will be a battle in which the outcome impacts everyone. 

Much rhetoric, really lip service has been given to the idea that unity for a politically split America can be achieved with just so much kum ba yah.  Obama thought he could sell it and, as a result, he got his clock cleaned by the Mitchell led Republicans ending in four years of Trump horror. Now it has become a lead infomercial for Joe Biden. 

Our Nation has a majority left leaning, moderate electorate. There is room in that majority for moderate, conservative Republicans and the Nation would be politically less dynamic without them. However, since the beginning of this century the Republican Party has been hijacked by an extreme Right wing of the Party, primarily by philosophies rooted in White Supremacy and Christian Nationalism. 

They have cloaked themselves in flags, “patriotism”, prayers, slogans of “law and order”, and “righteousness”. However, what really drives them is an endless dirge of fear propagated by power hungry politicians and a dedicated, profit driven media. Rush Limbaugh deserved a metal, sure, but it should have been for amassing $500 million by soaking the faithful. 

The far Right (otherwise known as the Trump base) have been brainwashed (truly brainwashed) into fearing that “Liberals”, Government, minorities, immigrants, intellectuals, homosexuals, and the poor are conspiring to take away everything they hold dear, and, even worse, poisoning their children to their values and beliefs. This mindset is virtually no different than that embraced by white Southerners immediately after the Civil War. 

Like political fundamentalists, there is no wavering from Right Wing Conservative dogma, so any Republican that strays is immediately thrown into the Liberal stewpot. In fact, those Republicans are the most targeted, not just for their “heresy” but because they can actually be taken down within our democratic process. 

It wouldn’t be an issue was it not for the fact that the arcane mechanisms by which we choose representatives in Government is weighted in their favor.  The Electoral College, the Senate, and gerrymandering gave this minority real power. They created a President Trump and the people who enabled him for four years. This should not, cannot happen again. But to stop it will take more creative effort than has been rallied to date. 

Democrats and Independent voters (D&I) need to take on Republican extremism. Not by trying to win general elections in Red states and districts, but by controlling them where it counts…at the Primary level. 

Democrats and Independents need to vote in Republican primaries to assure that the only choice available in the general election is between two individuals who believe their power and future will ultimately be determined by defending the Nation's well being. 

A movement needs to begin right away to prepare D&I to register as Republicans in those states that require such to vote in a Republican Primary (closed or semi-closed), or to educate them to vote Republican in those states that have no requirement (open or semi-open). Every adult American citizen should have the right to vote in both Republican and Democratic Primaries, but that would have to occur at the state level, and we’re probably decades away from that. 

Changing registration to Republican would also allow Democrat and Independent voters to influence Republican caucus states. 

This should not be stealth activism, quite the opposite. We want to encourage moderate Conservative Republicans to take on the extreme Trumpian candidates, and we want existing Republican lawmakers to know they don’t have to define their actions through appeasement. 

The sacrifice of not using a vote to influence the Democratic nomination is minor compared to the need for keeping the door closed on Right Wing extremism. It’s time for the American majority to define the future. Become a Republican in name only…be a RINO.

We Need More Wind

On August 11, 1949 Margaret Mitchell stepped off the curb on Peachtree Street in Atlanta, a street known by millions of people because of her. She was suddenly hit by a passing car, her husband watching just behind her, and died five days later at age 48. 

She had a minor career as a journalist while in her 20s, but she gained extraordinary fame and literary “immortality” for the only book she ever wrote as an adult, Gone with the Wind. Published in 1936, this first book by an unpublished and unknown author sold for $3 a copy (probably due to its 1037 pages), the equivalent of $56 today. It sold a million copies in the first six months…during the depression. 

It has been and is considered one of the greatest works in American Literature.  Polls as recently as 2008 and 2014, have the American public rating it as their second favorite book of all time...after the Bible. Mitchell was awarded a Pulitzer Prize and won the National Book Award. The epic film from her book was completed only 3 years later, and, more often than not, listed in the top five of greatest American films to this day. 

The book appears to be somewhat autobiographical, in the sense that Mitchell used her experience growing up in Georgia in a relatively wealthy family and had close relationships with her grandparents who had firsthand experience of the Civil War and Reconstruction years in Georgia. Once published it appears she lived off her fame with her husband, John Marsh, giving interviews, christening warships, and such, till her untimely death. 

There is no equivalent publication story in American literary history, even though were it written today…it would never be published.  We’ve come too far. 

