The facts as they are

Let’s face it.

There are times in life when all of us have to stop screwing around, and deal with the facts as they are, NOT as we would like them to be.

 After that utter monstrosity of a presidential election we just had in this country, this is certainly one of those times.

 Quite frankly, I’ve grown big time weary of all of the backbiting and circular firing squad stuff coming out of the Democratic Party since Donald Trump soundly defeated Kamala Harris in a contest that, surprise-surprise, was nowhere as close as the incessant polling and news reporting falsely led us to believe it would be.

 Now that the smoke has cleared, we have a nation that is hopelessly divided even more than ever. Maybe, sadly, that’s the way it’s supposed to be.

 Half the nation, who call themselves MAGA (Make America Great Again) believes that they won because the other side just “doesn’t get it.” They feel that the other half is comprised of social liberal elites who cater to liars, cheats, and criminals, and use the power of government to make laws we’re all forced to live with. To them, Donald Trump, a convicted felonious former president and billionaire son of an avowed racist New York City businessman, is the personification of their grievances, and as far as they’re concerned, despite Trump’s many moral and ethical shortcomings, he has been ordained to lead this country back to a status of world dominance.

 That’s why thousands answered his seditious call to attack the US Capitol on January 6th, 2021 to stop the certification of the 2020 Electoral College votes from the states that elected Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.

 One of the most shameful days in US history.

 The other half of our nation, who call themselves “Americans” (see, I’ve pissed some folks off already) believe this is a nation of laws and principles, and is still in the process of living up to its promise of being a place of justice, freedom, and opportunity. That means people can come here from all over the world to learn, grow and share in the promise of that freedom. In the process, times may get tough, but as long as we live by our creed of justice and fairness, and work together for the common good, providing opportunity for those who abide by our laws, and are willing to work hard, we will become stronger as a nation.

 Kamala Harris, an accomplished Black-Asian woman and vice president of the United States, child of a Jamaican father and Indian mother who met and married during this country’s civil rights movement, personified those precious American aspirations and principles.

 And there are those who feel that that’s at least half the reason why she lost.

 That was your fight card, ladies and gentleman. By all indications, it was assumed, erroneously it turns out, that Harris, given her attributes and what she represented, would be victorious over the MAGA doom and gloom that has infested this country beyond all measure.

 That assumption was perilously wrong, and here’s why.

 Part of the “freedom” this country offers is the right to lie your behind off to anyone who will listen as long as you do it under the guise of politics, and base your lies in the untethered hatreds and prejudices of those who are so blind, they’re willing to vote against their own interests.

 So when most Republican politicians, in their endless quest for unfettered power, lie to people who come from generations of struggle - be they rural white folks, Latinos, or Blacks - falsely blame liberals for their problems, and don't want to even try to understand or do anything about those problems - such a witches brew of devious falsehoods can only lead to trouble, as we saw Election Night.

 Now let’s be clear, a bad economy affects everybody. Liberal Democrats pay exactly the same high prices for goods and services as any other citizen, and don’t like it anymore than anybody else.

 But the part that royally tees me off is that just because a Democratic president is in office, doesn’t mean that he, and he alone, is responsible for every economic palpitation that takes place. There’s a Congress, who last I heard, is also supposed to take some responsibility for the shape of the economy, since they’re responsible for passing economic policy into law.

 Now most Americans feel good with divided government, namely voting in one political party to control at least one house of Congress, and the other to control the White House. Makes us feel that some sort of reasoned compromise could be reached when issues are debated.  But what happens when one house of Congress doesn’t want to govern, but just manipulate the system to further its ends towards power?

 Or deliberately undermine the governing process so literally nothing gets done, especially by the Democratic president?

 Who holds that party accountable for its actions? Supposed to be the voters, but historically we’ve seen how that works. 

 You see, this is where I absolutely disagree with Democrats who are crying in their soup about not knowing how to speak to the “working class,” or supposedly talking down to the working class.

 “The party itself has increasingly become a smarty-pants, suburban, college-educated party, and it lends itself to the kind of backlash that we’ve seen,” charged former Obama campaign adviser David Axelrod on CNN.

 Sorry David, I disagree. You don’t raise a billion in campaign dollars in three months - much of it in small dollar donations -  by not knowing how to talk to people about the issues and the dire future they face if they lose an election. 

 There’s more at play here.

