Scary Times

My rule of thumb has always been to avoid writing about politics, religion and sex because each are intensely personal. Save for one post I wrote a few months back, I’ve been true to that credo. In fact, when Superman wrote this post last week, I responded off line. But when a sitting governor is the subject of a kidnapping and potential murder plot, I can’t be a quiet bystander any longer.

ENOUGH!!!!!!!!

As you all know I have never been a Trump fan, but I have stayed out of the name calling, political hysteria, and all that crap. I felt and still feel that anyone who openly wished for his death when he caught the virus is just plain wrong. But his behavior since the COVID diagnosis has become even more erratic to the point of being downright frightening.

One of the first things someone told me as I entered the managerial phase of my work career was that the first rule of management is that everything is my fault. Both the good and bad. They explained that the leader sets the tone for his people, that any department head wears the successes and failures that follow, and that if I didn’t have a thick skin I’d better develop one quickly.

In our fearless leader’s mind, that doesn’t apply to him. Everything good is his doing. Anything bad wasn’t his fault, responsibility, or someone else is to blame. And his tribe follows his lead.

How else can you explain the visceral and often primitive reactions between those who believe in the science of COVID and those who think it’s all bullshit? How else can you explain the amount of hate that is so blatantly obvious in this country? How else do you explain why we lead the world in COVID related infections and deaths. How else can you explain that there is no outrage from the White House when a black person is gunned down by law enforcement, yet peaceful protesters are branded as subversive. And now we have the incident in Michigan.

What a fucking mess!

COVID would have been here regardless of who was in the White House, I know that. Not all Trump supporters are blatant racists, but I bet it is safe to say most racists do support him, and he continues to refuse to disavow their actions. And Trump didn’t recruit or organize any of the terrorists, lets call them what they are, to take out the Michigan governor. But I’m sorry. Anyone who insists that he has absolutely nothing to do with the state we now find ourselves in are as much of an enabler as his cronies in the Senate. He is the messenger egging them on. After all, he did say that Michigan (and other states whose governors dare criticize him) should be “liberated”. Well, I guess some of those “good people” were listening and decided to act.

If he wins the election, everything is all hunky-dory, but if he loses, the election was corrupt because of absentee ballots, the Democrats and any other wild shit he can concoct. He encourages people not to let the virus dominate their lives, and that it isn’t any worse than the common flu, without taking into consideration that he’s just plain wrong, that nobody on the planet received the treatment he received, that it demeans those who lost their struggle with COVID, and even if a bona fide treatment becomes available, not everyone will have access to it because he is so hell-bent getting rid of the Affordable Care Act.

Mitch McConnell meanwhile breaks all historical precedent by refusing to have the Senate hold a Supreme Court confirmation hearing more than eight months before the 2016 election, claiming the incoming President should have the right to choose, but wants to ramrod a nominee through less than a month before the election that involves the most unpopular Presdient in our history who lost the popular vote by over three million votes. The hypocrisy of it all makes me want to puke! Putin and our enemies must be laughing their asses off as they toast to their success.

My eighty-five year old mother in law has said on a number of occasions that Trump reminds her so much of Hitler. I’ve never bought into that comparison, and still don’t (mostly), but how can you not see the similarities in the creation of what became the Nazi party in Germany to what is occurring here now. We have a very unpopular President, who was always a loose cannon, who is now spouting off incomprehensible bullshit that I’m actually hoping is a case of rhoid rage from all the steroids he received instead of him losing his mind. Indict Obama? Indict Biden? Indict both of the Clintons, Pelosi and any other enemy he can think of? For what? Does this sound like a sane person? He’s doing everything he can to make it harder for people to vote, either in person or via absentee ballot and his enablers are helping him, like the governor of Texas who mandated there can only be one location per county where people can drop off their ballots. Do you know how big some of those counties are?

Any true leader would care for the welfare of all of his citizens, not just those who support him, and would do everything in their power to make it safer and easier to vote. His actions demonstrate the only thing he cares about is winning, and he does not give two shits how that happens. Does anyone honestly think that all the absentee ballots will be handled appropriately and accurately? I expect to read stories about how bags and bags of these ballots were thrown away or “lost” after Election Day. It’s the only way he wins the election in my opinion.

These next few months really scare me. He’s sewn doubt about the election and in so many words encouraged his people to flood the polling areas to make sure everything is above board. Even the Department of Homeland Security admits that domestic terrorism is the greatest threat we face, and he’s calling in the dogs to…..what? Intervene if they think they see something fishy. How do you think that will turn out?

He and Pence have all but admitted they will not accept the election results should he lose, and he has a lapdog of an Attorney General who asks how high when Trump says jump to help him steal the election. How can anyone not see this is a recipe for disaster? How can anyone not see the potential for carnage in the streets unlike anything we have yet seen? Accuse me of being overly dramatic, of hyperbole, of being full of shit, and of being a far left socialist (I’m not, by the way) if you want to,  but when a republican senator and ally says “democracy is not the objective of the US system,” how can you not think otherwise, regardless of how Senator Tillis tries to explain it away. The only chance we have of the administration accepting the results without much fuss is if he loses BIG. And even that may not be enough.

I’ve never been a political animal, and have proudly straddled the middle for as long as I can remember. I’m fiscally conservative (don’t get me going about the spiraling national debt that will soon overwhelm us), and socially liberal. But this election isn’t about politics for me. It truly isn’t. I’d say the same thing about anybody in that office who is as unhinged as Trump is now.

This is simply about a bad guy who only cares about himself that needs to be fired before this becomes a country we no longer recognize. We’re more than halfway there already. We can argue and worry about 2024 in 2024. The church of what is happening now is what’s important.

Whenever the dust finally settles on this cluster fuck, I sincerely hope we have a new President. We didn’t know what Trump was about in 2016, but have no illusions now.  Shame on us if he doesn’t lose big. We’ll have nobody to blame but ourselves.

And I’ll probably become an alcoholic, drug addict or both. How else can one numb themselves from the reality that is sure to follow?

Author: Steve Markesich

I am loving husband, a doting father, a Red Sox fanatic, an aspiring novelist and MS advocate. Feel free to check out my stevemarkesich.com web site. View all posts by Steve Markesich