We Trump Again. Will We Ever Learn?
History repeats itself. First as tragedy, second as a farce. –Karl Marx
Most souls learn best through experience. Burn a hand, and know the hard way to avoid flames and hot surfaces.
In returning Donald Trump to the White House, the American public will soon re-experience why they kicked him out in 2020.
Meanwhile, all manner of farce and tragedy will play out across this nation and throughout the world.
Global autocrats will be emboldened and celebrate as the new POTUS cozies up to them and most likely hands them U.S. intelligence secrets. He’s done it before and escaped all consequences. What’s to stop him now?
Trump will play “peacemaker” by withdrawing all U.S. support for Ukraine. This may ultimately compel the country to cede territory (and likely far more) to Trump’s favorite autocrat in exchange for so-called peace.
And U.S. support will no longer have any credibility or meaning in the world.
But hey. For a certain consideration, maybe these smaller countries can get on Trump’s good side. All it will take is fulsome praise and a whole lot of cash pilfered from their national treasury.
Trump is no doubt still livid that the Saudis forked over $2 billion to his son-in-law after Jared Kushner left his White House post. Wonder how much Trump will demand from them this time if/when he leaves office?
Are we roundup ready?
Meanwhile, those fleeing violence and economic devastation south of the U.S. border to build a better life in this country may well be separated at the border from their children, most likely never to see them again. It happened in the first Trump administration. What’s to stop it from occurring again?
Or, this time, flat out shot and killed without trial, no questions asked. After all, the U.S. Supreme Court just gave U.S. presidents legal protection from prosecution for any action related to the office. Trump can argue he was stopping a (fictitious) border invasion when he gave the Border Patrol the kill-on-sight order.
Will any of the agents resist that order? Not if they want to keep their jobs.
What about that illegal alien roundup Trump promised? If, unlike the border wall, it really takes place, it may well ensnare many naturalized U.S. citizens and those here as legal alien residents. If I were in either of those categories, I would keep my citizenship papers or green card on my person, always. I’d sleep with the damn things.
Of course, that may not make that much difference to MAGA minions eager to prove their worth to the old/new Dear Leader. Papers proving you are here legally? We don’t need no stinkin’ papers! You’re outta here!
Who cares about the emotional and financial devastation of abrupt and brutal family separations? After all, in the first Trump administration, such cruelty was not a byproduct or afterthought. It was deliberate. Is that who we are as a nation?
Native Americans and black folk torn from their homes and brought here in chains may well answer a resounding YES! My heart weeps.
And if that roundup nightmare does take place, even his MAGA faithful will feel the effects. Fresh fruits and vegetables unpicked and unavailable. All manner of services unobtainable or priced beyond ordinary means.
New arrivals to this country have always taken on jobs that are essential yet invisible and that no one native born wants to do. We’ll see how happy we all are if/when that labor pool vanishes overnight.
What’s to stop Trump from unleashing the U.S. military on peaceful domestic protesters? He wanted to do so in his first term but was persuaded otherwise by staffers who will not be present this time. Will the U.S. military obey such a clearly unlawful command?
And then there is the looming national abortion ban—all without any additional legislation. Those of the XX persuasion in all states will relearn why they dislike Trump when his new, ultraconservative U.S. attorney general mandates enforcement of the Comstock Act.
That law forbids interstate mailing or transport of anything related to abortion, like the abortion pills or the instruments for surgical abortion. Access to abortion will go up in smoke in all 50 states, even those that enshrined reproductive rights in their state constitutions.
With no need to pass any new laws, GOP politicians can throw up their hands and claim with a straight face they had nothing to do with it.
No right to abortion? No right to sex!
Maybe, finally, women in this country will not only get rip roaring furious about being relegated to breeding stock, but DO something about it. It could happen, and it won’t be pretty.
How about a nationwide sex strike? Combine that with a national women’s work stoppage. Men will find out just how much of the burdens of daily living women in this country shoulder every day.
Males will not like to be underpaid/nonpaid caregivers, cooks, cleaners—the essential but invisible (to men) work that women do day in and day out.
Maybe all the outrageous things Trump said during his campaign was just red meat for his base. But when he told his MAGA crowds, “I am your retribution,” I believed him. I still do.
Government based on retribution, fear, cruelty, venality, and corruption/grift is not one I wanted to experience for a second time. And you?