 Another Democrat opined that the party is afraid to openly condemn bad behavior like violent campus protests and demonstrations, afraid that it will lose support from possible constituents. That failure allowed Republicans to erroneously and indirectly link Dems to those unfortunate things like "Defund the police.".

 I can agree with that, and cringed every time it happened, and Dems didn’t say a word. That was a mistake, but still not enough to lose an election.

 It was the late political analyst Bill Moyers who wrote in 2017, “For four decades now, Republicans have succeeded in framing Democrats as the party that uses government to bigfoot rather than aid the American people. Democrats may celebrate public servants for keeping our food safe and our lakes healthy, but Republicans have successfully portrayed them as humorless bureaucrats who salivate at the urge to exert power and control over taxpaying Americans.” 

 Translation - Democrats have traditionally addressed problems with governmental solutions, and Republicans have made them pay for it with divisive lies and smears in order to maintain some relevancy and control.

 Based on what we’ve seen even before Trump came to power eight years ago, the issue for me isn’t Democrats being elitists or talking down to anybody, but Republicans not being held accountable for always scheming, and not addressing the needs of working people, for political gain. They’ve made it clear, especially since Trump, that their only purpose in life is to attain political power, not surprisingly for the millionaires and billionaires who keep them in business.

 So on issues of jobs, helping people out of poverty, access to affordable healthcare and housing, building personal wealth, etc., Republicans have made nefarious use of precious oxygen to tar and feather earnest Democrats who have tried to ensure that all Americans, or potential Americans, can enjoy those basics.

  Republicans, at the behest of the wealthy, have convinced generations of certain struggling people that everybody Democrats want to help, and especially folks who don’t look anything like them, don’t deserve to enjoy ANY of those basics.

 Instead, they do, Republicans say, because they’re the “true” Americans.

 Don’t get me wrong, I believe in sensible border and immigration policy and security too. But what I don’t share is the vehement racism Republicans have employed to mischaracterize the problem, all because they’re deathly afraid that one day, those helpless immigrants fleeing tyranny for freedom with their children, will one day be future Democrats.

 To Trump and company, stopping that flow is an imperative. 

 So Republicans have done a masterful job of mischaracterizing those folks as not deserving, or evil, as a way of both planting, and then fertilizing seeds of distrust, hate and fear against them.

 Come on! It doesn’t take much in this country to “other” someone else if they’re perceived to be not worthy of citizenship, or even being on our shores.

 “They’re eating the cats…They’re eating the dogs…!” Sound familiar? Spew that enough, and it doesn’t matter who’s saying it.

 “Kamala wants to spend your hard earned tax dollars so that transgender boys can become girls and compete against girls in high school sports!”

 Say it enough…..!

 “They’re letting them into our country from the insane asylums, and the prisons, and mental institutions. They’re murderers, and rapists, and terrorists. Crime is out of control. The streets aren’t safe for anyone!”

 Say it enough…!

 “Democrats are taking YOUR money, and spending it on those people. That’s why the price of gas, food and housing is so high!”

 Say it beyond enough, and presumably sensible white, Latino and Black voters will believe it, come together and will vote for a convicted criminal-in-chief in order to protect their homes, families, and country from a common enemy. In fact, this election, that’s exactly what happened.

 Only Trump has vowed to protect us. Democrats have vowed to protect the “enemy,” and with your money. That’s why “crooked” Joe Biden and Kamala did nothing about closing the border until it was too late, Republicans insisted.

 Trump and the GOP  have been consistently exploiting the fear of race and class for years, and now they have a powerful media eco-system in Fox News, Elon Musk’s X (formerly Twitter), conservative podcasters like Joe Rogan, and others to lie like the Hell I sincerely hope they’re all headed to.

 And unfortunately, they’ve done an excellent job!

 So while noble Dems were out there vowing to protect a woman’s right to choose and help families move into the middle-class, Trump and company were saying, “They’re lying. Don’t trust them. Believe us! We’re your only salvation!” 

 Well, now Trump and MAGA have the power they so brazenly lied, cheated and stole for. This criminal will now escape punishment for the extraordinary crimes he allegedly committed before, thanks to being elected president again, plus, he can now commit more crimes as president with impunity AND immunity, says the conservative U.S. Supreme Court he now gets to further mold to rule for generations to come.

Trump has already named folks like crazy Robert F. Kennedy Jr., bonkers Elon Musk, racist Stephen Miller, and a clown from Fox News as his defense secretary to his coming administration. 

