CommentsPERSPECTIVE--Republicans: this guy is YOUR fault. You own him. I know, I know: fake news. Russia is fake news. Climate Change is fake news. Charlottesville is fake news… let’s face it: anything Republicans and Trump supporters don’t like is fake news.
Except it’s not.
No, it actually appears almost certain Donald Trump’s campaign colluded with Russian agents to attack Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election, Climate Change is 100% real, and Charlottesville revealed that our President and many in his party are unconscionable racists.
As Captain Jack Ross famously states in A Few Good Men: “these are the facts of the case. And they are undisputed.”
…or at least, undisputed among those of us who are sane and don’t hang on every word out of Sean Hannity’s mouth.
And that’s the catch, right?
Because Republicans aren’t going to read this or the “failing” New York Times or the lying Washington Post or CNN or MSNBC or anywhere they might hear anything bad about Donald Trump or the current mess we have in Washington.
Actually, I assume Republicans don’t read much at all -- and please understand, I don’t mean that as an insult. It’s just the truth for 95% of them. Because if they did, it would be impossible to continue supporting a President who is dangerously unqualified for the job, and a GOP Congress who, both out of cowardice and political strategy, refuse to remove him from office.
It would also be impossible to pretend, as many of them do, that they believe in anything close to resembling Christianity, as the Houston floods have revealed. “Christian” Joel Osteen had to be shamed into opening the doors of his megachurch for Hurricane survivors in Houston.
No, the people who support Trump and/or Republicans are no-information voters, low-information voters, or pro-information voters (think Fox News, Breitbart, InfoWars, etc. -- all the media where either Trump is great or Democrats are awful, all the time, no matter what.)
That’s bad.
It’s why we’re in this awful mess in the first place.
But it’s not just bad for those of us who’ve seen the light, and this is where we come to the point Republicans need to understand: it’s bad for them too.
Because as I noted, the rest of us -- indeed the rest of the world, with the exception of pro-Putin Russians -- aren’t dumb enough to buy the propaganda. We see what you’re doing: it isn’t Christian, it isn’t conservative, and it sure as hell has nothing to do with the principles this country was founded on.
Please understand: what Trump is doing is genuinely bad. Indeed, the Republican agenda, if they can ever get their shit together enough to pass anything, is bad.
Bad as in: people’s lives will get worse.
And at some point, they’re going to get mad.
Some of us — yours truly — are already there. If I hear someone talking about Trump in a public place, I’ll butt into the conversation to point out he’s an asshole and should be impeached.
Others are more mature; they protest, organize, donate, etc.
But make no mistake: we’re mad.
And more Americans are joining our ranks every day, whether it’s Trump’s racist remarks about Charlottesville comparing Nazi’s and white supremacists to peaceful protesters, his attacks on journalists in Phoenix, or his pardoning of Joe Arpaio, who once favorably compared the jail he was running to a concentration camp.
Because I mean that’s awesome, right?
Of course, if you’re reading this a couple weeks or months from now, I’m sure you can fill in another 3+ more recent events/tweets in which he’s been a completely incompetent racist douchebag.
Because Donald Trump is a horrible, no-good, rotten asshole, and that’s never going to change.
Here’s the thing though: at some point, those angry people are going to start to turn on Republicans and/or those who voted for Trump -- not with violence or anything like that -- just in terms of everyday life.
Because while Republicans live in a self-imposed information bubble, their lives -- whether it’s at work, church, the gym, or on vacation -- aren’t so safely sanitized. And people are going to say things… like:
“Why’d you vote for that guy?”
“Are you a white supremacist?”
“Sorry, but I don’t speak Russian.”
Or perhaps more succinctly: “Fuck you.”
No, it’s not the nice or polite or unifying thing to do. But people are mad. They have every right to be. And if you’re a Republican and/or voted for Trump, you’re going to become a target. Again, not for violence or any kind of direct personal threat.
But for comments? Yes.
For derision? Yes.
For angry tirades? Yes.
See, the rest of us are fucking pissed, because we know that all the shit you say “fake news” to is real news.
Really. Bad. News.
So, I guess the message is this: if you’re a Republican, Trump supporter, or Evangelical conservative, wake the fuck up and start paying attention to what’s going on.
Turn off Fox News and Limbaugh, take off the tinfoil hat, and recognize that the man and party you support need to be removed from power as quickly as possible, AKA 2018. It doesn’t mean you have to become a Democrat or even like them -- it just means you recognize you’re an American and you want to live in a country where we have a civil society, the rule of law is upheld, and we don’t have a President and party who are beholden to White Nationalists and Nazis.
As for the rest of us? Don’t be afraid to be mad.
Not violent mad. Not crazy mad. Not stupid mad…
But mad.
Don’t suffer these people to walk through your building, attend a sporting event, go to church, or sit down in a restaurant without giving them a piece of your mind. Make them remember that their decision to vote for Trump and to continue supporting him and the Republican Party is ruining people’s lives and the nation we love.
Because we’re right.
They’re wrong.
And it’s not even close.
(Jeff Allen is a political and fiction writer, author of the novel Cherry City Pulp, I believe in the power of words -- confessmanchild.com, isthisgood.org and chuckingrocks.com, where this piece was first posted.) Edited for CItyWatch by Linda Abrams.
-cw