As a child I saw the movie actually in a movie theater, for the film was periodically re-circulated to theaters until the early 1960s. I thought it was incredible. It was a major reason I grew up (in New York) with a sense of empathy for the plight of the scrappy Southerners during and after the Civil War. It remains one of the finest examples of “educating” the general population about history in the form of entertainment. As with most movies that center on wars, entertainment trumps history every time, and ignores the insidious themes that flow beneath. 

Decades later, incarcerated in a pandemic, with time to spare, and in search of another book to read; I thought Gone with the Wind …why not? Now having read it and, at nearly the same time, watching real history being made, such as the mob assault on our Capital Building, I am taken aback how this beloved novel found its way into the darkest regions of America’s beating heart. 

Movie goers would give casual description of Gone with the Wind as an epic love story, which is understandable from the marquee posters to the last words of Rhett Butler as he walks out into the fog. Certainly the novel devolves into a well conceived romantic melodrama in the last 200 pages or so. 

The movie makers knew what they were doing. It takes reading the book to understand the underlying message which laments stolen heritage and the wicked destruction of rigid social classes. 

I write this not as a review of the novel. It is, in fact, beautifully written, really quite extraordinary for a first time author. The characters are rich with character and the story is complex and complete. I am writing this because both story and characters define the essence of what reactionary Americans, who count themselves as Christian Conservatives, have become in the 21^st century. 

I could almost see the tinsel insurrectionists screaming through the halls of Congress with a Bible in one hand and a copy of Gone with the Wind in the other, just as those sympathetic with their motivations might imagine it so, but with endorsement. 

Nearly countless signs, flags, masks, hats, and politician rhetoric on January 6^th at the Capital sported the phrase: Stop the Steal. Those signs, et al, echoed Trump’s endless drumbeat, begun even before the election and daily thereafter, to perpetuate the “Big Lie”. Still, in the light of virtually no evidence to justify The Lie, why have so many Americans so emotionally embraced it to the point of debasement. 

I believe the “steal” they feel so heinous is not simply about an election outcome. You can find it in the pages of Margaret Mitchell’s book. They have been fed the illusion that the lives they envision for themselves and their children are in the process of being stolen.  Her novel begins with goodness surrounding a class of landed, white aristocracy, seeking only God given freewill, Nature’s manna from heaven, and self determination. This honorable goodness is ripped away by a criminal Federal government, “scallywags”, and “free issue N-----s”. 

Today's Trump supporting Christian Conservatives want a life back that they never had; that they were told had been theirs. Trump and those like him have fed that anxiety for 155 years. As a candidate and then President, Trump used his honed persona and seemingly endless lies and conspiracies to rally and incite white Christian Conservatives to believe that a “Great” America was something to be reclaimed. 

Trump did it primarily for his own enjoyment and aggrandizement; even to the point when lost he and his confederates engineered perhaps the most ludicrous attempt to overthrowing a major government in modern world history. I wouldn’t have been surprised had the mob been armed for the final attack with MyPillows. Humor and tragedy are so often different sides of the same coin. 

It is sad for me to think someone as gifted as Margaret Mitchell might have supported the assault on the Capital last month, but it’s hard to see it any other way, after all…she wrote the book. If Republican Senators had any sense at all, they would take that book and throw it directly at Donald Trump. 

The Constitution is a Piece of Paper

Pundits, both Conservative and Liberal, have of late proclaimed the fragility of Democracy. Democrats, while reflecting on the mob attack of the Capital, have especially warned of Democracy’s near demise in the US. None of that is precisely true. Democracy is far more a verb than it is a noun. It is claimed we are a Constitutional Representative Democracy. We do not carry out Democracy like a PTA, Elks Lodge, or sorority house.

The operative term and true noun of how we do Democracy is Constitutional. Most people view our Constitution, sometimes reverently, as the “rule book” for how we do Democracy and they wouldn’t be entirely wrong. However, it is not a rule book like the rules for playing Backgammon, which probably can stretch back unchanged for thousands of years. 

The Constitution is intended to be fluid, correctable and only asks that a clear majority of Americans agree on the changes. In the body of the Constitution the Founders stated that they: 

…expressed a desire, in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added: And as extending the ground of public confidence in the Government, will best ensure the beneficent ends of its institution. 

It was a radical idea in its day, for the rules from governments, whether King or Tyrant, were always intractable rules until they weren’t, replaced by the next set of intractable rules. 

In the new United States all laws became by default tentative and challengeable. The cohesiveness of citizens that evolved from the understanding that nothing was etched in stone as long as a clear majority of the governed was in agreement turned the US Constitution, the Country, and its people into a powerhouse of potential. The stone prevailed and the world looked on in envy. 