Gee, I feel safer already.

Word is Michele Morrow, who North Carolinians wisely did not elect to ANY responsible office, wants a job with Trump overseeing education policy. Lord help us!

Gee, why not hire Mark Robinson to lead Trump's new U.S. Dept. of Female Anatomy. CNN says he allegedly has some personal proclivities in that area.

And of course Project 2025, the dystopian plan to dismantle American democracy Trump once vehemently denied having anything to do with, will now commence once he takes the oath of office on January 20th. 

 Now aren’t you happy?

Trump's "no tax on tips and overtime" B.S.. Yeah, wait until his tariffs on foreign goods, and the cost of deporting of millions of human beings, catch up with your paycheck, sweetheart! Even if you never file another federal tax return in life, Trump is about to stick ALL of us with the BIG bill for his fiendishness. 

Trust me!

Oh, by the way…apparently there was no alleged election malfeasance this trip, so nothing for Trump or any of his MAGA lawyers to jump up and down about. I wonder what changed from 2020? Hmmmmm.

Dems could have run on the truth - that feel it or not, the US economy is currentlythe best in the world. That inflation, which, in fact is global, but cooling now here, is the result of getting back on our feet relatively quickly after the pandemic shut everything down. 

And supply shortages have driven everyday prices up for consumers. For instance, an avian flu outbreak, for example, caused our egg prices to soar, and not come back down yet.

Only the price of gas has shown us mercy, intermittently dropping on occasion.

 If Dems truly screwed up though, it was in not adequately and effectively defining Trump’s first term in office for the disaster it was to illustrate that he just can’t be trusted, and is an inadequate leader, no matter what he promises. 

 Folks who voted for Trump last week "fondly" remember the "great" economy he had before the Covid pandemic. Yeah, that was the holdover Obama economy that Trump ultimately blew up himself by mismanaging the pandemic. That's why he was lying so much about how soon Covid would be over. Remember how hard he tried to get folks to drink bleach, not wear masks and get back to shopping? 

 He also lost 2.7 million jobs and increased the unemployment rate to 6.4%. Home prices went up 27.5%. Illegal immigration actually increased. So did crime and the murder rate. 

And because of Trump, hundreds of thousands of Americans needlessly died, thanks to his horrendous mismanagement of a deadly disease.

 All of this is documented. None of it was used against him. Talk about political malpractice.

 Instead, Dems went after him personally, which turned that convicted criminal and liar into a “victim” in the minds of many. Incredible!

 During his first term, because Trump didn’t expect to win in 2016, he wasn’t properly prepared to flex his muscle. Thus, a lot of folks working for him were loyal to the country, and in position to stop some of his most dangerous policies in their tracks once they saw just how crazy he was.

 But now, Trump is MORE than ready to take power, and he’s already begun appointing MAGA loyalists to key positions to carry out his every whim without question once he takes office in January. So he's got loyalists on top of loyalists to do his bidding now.

 Former Democratic U.S. Senator Claire McCaskill hit the nail on the head after the election on MSNBC. "I think we have to acknowledge that Donald Trump knows our country better than we do," she said. "I think he figured out that anger — and frankly, fear — were way more powerful than appealing to people’s better angels. That anger and fear were going to work in this election. Whether you’re afraid of immigrants or afraid of people who are trans, he figured that out."

 I like what SNL did in their cold open last Saturday night, using dark humor to acknowledge the immense power and control Trump now has over our country and ALL of our futures, and comically “apologizing” for seeming to try and stop him with their brutal satire. 

 NOTE TO REPUBLICANS - Now that Donald Trump owns ALL of you like a cheap whorehouse in Texas, having both houses of Congress, I hope you're ready to take his orders without argument. He's already strong arming Senate Republican leaders to agree to his recess appointments, and to block anymore Biden judicial appointments. You're now fooling yourselves if you think you represent ANY of the voters who elected you.

When the people who elected Trump finally wake up and realize what they’ve done, it will be one of the greatest collective shames, and disgraces, in the history of western civilization. Hey, but why should we be surprised? I betcha most of those folks didn't want to wear a simple protective face mask during the pandemic to save their lives and someone else's. So how they voted last week really shouldn't surprise the rest of us, should it?

 Actually, now that I think about it,  they may never wake up!

 The facts as they are, folks, NOT as we would like them to be.