Sosbee.com

Of all the presidents America has elected over the past couple of hundred years, why was this one, this president Barack Obama, subjected to the kind of aggressive opposition of a type and degree that would apply to the worst kind of pariah? The official Republican position was established on the very day of Obama’s election. “We do not want you as president and we will do everything in our power to destroy your presidency.” It cannot be described any other way. Every action, every utterance of the Republican Party has followed that policy to this very day, even after he has left office. As for the total effect on the country as a whole produced by this mysteriously hateful attitude, that is beyond our ability to measure. The Republican strategy worked. The Obama presidency was effectively negated. We will never know how much better off the country would be today were it not for the party of NO, people who call themselves “Republicans”. But why? The easiest answer would be his race. But surely, surely we have moved beyond that as a nation and as humans. Or have we ?

I would not waste 10 seconds trying to thwart Trump and his agenda. Trump will dig his own grave, and create plenty of enemies in the process without any help from us. Our real enemy is the Republican party; therefore, our effort should be 100% in the direction of getting them out of office at all levels.

Has there ever been a politician that so closely duplicates the way Republicans think and act? Republicans have always been misogynistic. That is Trump to a “T”. Money, since the Reagan revolution, has been the Republicans’ primary metric for judging a person’s worth. Ditto the Donald: racial bigotry; opposition to social progress; indifference to the damage caused by pollution; the hierarchy of corporations over people; all these are well-recognized Republican characteristics. However, as yet the Donald has not embraced extreme gerrymandering or draconian voter suppression tactics to maintain control, but “the night is young” as they say.

There is an old saying (of Hebrew origin, I think) to the effect that: “things need to get much worse before they can get better”. The electoral college selection of “the Donald” as President Of The United States is perhaps the clearest proof of how appropriate that adage is to the present time. It is difficult to imagine how the next four years could be any worse for America than what the Trump agenda portends, but it certainly does not promise to be any better.

Republicans knew very well what “the Donald” was. The primary campaign exposed without any doubt how completely unfit this con man was to be President of the United States. Yet, they saw an opening. Clinton’s lackluster campaign was faltering. If the Republicans could only combine their traditional base with Trump’s crowds, then add the Tea Party, and the legions of Clinton-haters, they would have a shot at the big prize. To Republicans, this was Nirvana, the Holy Grail they had coveted since Ronald Reagan gave them that taste of power in the 80s, (they were almost able to grab it again after Obama screwed up so badly in his first two years in office). The devil offered a deal they simply could not refuse: abandon “never trump”; accept “the Donald” as America’s Savior, and pour all your resources into getting him elected. If you do this, I will give you absolute power for generations to come. That was simply too good. They dropped “never trump” like the hottest potato, and the rest is history. We are now watching the historic dismantling of virtually everything good our elected government has done for the country for the past 70 years.

Those of us who witnessed Mussolini in the 30s and early 40s performing his speeches before an adoring, carefully chosen audience, are having flashbacks watching “the Donald” do the same.

Americans opened their hearts and pocketbooks to pay for rebuilding the arson-burned mosque (20,000 people pledged over $1 million in just a few hours), and in another town, Americans put together $76,000 to fix the vandalized Jewish cemetery headstones. When you see this response, you realize we do not need Trump to make America great again. We are far greater than anythingTrump ever has or ever will produce.

Americans opened their hearts and pocketbooks to pay for rebuilding the arson-burned mosque (20,000 people pledged over $1 million in just a few hours); and in another town, Americans put together $76,000 to fix vandalized Jewish cemetery headstones. You see this response, and realize we do not need Trump to make America great again. We are far greater than anytyhing Trump ever has or ever will produce.

Did anyone ever think America would some day have its own Rasputin?
Probably not, but how else could one describe Steve Bannon?

All signs point to a catastrophe of colossal proportions, just waiting to explode. . The various villains Trump has chosen to fill out his cabinet and head up the agencies, bureaus, and offices of government are a veritable rogue’s gallery of “hit men” who make no secret of their intention to emasculate some of the important institutions, laws, and regulations, America has developed over the past 2 1/2 centuries. The only hope for the future of America-as-we- know-it is for right-thinking ( as opposed to “ right-wing”) Americans to get out of the house and join, participate, contribute, support, write and/or call your Congressman. In other words, don’t wait for the next election. Respond, react, protest every evil move coming out of Washington. You can be sure there will be plenty.