I got this letter from a fella on the internet after he read a post of mine here ...
Hopefully you really don't believe the projected assertions you recently posted on KOS about Trump's narcissism.
Why not relax and enjoy the results Trump has accomplished in less than two years? An exploding economy, lowest black and hispanic unemployment in history, 7 TRILLION appreciation in the stock market where anyone - rich or poor with any savings or pension for retirement is benefiting, a not-yet accomplished task of securing our southern border from drug dealers, human traffic smugglers and rapists, etc?
Seriously, it is unfortunate you have swallowed and believe the "resist" propaganda -- and actually contribute to it. Consider that your view might actually be wrong and holding it makes you bitter and depressed.
Wishing you improvement,
Unwashed Conservative
… and I decided to respond.
Dear ‘unwashed conservative’,
I really appreciate your letter, and I’m not being sarcastic. The fact that you spent precious moments of your life not only reading what I wrote, but pondering it so deeply you felt the need to look me up and respond personally to it, is in itself a victory. I’ve been thinking about your response all week because in it, you’ve demonstrated the perfect example of conservative versus liberal thinking.
I agree with you on this: I am bitter and depressed. You’re totally right. I’m bitter because the unfunny joke called Donald fucking Trump is president. He is president despite the fact he lost the popular vote by three million. Can you fathom that? Three million people. That’s the entire state of Nevada. He’s president, in large part, because our election was hijacked by Russia in an unprecedented attack against our democracy, which is kind of a big deal to me. That makes me bitter. The fact that his administration has thus far worked to separate migrant children from their parents (who are fleeing asylum from war-town countries LEGALLY, by the way), vowed to roll back Roe v. Wade and take women’s freedom to choose (and even more bananas, threatened to prosecute women who have abortions), repeal Obamacare and eliminate protections for folks with pre-existing conditions, gut Medicaid, slash Social Security, roll back protections for endangered animals, and sell off federally protected lands to oil and gas companies, all while rewarding his own company and merry gang of grifters and giving tax breaks to billionaires … yes, it makes me depressed. It makes me very, very depressed.
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You ask me, why not relax and enjoy the results of Trump’s presidency? I could sit here and debunk your points (yes, black unemployment is at an all-time low. But that trend started under Obama, so Trump can’t claim full credit for that one. Stock market’s a similar story; criminals account for only .6% of the migrants detained at the border, etc etc), but Google could do the job just as well as I can. Google is your friend. What’s more important here is to tell you that you’re right about one thing: I am actually doing fine under Trump’s presidency. Personally, I haven’t been affected. I have nothing to complain about. I have a job, a thriving family, amazing health insurance, even a retirement fund. I own a home in one of the most expensive regions in the country. I have a job I love. And the liberal rag I work for? We’ve never done so well as we’re doing under Trump as president. I love my life so much. I’m doing great.
Guess what, though? It’s not enough. It’s not. It shouldn’t be.
Your letter perfectly illustrates the blinders at work in the conservative mind. Pathologically shortsighted, you look at your life and think, “I’m doing well, so this is fine.” There’s no deeper thinking than that. Your vision doesn’t reach beyond your damn self. It’s juvenile. It’s a fundamental inability to empathize with other people who might not have it so well under this administration. Yes, I’m doing well, you’re doing well. Some people do quite well under dictators and fascists. But at the cost to whom? Do we not have human hearts that enable us to imagine what some of these policies are like for other people? For kids in detention camps, with no parents to fight for them? For people who are targets of hate crimes brought on by hateful rhetoric? For baby fucking bears? I’m not a migrant kid in a cell, I’ve never been bullied, and I’m not a baby fucking bear, but you know what? I can imagine. And that, my friend, makes me liberal.
I’ve been thinking about the division between parties in a larger way lately. Not in a reactionary news cycle way, which is where my eyeballs focus daily. I’ve been thinking about this in a more philosophical way—about how the deep, deep rifts between modern conservatism and modern liberalism are just a giant-scale expression of the American identity crisis. At our heart, beneath all the bald eagles and the red-white-blue, America is simply two ideals both alike in dignity that will never agree. We are, at once, the dream of democracy, of “we the people,” of come-togetherness, a melting pot, your huddled masses—and, on the other end, we are rugged individualism. We are the Wild West. We are colonialism. We are me, me, me.
I don’t have an answer to this, except no matter if we’re liberal or conservative, it seems we are not who we think we are. How do we proceed when our center cannot hold? When we can’t agree on basic facts? When we look in the mirror and see different things?
How can we form a collective when yours is the only perspective you’re willing to entertain?
So you’re right. I’m bitter, I’m depressed, but I’m fine. Trump’s worst policies are no threat to me personally. I’m privileged like that. But can I ask you a favor? I’d like you to imagine—really imagine—what some of these policies mean for someone different than you. A trans person in the military, maybe. Or a DREAMer who's lived in the Unites States since toddlerhood. Someone who is telling you they feel threatened. Someone whose life is directly in the line of this administration’s dumpster fire. These folks are out there, I promise. They are real. They aren't "fake news."
I’m fine, yes.
But what about them?
