I stand in opposition to witless opinion and feelings of discontent presently affecting supporters of Donald Trump. Most of the time, most people seem to prefer or seek approval and security, thinking they are defending a harmonious and ordered society. Devaluing the value of the individual, they senselessly deploy words like “anarchy, socialism, communism, elite, intellectuals, leftist, and liberal” as abusive or scornful insults contemptuous of those perceived against what they believe.
They deem anyone not thinking like them as disloyal or “unpatriotic.” Some are highly educated physicians, attorneys, realtors, ranchers, and bankers who feel their vested monetary interests are threatened. Protecting their own seems selfish or narrow-minded; “The country be damned, I’m getting mine.” Others participate in circus-like raucous truck parades, apparently lacking knowledge of government while jeering at passersby. Wealthy, educated or otherwise, justice seems the last thing on their minds. For whatever reasons, selfish or artless, they defy the idea that we are all Americans. Nations are judged by how well they care for their most disadvantaged residents, not by how much money one makes. No one expects “free handouts,” but rather equal opportunity to achieve the increasingly elusive “American Dream.” Responding with willful blindness or naïveté, Trump followers seek a “strong man,”, adulating a puerile man’s insulting jabs at anyone disagreeing with him. This is not leadership; this is blatant demagoguery and they follow lemming-like into the abyss of iniquity.
Democracy comes from the Greek, meaning “government by the people.” The United States Constitution defines government whereby qualified citizens elect representatives, a democratic republic. Guided by the philosophy of the Enlightenment with its value of the individual, rule by the majority, i.e., more than 50% of eligible voters select the President, Vice-President, Congressmen/Congresswomen, and other public servants was deemed by the Founding Fathers the most just. The minority is protected from the “tyranny of the majority” by the Bill of Rights. Self-rule necessitates all citizens to cooperate for the greater good, not “what is best for me and my friends,” but what is best for all the citizenry. The very idea of compromise and cooperation for the commonweal seems alien to many Trump followers.
There have always been those who argue that tribal solidarity or social cohesion should take precedence over justice. So-called “western civilization” holds that the individual, or the truth, may not be sacrificed for “order”, where “order” means control over society as facilitated by authoritarianism. This resulted from individual struggles against the collective instinct of a “quiet life,” i.e., the fantasy of “the good old days.” We must assert the unalienable rights of the individual, but must continue a generalized assault on the vile role played by hypocritical racial hatred, by militarism, and by the blind devotion of “the nation” or the state.
It’s not only the elite Republican profiteering enablers, like a local banker seeking funds for Trump’s legal defense, but the ugliness of how social media and the Internet misinform and shape public opinion. Then there is the blatant malevolence expressed by armed men at Texas’ and Michigan’s state capitols. What would lead these so-called “militia” to brandish weapons? What spurious poison overwhelmed their intellects and corrupted their souls? What small minds leads them to cowardly intimidate fellow citizens? It is a saddening and disquieting part of the 21st century carried from 1789, the time of the Declaration of the Rights of Man — that Trump instigates race war, the most odious and most stupid of fanaticisms. This shameful terror wants to reign, the bravest turn to cowards and no one dares say what he or she thinks for fear of being denounced as unpatriotic or a traitor. A few newspapers still print the truth, but most Trump followers turn a deaf ear and many are non-readers preferring social media propaganda to actual learning, like the Laredoan who told me he didn’t read because all he needed was his church and Fox News. We must be aware of the somber obstinacy of public opinion. Hundreds of media blogs report public opinion demeaning people of good conscience, loud parades blare horns and disparage good people, guiltily prodding those in authority to stifle the truth. There seems to be a sadomasochistic relationship between these insecure mobs, such as those led by the local Border Patrol Union leader, and their adulation for “strong men.”
I plead that Americans examine their conscience. Would they mock fellow citizens or defend someone who was being attacked? The United States has no king, yet there are those quick to fall in love with a lying demagogue. Complicit among these are Trump supporters and the Republican Congress members who were so quick to acquit an obvert conman who defied the Constitution almost daily. Trump’s acquittal was not a “miscarriage” of justice. It was an abortion of justice, now refuted by the people.
