Trump’s Treasonous Plan

Unbelievably (and not surprisingly) things are getting worse.

I was devastated when Trump won the election four years ago, but I took some reassurance in the fact that ‘the balance of powers’ and the institutions of our government would contain the worst of the damage. I did not account for the fact that the Republicans in Congress would simply do the bidding of this mendacious egomaniac and allow him to systematically destroy the democratic fabric of our country.

This came to a head on Tuesday when Trump was asked if he would commit to a peaceful transfer of power if he loses the election. “Well, we’re going to have to see what happens,” Trump said. “You know that I’ve been complaining very strongly about the ballots and the ballots are a disaster.” He went on to say: “Get rid of the ballots and you’ll have a very — we’ll have a very peaceful — there won’t be a transfer frankly, there’ll be a continuation.”

Trump’s bald acknowledgment that he has no interest in democracy, only in the continuing of his grip on the levers of power is horrifying and unprecedented. In her wonderful daily dose of perspective, Letters from an American, Heather Cox Richardson reports:

On Facebook, veteran journalist Dan Rather wrote of living through the Depression, World War Two, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and Robert Kennedy, Watergate, and 9-11, then said: “This is a moment of reckoning unlike any I have seen in my lifetime…. What Donald Trump said today are the words of a dictator. To telegraph that he would consider becoming the first president in American history not to accept the peaceful transfer of power is not a throw-away line. It’s not a joke. He doesn’t joke. And it is not prospective. The words are already seeding a threat of violence and illegitimacy into our electoral process.”

I am sick with worry and fear as I write these words. Unthinkable. Impossible. America, the shining beacon of hope and possibility for all people is falling into an authoritarian dictatorship. Of course, as Black Lives Matter has brought to our very selective attention, this country was never what we said we were. Our pretensions and posturings of fairness and equal opportunity have always rested on the foundation of a mass genocide of indigenous peoples and the brutal and the ongoing subjugation of human beings, particularly those with brown and black skin. Our country was never what we thought, and some of us are just waking up to this reality.

I spoke yesterday with a friend who is thinking of donning his priest’s robes and going downtown to bear witness. He said he doesn’t even quite know what that would mean or why he is considering doing it but being reasonable and having conversations is seeming less and less viable. I think we are quickly moving past the point of if we should go to the streets, but when we must go to the streets.

My other new source of information and perspective is Robert Hubbell, a lawyer who writes Today’s Edition. (Thank you to friend, fellow writer and blog reader Fred Adair for pointing me to Richardson and Hubbell’s wisdom.) I hereby (temporarily) cede my bully pulpit and close with Robert Hubbell’s words:

 Every day seems to be more challenging than the last. It is easy to feel overwhelmed by the struggle. But we should remember that the struggle itself is worthwhile. A reader from the Netherlands sent the following story about A.J. Muste, a Dutch-born American clergyman and political activist. Muste was protesting the Vietnam war by standing outside the White House night after night, holding a candle. A reporter asked Muste, “Do you really think you are going to change the policies of this country by standing out here alone at night with a candle?” Muste replied, “I don’t do this to change the country. I do this so the country won’t change me.”

         While it is difficult not to worry about short-term outcomes, we should remember that we are engaged in a generational struggle not only for ourselves but for our children and grandchildren. We can’t let Trump change us. Our acts of resistance are acts of self-preservation, resilience, and faith. They are a bet on the future of America. That is a bet worth taking.  R. Hubbell