Get with the program
It is January 21st, 2020, as I write this, and recalling that this is a leap year, it means we have 366 days to see Donald Trump in handcuffs the day after the inauguration of a Democrat. In the critical path of our fondest hope is the election. I’m still hearing deeply disturbing rumblings from certain factions of the disconsolate Left, the consequence of which is that we may get Trump for another four years after all. Some people are actually signing their names to the ridiculous proposition that if they don’t get their particular candidate then they are going to sabotage the election, either by not voting at all or voting for Trump.
I don’t know what to say to someone that monstrously stupid and evil. Holding the life of the planet hostage because they can’t have their candidate elected and their policies enacted immediately is simply stupid and evil. We are in a life and death struggle to save our planet from the anti-science ignorance of the Trump pirate ship, time is running out on our ability to do anything, but no, first they need to stick it to the Democratic National Committee, or stick it to the misogynists, or stick it to the corporate Democrats. It is as if they were doctors insistent upon treating a stubbed toe first because the heart attack can wait.
It is a form of existential climate science denialism. Anyone who does anything to help Donald Trump get reelected, either by deliberate action or inaction, is a climate science denialist. It is existential suicide. Trust me, if you want to kill yourself that’s your lookout. But if you want to take me and my loved ones with you, I take that very personally, and so should anyone listening to the claptrap of these idiots. Yeah, you can stick it to the DNC by destroying the planet. That’ll really show ‘em.
I remember dealing with the anti-Hillary claque in 2016 and hearing the exact same idiotic crap I’m hearing now. At the time it was frustrating enough to listen to some fool who was going to vote for some third party candidate who didn’t have the chance of a tub of Ben & Jerry’s frozen yogurt in the netherworld. At the time it was, as I say, merely frustrating. Now it’s downright exasperating. In 2016 I was certain Hillary was going to win. Now I take nothing for granted, and neither should you. There’s too much at stake.
Will Rogers once said, “I am not a member of any organized political party. I’m a Democrat.” That what Rogers said in the 1920s or 30s could still be a valid joke today in 2020 is to our own particular shame. Perhaps the coming charade of an impeachment trial in the Senate will organize us in some form worth the name, I don’t know. I hope so. One thing is clear: a supermajority necessary to convict Donald Trump in the Senate is almost out of the question. Expecting the mollusk Republicans to suddenly evolve into vertebrates is naive. But I do expect fence-sitting Democrats to evolve beyond 2016 come November. Between now and the convention go ahead and vie for your candidate. I have my own favorite too. But once the decision is made, vote for her, or vote for him. Your life and the lives of everyone important to you may hang in the balance.
Robert Harrington is an American expat living in Britain. He is a portrait painter.