The key has been the cohesiveness and, to a good extent, diversity among social classes, economic classes, and intellectual secularism (if secularism might be defined as the absence of religion in the creation of law) in every state of the Union. Without it, all bets are off.

To put it bluntly, if a significant portion of the American people concluded that there was no Constitution (or anything else) that binds them with every other citizen in the Country then our Constitutions could create no flame of Democracy greater than the match to burn the paper it was written on. 

There have only been two significant periods in American History where there has been no success or even effort to modify and improve the Constitution of the United States. One was the 61 years prior to the end of the American Civil War. In recalling Lincoln’s and other’s reflections on the times, they understood that our Constitution was in peril for a lack of adherence. His speech proclaiming a house divided against itself cannot stand has stood the test of time as rhetorical prophecy. 

The other major period of American History where there has been an inability to modify our Constitution to deal with present circumstances is the 54 years preceding the inauguration of Joe Biden. That’s 54 years and counting (note: I have not included the ratification of the 27^th Amendment which was a minor act passed in 1789 that got a final perfunctory ratification in 1998). 

When the Trump mob stormed the Capital building, encouraged to radical behavior by Trump and a substantial number of Republican Congress men and women, they fashioned themselves as “patriots” defending the Constitution. They and their Republican mentors appear to have had no ability to understand that they were doing the exact opposite. They were demonstrating that the US Constitution has no validity for a motivated minority. It would be of lesser consequence, given the single event by a relative few, however polls taken immediately after the event showed a 70-80% majority of Republicans approved of the effort made by the mob. 

This is the stuff constitutions can’t survive. 

Mitt Romney (R-Utah) rather eloquently pointed out on the floor of the Senate that the only way to overcome irrationality is on a foundation of truth.  Trump and Senators like Cruz and Hawley traffic in seeking the type of power where the rule of law is not based on a majority adherence to a constitution, but rather on the temporary emotions of those they have succeeded in turning fearful. They, along with Mitch McConnell and others have stoked Christian Nationalists to hate our form of Democracy, all the while lighting their cigars in the back room with copies of the Constitution.

Watching them beat a Capital Hill Policeman with an American Flag on a pole while Trump called them “special” was perhaps the best metaphor to emerge from the riot.

If You Can't Beat 'em...Join 'em

This month’s Presidential election did end the reign of Donald Trump, a megalomaniac framed in cartoon proportions. That was a good thing. However, it was no true victory for the Country. I was disappointed enough to walk about with a blue cloud over my head straight through and beyond the Saturday following the election when the AP called it for Biden. I probably didn’t feel much better than those crushed by Trump’s defeat.

This last year and last month particularly has been an education for us all on the limitations of our unique form of electoral democracy. Its obvious facility to support minority rule of government begs the question: what do we do now?

It is clear to me that Biden has decided to work from the same naïve playbook used by Obama, the… if we’re good, honest, and caring we can unite Americans of all political persuasions…and, as a result, will have his legs removed early in his administration (as Obama did after two years). It’s as if they both graduated from the Neville Chamberlain School of Political Persuasion.

Biden needs to work to lead the Democratic Party for the next generation of voters, not the current ones.  He needs to lead a Party that seeks ways of obtaining the power necessary to support the diversity that is inherent in a democracy, and thus force Republicans to seek diversity themselves.

I have near zero confidence he has that ability, and the de facto proof is both the results of this past election and what has occurred since, not to mention his own rhetoric. The only thing he has going for him at this point is a bar that is exceedingly low.

In Ezra Klein’s seminal work Why We Are Polarized (Simon & Schuster 2020) he outlines a diagnosis of a divided America focusing most intently on how political identities have entrapped us on opposing sides at the sacrifice of all other human identities. Those human identities (family, philosophy, joys, aspirations, sports, neighborhood, faiths…you name it) for which we could bind ourselves to one another regardless of political party leanings. It took a Civil War in 1860 to correct that kind of identity exclusivity. No war necessary here, but it’s going to take a fight.

The un-democratic institutions of the Electoral College and the US Senate are two problems that inhibit majority rule democracy and promote minority rule authoritarianism. Klein, like others, promotes simple answers like the National Interstate Popular Vote Compact (Google it) and making DC and Puerto Rico states. And, of course, the big Kahuna: campaign finance reform. Great ideas but one is tenuous and the other two require that elusive power to accomplish.

I would suggest two efforts; concentrate power to your strength and work to elect responsible Republicans.

