Confessions of a middle-aged Canadian political junkie (since age of 5)
On election night after tucking my young son in bed, I scoured live updates on various websites on my Ipad. Becoming more frantic and consuming as the night progressed...hoping against hope that Clinton could muster a comeback after the odds shifted against her. That New York Times meter system started as a source of comfort to contrast the howling outrage on the Daily Kos comment section. Odds were still 50-60 in Clinton’s favour...then the midwest vote count came out. Plunge!!! Clinton’s odds falling in the 40’s then the 30’s with no course reversal to come. Crash! Crash! Even the comeback in Virginia meant nothing. My wife who is not a political junkie, is a quick study in figuring out how to scout the different updates on various websites. She kept pointing out to Virginia and the narrowing gaps in Wisconsin and Michigan as hopeful signs. No matter. I knew in my heart that it was fucked even as I hoped against hope. Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania were never supposed to be in play. Ominous and damning. My dear wife shouted in joy about California turning blue right away. I shook my head...look at the Rust Belt states as the pivot, not the big safe blue states. She soon retired herself to bed, but I stayed up glued to the boob tube and the websites. I knew it was done, but powerful emotions swirled inside. My heart riding through the maelstrom of fear and sorrow.
Unlike past elections, it was no mere disappointment or worry. When Reagan and the Bushes won, I was dismayed mainly for my American neighbours. I was pissed when Bush II beat Kerry, but I did not fear for the future...trusting in the process of positive change to come. Trump put the existential dread into me. Powerful sense of utter danger that I had not felt...probably that many of us have not (unless you lived in Hell on earth, wherever that be). Even the nuclear nightmare of the 1970s didnt hit me like this. Just an underlying sense of strong self-preservation in the powerful ones from both USA and USSR. Now its danger not just for the Americans, but for the rest of us in this world, for life on earth. Foreboding that we as a society will know what many in 1930s Europe experienced. And that’s just the beginning. I was not angry that night. I shed man tears in deep sadness for our young son. What will his future hold amid all of this and that to come?
Memories of my talks with my late father came to me. About 30 years ago, he was driving me home. Small talk quickly shifted to deep and heavy stuff. My father with this somber look blurted out of nowhere about the dangers underlying the USA. I assumed he meant the ongoing Cold War or ravaging effects of unbridled greed and waste. Wrong. Serious and worried but calm my father was. He talked about the underlying Nazi elements among the many including the powerful in the USA. About the hidden fascism waiting to emerge. The next 1930s Germany will take place in the USA. Just a matter of when. I just listened and nodded, but that did not sink in for me. Not because I thought that it was far-fetched, but I just did not see clear signs myself. Greed, yes. Nationalism, yes. Imperialism, yes. Disregard for environment, yes. The poor being shunted aside, yes. But this nazi-fascism, no...except for the fringe element like the KKK. This year so naked to my eyes. That’s why I keep recalling this conversation with my dad.
Another thing: my father had been an astute and intuitive observer of what’s been happening in the world. His consternations about the powerful in the world and their disregard for the people and the earth plus their hunger for power and self-needs. He didn’t care much for many leaders, whether they were part of the ‘free world’ or the ‘tyrannical countries’. A few he regarded well like Jimmy Carter, Abraham Lincoln, Nelson Mandela, Bishop Romero from El Salvador, Desmond Tutu. To him, very few powerful people actually gave a damn about others as much or more than themselves. He was meh about Obama, but he did acknowledge him as a good man. My father would be quick to point out those he saw as malevolent, but only one figure he found very disquieting and disturbing...one with naked hunger and evil with enough power and ambition to harm the world as Hitler and Stalin have. Not Saddam. Not Bush II. Not bin Laden. Not Brezhnev. Not Nixon. Not any of the Chinese or North Korean leaders. Who? Putin. Right from the beginning when he was vying for power. In the late 1990’s, my father out of the blue as usual spoke with calm consternation about Putin: beneath that calm and smooth demeanour, a very dark one with sheer ambition and hunger to shape Russia and the world in his image. Not right away. He will bide his time. Build over time. But it will come when we will feel his impact on all of us. Look at today. Not just Putin’s asserting the Russian will on its people or nations from former USSR. But on this web of neo-fascist/neo-nazi ultra-right nationalism throughout Europe and now in the USA. Fuck, my father saw all of this shit coming.
My father passed away in April 2016 after such a long and tragic struggle. Unlike earlier years, he became less engaged in world happenings over the past few years. As I poured through his writings, it was clear to me that he was not ‘less interested’, but the darkness of the world was too much for him to ponder and dwell as he did in the past. As I grew up with him, he was a visionary and compassionate leader for many people. A calm and prudent figure that instilled hope, caring and resolve in many, including me. Part of me wish he was still here as he was during my childhood, youth and young adulthood. But another part of me says that he left this earth at the right time. I’ll never forget my father’s look of sheer disgust (insert BLECCHHH!!!) when he stated Trump’s name (during the biz-celeb years). So amusing then. It may be a blessing that he’s not here to feel the horror of the abominable marriage of Putin and Trump, two of the most powerful men on this Earth as of 2017. But at the same time, we who knew him wish he was here to walk with us as guide and rock of serenity no matter how dark the valley be.
Everyone, we must march on. Do not dare roll over and die. Be wise and strong. That is the lesson my father imparted on me and many others.
