There are so many causes and outcomes of our last election that can serve as worthwhile platforms for our expressions of outrage, panic and fear about the devastation that an unchecked President Trump, and a rabidly unbridled Republican Congress can wreak upon the US; but the sheer volume of everything we have to fear runs the risk of getting diluted into parts-per-millions. Therefore, we need to focus our outrages as extensions of a select few immutable sources.
Michael Moore did a great service for providing a concise, level-headed Morning After To-Do List immediately after the election. While 1-4 were good in their own rights, the one that stuck out to me most was #5:
You must say this sentence to everyone you meet today: "HILLARY CLINTON WON THE POPULAR VOTE!" The MAJORITY of our fellow Americans preferred Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump. Period. Fact. If you woke up this morning thinking you live in an effed-up country, you don't. The majority of your fellow Americans wanted Hillary, not Trump. The only reason he's president is because of an arcane, insane 18th-century idea called the Electoral College. Until we change that, we'll continue to have presidents we didn't elect and didn't want. You live in a country where a majority of its citizens have said they believe there's climate change, they believe women should be paid the same as men, they want a debt-free college education, they don't want us invading countries, they want a raise in the minimum wage, and they want a single-payer true universal health care system. None of that has changed. We live in a country where the majority agree with the "liberal" position. We just lack the liberal leadership to make that happen (see: #1 above).
Last Tuesday, I battled late into the night with my FB friends who were giddy that their moronic votes netted Trump a win in the Electoral College. By the time I read Moore’s 5-Points the tragic Day After the election, I had already posted this on my wall:
Hmm, so the last two Republican Presidents will have gotten into office by losing the popular vote?
Seems like elections actually are rigged.
Naturally, my Trump-sycophant friends giggled mightily about that.
To me, that simple fact should be the nexus for our outrage since everything else … all the destruction to Obama’s legacy, ACA, women’s health, climate change, minorities, immigration, foreign policy … EVERYTHING stems from the fact that the Party to receive less votes gets everything they want … once again.
The last time this happened in 2000, there was outrage when SCOTUS’s 5-4 decisioin handed Bush the Presidency, by then there was also plenty of fatigue with the whole affair. Democrats, being good stewards of our Republic’s principles and institutions, fell into line in pretty short order. And look what we got in “coming together as a Nation?”
Whatever argument you’ll ever make, outrage you’ll ever express, or diatribe you’ll ever rant about President Donald John Trump and the Republican-controlled 115th United States Congress, always preface it with something along the lines of: they didn’t win the popular vote.
Now obviously there will not be a change to the Electoral College, but by god there should be a concerted effort to obliterate it once and for all! It’s been almost 35 years since Roe v Wade, and yet overturning it has a constant legislative effort for Republicans ever since. By making the Electoral College our Roe v Wade, our calling cry for what’s right, we have a starting point for unified resistance to serve as a constant reminder that the Republican majority in US Governance is a American minority.
By focusing expressions of outrage on the Electoral College source which has a clear patter now of thwarting the will of the people, we:
- Provide a simple, easy to understand rallying point and springboard
- Constantly remind the thwarting of the majority
- Force the narrative’s continuation
- Stigmatize and taint Republican’s actions that are sure to be counter to majority will
- Harness all the anger, all the frustration, and all the despondency into a single focus
My fear is that all our very real, and monumentally legitimate fears will simply muddy in the Republican cesspool we’ll all be drowning in very soon.
Here’s a version of that photo that fits within Facebook’s Banner/Headline box: