General To Specific: We Knew This Was Coming

After the first Women’s March in 2017, when millions of people the world over demonstrated against the newly-sworn-in U.S. president, someone – possibly Stephen Colbert – quipped that never in all recorded history had one man been rejected by more women in one day than had Donald J. Trump.

Looking back to that period now, it seems almost harmless. The days immediately after the inauguration (the Women's March being the next day) were scary, but the threat was unfulfilled, if not altogether benign. Maybe that’s because it was still new, and because a lot of people still thought Trump might “grow into the job.”

One impeachment, one mishandled pandemic, and more than one sickening abuse of power later, that’s all gone. We have morphed from the general to the specific; from potential to consummation; from benign to malignant; from scary to downright terrifying.

Trump is now a cornered rat. Someone once said something about always betting on the cornered rat. I don’t remember the context.

Even before Trump took office there were riots in the streets of American cities: the very night, thanks to the electoral college, after he was elevated to the presidency. (He lost the 2016 election. He lost. We must never forget that.)

At that time I was among the last to brand Trump a fascist, in a flight of fancy I couldn’t resist calling Life in the Fascist Lane. How quaint. As the world witnessed in DC’s Lafayette Park on June 1, these early musings have also gone from general to specific.

I went to that first Women’s March, the Denver edition, and found myself unexpectedly inspired, if not optimistic. We were 100,000 strong. I may not really believe that the future is female. I believe it should be; that a world run by women would probably, probably, be more equitable (at least at first, since power corrupts, since ideals are seldom realized, etc etc).

Donald J. Trump. The J stands for Judas. He is utterly divorced from reality. That he must be removed from office is a given. That it will actually happen, in spite of what any survey says, is not.

Vote anyway. If you have not registered to vote, do so. I am not now, nor have I ever been, a member of the Democratic party – or the Republican party, or the CPUSA, or the Socialst Party, or the Greens, or you-name-it. I don’t care for Joe Biden all that much. My vote is not so much for him as it is against Trump. It may be futile, but I shall cast that vote anyway. By mail.