The Democrat Party strongholds have become those states with large, highly educated urban populations, with high minority representation. Biden won 11 of the top 15 most populated states. It is noteworthy that the 2^nd and 3^rd most populated states he lost; Texas and Florida, respectfully. North Carolina, rapidly expanding with a well educated population, is also an anomaly to the rule. All have significant minority population. The Democratic Party should put their highest concentration on those three states (plus their toe-hold on Georgia) to redirect the demographics.

Second, the Republican Party or conservatism is not intrinsically evil. They have only been tools by which individuals can manipulate government to primarily; support those with financial clout and to retain their own positions of power. The best example of this is their using non-political social issues to control Christian Conservatives in supporting them even as these evangelicals contradict their own values by doing so.

Without a 21^st century Fairness Doctrine, like the one Reagan threw out in 1987, the cohesiveness of the extreme right, glued with all the tricks one associates with neo-fascist authoritarianism, will continue to dominate the Republican Party with likeminded extremist candidates.

We want good people in office regardless of Party, those where self-interest is subservient to the National interest (or at least equal to it). Democrats all over the Country should start to re-register as Republicans and, with enough numbers, begin to control the Republican nomination process.  In states, like Virginia, where no party registration is required, plan on voting in the Republican Primaries for moderate candidates who are out of favor with the Trump controlled far right. Not something to hide, but to encourage moderate candidates. This should be a campaign on the part of the Democratic Party.

There will always be enough diversity to argue over issues, and a representative democracy has no guarantee of success during any election cycle. But a true democracy allows us to change course, and changing doesn’t appear to be happening on the near horizon.

Biden's Flawed Campaign

On her afternoon show this week, Nicole Wallace asked one of her Progressive guests why Democrats (especially) have such extreme anxiety over the possibility of a Trump victory. He then waxed on about misleading polling in 2016 and facing a political déjà vu. He was wrong, or at best grossly incomplete.

Despite the jaw dropping, stomach twisting experience many felt (including me) in November 2016, what we are feeling today is quite different. Although it had seemed unbelievable that a comically excessive, reality TV host had won the Presidency there was still an unknown factor. What kind of President would Trump become?  He had been almost everything during his life, Democrat, Republican, Liberal, Conservative, pro-choice, pro-life and so on. No one, not even Republicans, were comfortable speculating.

I for one have always believed that the weight of the office always sculpted the holder into something new, something better. I don’t believe that anymore. Trump took his buffoonery and manic desire for adoration to the White House and never let go.

This time around we don’t need to or have the luxury of speculating on what kind of President Trump would be over the next four years. We know precisely and that realization is devastating and truly frightening. We know not because we are in a mishandled pandemic, we know from nearly four years of grueling incompetence, self-dealing, and absolutely shameful displays of crass authoritarianism. (see my 8/22/20 post “Lest We Forget”)

However, the utter exhaustion from Trump’s Presidency seems to have been lost on the Biden Campaign and I fear there are consequences to be had, even if Biden wins.

The brain trust at the Biden Camp, whoever that may be, decided months ago to wage their war primarily on a single issue: Covid-19. A single issue? Think about it. Here you have our National leader so defective that he feels comfortable saying and doing virtually anything that comes into his head. Since 2017 he has acted no differently than if he were on the set of The Apprentice, only without producers or a director. Yet the focus of his opponent is on one issue.

The Biden strategy may be a winning strategy. Given the clown car incompetence Trump applied to the Pandemic, it likely will be. But it creates this question: might Trump have been the logical winner on election night 2020 had the Pandemic not occurred?

That question should not even be contemplated. Trump has been the worst President in modern American history and probably competes with James Buchanan for the top spot overall.

However, when Biden takes over many of the arguments the Trump devotees have made in the Fox News echo chamber may actually come to pass, at least in part. The pandemic will not go away, the extent of the contagion will still be out of control, total compliance to mask wearing will not be achieved, and social distancing and isolation will erode We will find ourselves with many more months of “living with” the virus, partially offset by therapeutics, until an accepted vaccine takes hold.

Biden will be faced with a sick nation, frustrated and not caring about who did what when. The economic problems and pandemic fatigue may make it impossible to initiate reforms in health care, immigration, foreign relations, infrastructure, climate change, and inequality (social and economic). Even worse it might result in the loss of Congress, House and Senate, in 2022. Republicans will be assembling in back rooms in January 2020 on these very points.

One thing for sure, it will be too late to try and resurrect the reality that there were a hundred reasons not to re-elect Trump before Covid, with every supporter held accountable. The Fox News crowd (plus the new network: Trump News) may be perfectly positioned to rewrite history, never having to defend it before an election, and ask the Nation to Make America Great Again.

Just enough people may listen.