As Americans keep our collective powder dry, waiting for the final straw, Trump’s crime family slowly sips its bitter brew. Say what you will, and choose to believe it or not, polling in the Democratic primary election suggests that Trump has come a long way in achieving his goal of rubbing out the candidate he most feared in his reelection fight. Joe Biden’s failures in Iowa and New Hampshire have in great part been engineered by the mob known as Trump and the Republican Party. Say all you want about Biden’s lackluster performance to date and his strategic plan for creating a South Carolina “firewall”, but the former VP has been the target of a well planned political hit designed to replace him with a candidate that better suits the mob's election plan. He was so feared that Trump risked his own impeachment to make it come about. And now, it seems, his gamble has paid off.
I wrote about this in late September and took a little flak from Biden supporters who disagreed with the premise that the Zelensky call would take its toll on Biden’s candidacy (
www.dailykos.com/...). Alas, I feel vindicated by recent events. Joe Biden has now lost both Iowa and New Hampshire. Biden has lost his “Trump-killer” mojo and in so doing has also lost his commanding lead in national polling, forfeiting his mantle of “most electable” and “candidate most feared by Trump” to Bernie Sanders. The titles are not necessarily transferable and Trump appears to be emboldened by his latest venture in election tampering. What was also suggested in my earlier diary, however, was that the tack would harm Trump as well. Unhappily, Trump has apparently taken his “hit” and survived thanks to the partisan Republican Senate, the incredible incompetence of the Democratic Party leadership, and the timidity of the American public. How much more are we willing to take? Where is our breaking point? Is there a final straw?
Getting “used to it”...
This week, Ben Wittes, journalist and co-founder of the
Lawfare Blog restated the famous poem attributed to
Martin Niemöller:
First they came for the Socialists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist…
Rev. Martin Niemöller
Wittes’ version recounts the events starting with the firing of James Comey that we have witnessed as Trump has trampled the Constitution and ignored democratic norms. Wittes’ version ends with the events that occurred most recently as Trump has fought off his well-earned impeachment:
“...Then he came for Masha Yovanovich and I said nothing because ambassadors serve at the pleasure of the president and he can remove ambassadors for any reason or no reason at all.
And then he came for Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman and his brother, Evgeny Vindman, and I said nothing—because I was used to it.”
Benjamin Wittes
Breaking the back of our Democracy
Wittes’ retelling of the original poem that appears in the National Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C., which is, like its predecessor, a listing of atrocities overlooked because of fear or indifference. They both chronicle a series of “lines in the sand” that should have been drawn—a series of final straws. With the breaking news that the Justice Department plans to interfere with the sentencing recommendations of Federal Prosecutors in the Roger Stone case, the straws are long disposed of and our shocked reaction to this gross injustice is muted by the months of acceptance by the American public of a rogue president and his minions. There is no one left to blame but ourselves. Apparently, we have chosen to treat our civic responsibilities with a nonchalance of aloof detachment demonstrated by a voter turnout in 2016 of approximately 56%. Of that number, only 46% voted for the eventual “winner”—a New York mobster with Russian friends and a plethora of American useful idiots who decided that they wouldn’t bother to vote. A winner, by the way, who lost the popular vote total by nearly 3 million votes to Hillary Clinton who garnered 48% of the total vote.
So, what is the ultimate affront to our national pride, to the tradition of fairness and equality that has been promised by our Constitution? In truth, the “straws” have been ignored for centuries. Racism, misogyny, intolerance, and injustice have been fellow-travelers with a wide portion of our citizenry from our beginning. They are what fuels the current bigots and white supremacists who form the base of the Trump populist movement. The strength of our nation has been a residue of our inclinations to persevere the iniquities of our past. In a moment of lassitude or reversion, the Trump presidency represents a test of our resolve to finally practice the ideals in our nation’s founding documents. He represents all that we thought we had overcome. His presidency dredges up our past sins and reminds us of the struggles many of our citizens have had to overcome to truly make America greater than it was at its founding. It seems rather odd that we have come all this way only to ignore the final straw --the one that broke the Founders’ backs.
Each generation gets the opportunity to create its own American legacy. We may have one final chance to save ours. It is one that requires little more effort than to choose to exercise our right to vote. There are no more chances. No more straws or lines to draw. This election may well be the most important one in our lives---the last one to actually matter.