We can see what’s coming: Trump is likely going to lose, and he’ll immediately claim that he’s been robbed, and is the real winner. He and his side have been telegraphing this repetition of his Big Lie strategy in 2020 in a whole handful of ways. (Just yesterday, apparently, Trump launched one his baseless accusations of “fraud” against the Pennsylvania election — which tells us he thinks he’s going to lose that crucial state). With Trump, it’s either Win or Lie, and his lies have a most destructive impact on American democracy.
We need not only to defeat Trump as the leader of America’s now-powerful Fascist Force, but also to minimize how much damage he can inflict on the nation with his Lies that delegitimize in the minds of millions the President of the United States duly chosen according to the Constitutional Process.
It’s not good enough that Trump will fail to overturn the election — if he couldn’t do it when he was President, he won’t be able to do it when Joe Biden is commander-in-chief — but we also should do everything we can to minimize how much damage Trump can do when he repeats his Sore Loser refusal to accept his defeat as the will of the American people.
We should begin by launching NOW a pre-emptive strike designed to lead people to see Trump’s Big Lie 2.0, when it comes, as it seems inevitable to do, in the negative light that all the evidence suggests it should be seen. The right people should be delivering the right message before Election night — getting it to the right audience, people who might be seduced into giving Trump’s lie some credence — to minimize how much damage Trump’s attack on our election system (and thus our Constitution) can do this time.
When Kamala Harris is sworn in on January 20, which I do believe is what will happen, what kind of shape will this nation be in? In part, that depends on how effectively the pro-Democracy side can lead Americans away from the Big Lie, and its treasonous proponent, and to respecting the legitimacy of the American government the people chose.
And a pre-emptive strike — to prepare people to see Trump’s Poor Loser act for the ugly thing it is, rather than anything to lend any credence whatever — delivered by powerful voices on stages those people attend to, is a move that should be taken now, before Trump gets to falsely declare victory on Election Night.
Below, I discuss this idea.
Please check out my website and my video series — both titled, “A Better Human Story” — for both my thoughts on the crisis in America, and my picture of the nature of the inevitable challenge humans have faced — and have not yet met — as a result of being the civilization creating species.
