The resistance: trying to rescue America

Trump likes to brag about the size of the crowds he brings out to see him.  His real success is in the size of the crowds he brings out to protest him.  From the time he was nominated, people have gathered to show their opposition to him, sometimes in massive displays such as the Women's March across the nation.  A timeline of the protests against Trump can be seen here.

The crowd waiting to see Trump at Mountain View, CA.

Opposition to Trump is not essentially a partisan issue.  It is a moral issue.  People who are even marginally aware of what is reported in the news know that 
Trump's history is one of dishonesty, incompetence, fraud, and malice.  His scandals and business failures were reported even in the conservative media.  But once he had the presidency and began to use it to advance his ploys for self-aggrandizement and the subjection of others to his will, his GOP critics let their lust for power overtake any moral and intellectual objections they had toward Trump.  They are leading the nation into a moral and cultural decline in which it becomes clear that the principles around which the nation was formed have no value for them, nor for any Trump supporters.  Trump is a despicable man, but people are willing to join with  him because he affirms their pet bigotries, their desire for affluence at any moral cost, their resentment of the intelligent class whom they regard as elites, their willingness to give up decency and integrity for their personal exercise of malice toward those they choose to hate, demean, and oppress.  

As vile as Trump is, he is merely a symptom of the massive intellectual and moral failure that has overcome so many Americans.  Trump supporters have the right to speak out and hold opinions, and they have done just that.  They have stridently rejected the premises on which the country was founded and has strived to achieve:  liberty, equality, and justice.  They are against the very premise of America.  They want liberty only for themselves. They have no interest in equality.  And justice to them is the debasement of people they choose not to like.  Trump and his GOP adherents are engaged in acting out The Lord of the Flies in their juvenile obsession with power and malevolent plots.

The hard fact is that believers in the American way have trouble with the nature of the divide in the populace.  They like to believe that the differences are in the way we go about doing American business, when, in fact, half of that populace has no interest in the American way.  It is more interested in the pursuit of malice against those liberal elements on which America was founded.  The GOP likes to call itself the party of Lincoln, but practices none of those virtues which Lincoln stood for and advocated.  It has fully embraced authoritarian rule and illiberalism.   American liberals cling to the belief that there is a benignity in all their fellow citizens which can surmount the tendencies toward hatefulness, discrimination, and oppression.  They refuse to believe that our country has reached the point of Germany in the 1930s where fascism has a growing popularity and true democrats are finding it necessary to form a resistance,

That resistance has been formed on many fronts:  anti-misogyny, climate change, integrity of office, etc.  So far, protests have been massive and non-violent.  But the Trump administration's stiffing and stone-walling of Congressional efforts into activities involving Trump that look nefarious on their face demonstrate to many that civil procedures just don't work with Trump.  He flouts the laws and rules of presidential procedure.   The lawlessness of the Trump administration makes playing by the rules for the resistance to look foolish.   If the president and his minions choose to dodge and lie to evade questions about the way they conduct themselves, those who pose the questions have received an answer.  And that answer is that they have been played for fools and it is time to take action.  Peaceable demonstrations have had no effect.  Being nice has made Trump and his neo-nazi supporters bolder.  The divide in America has grown to be a divide between those who believe in liberty, equality, and justice and those who don't.  Trump supporters are the kind of people we once went to war to defend our nation against.

While the national press carries blather about the pros and cons of impeaching Trump and about the squabbling between and within the political parties, the group that is being ignored this time around is the one that knows exactly who Trump is.  They are the people who know about his business fraud, his perpetual lying, his dedication to malice, and his incompetence. They are aware that his image as a business tycoon is a total falsehood bought with his father's money.  These people are frustrated with a government that can be manipulated to cover and support him.  The government has proven that it is too corrupted to deal with him.  They are talking about how the republic has failed them and may as well be shut done.  Then, the real problem behind Trump--his supporters--can be confronted directly.

This is the group of people who have organized and participated in massive demonstrations to register their discontent.  They are the descendants of those who forced the country to end the Viet Nam War.  They are the people who are forcing others to face the realities of climate change.  And they realize the real obstacle they face is the mental climate that has made Trump possible.

They have been watching the protests in Hong Kong and the yellow vest movement in France.  They've seen the effects of mass movements elsewhere and know how they work.  Trump can attract huge throngs to force change on the country.  They may leave the country in a state that will need extensive rebuilding.  But that would be better than living in a criminal enterprise run by Trump and associates.

Hong Kong 2019