Enough!
Early along the disgusting road leading to the Trump presidency, before we fully awoke to what we were dealing with, Donald Trump discovered a new toy. He noticed that all he had to do was express his displeasure at something — his political opponent, an individual, the press, immigrants — and life would become dangerous for them.
Many in the press naively thought that, after he became President and he understood the consequences of his hateful rhetoric, Trump would stop. Remember when, in an early press conference, it was explained to Trump that using words like “Enemy of the People” to describe the press was extremely dangerous? Do you also recall his response? His response was to double down on it. He finally stopped using it because he got bored with it, not because he worried someone would get hurt. He simply found more effective ways to spread his hate,
We’ve come a long way since then and we’ve seen a lot of lives ruined. Heather Heyer is dead. Peter Strzok and Lisa Page have had their lives ruined. It’s still dangerous for Ruby Freeman and her daughter Wandrea “Shaye” Moss to be seen in public. House Republicans are seeking ways to indict Dr Anthony Fauci. I don’t need to tell you what’s become of Hunter Biden’s life. All this hate and mayhem and devastation has been brought into human lives for the sake of one man. It simply defies belief.
Sometimes we forget these are human beings. In the ruin and depredation and criminal excesses of the Trump disaster it’s easy to lose touch with the chilling devastation Trump has brought to so many real human lives. But every time he uses his racist dog whistle or stochastically terrorises someone, real people suffer actual consequences.
The recent revelation that general Mark Milley has quietly sought protection for himself and his family in the wake of Trump calling for his death has been met with a collective shrug. It’s almost as if we’ve lost the ability to find again the horror, outrage and indignation that came so easily to us back when, in a fatwa, the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini pronounced a sentence of death on the British-American novelist Salman Rushdie. Today, when Trump does it, we don’t even yawn.
Imagine if the Ayatollah Khomeini were alive today, living in America, under 91 criminal counts from four separate indictments in four different jurisdictions, and he tried to “fatwa” Salman Rushdie to death. He’d be in prison so fast his turban would spin. Right? But that’s what the former president of the United States has come to, issuing stochastic fatwas via “Truth” Social from his political mosque in Mar-a-Lago. He is a destroyer of people’s lives.
Well I say enough! I say it’s time to put the bastard in prison and damn the consequences. It’s time for Trump to learn that you can’t destroy someone’s life because you don’t like them or you disagree with them politically. Fiat justitia ruat caelum. Let justice be done though the heavens fall.
We now have the power to deliver that lesson to Trump right to his doorstep in the form of US Marshals armed with warrants and handcuffs. What the hell are we waiting for? Donald Trump has already violated the terms and conditions of his parole. It’s time to revoke that parole. And, as ever, ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters, comrades and friends, stay safe.
Robert Harrington is an American expat living in Britain. He is a portrait painter.