Yes, I know, I’ve stooped to clickbait. Being fumingly angry does that to a man
You see I have followed the handwringing, pant-wetting, shit-bedding story of how President Biden is presenting himself and the crowd of the fearful who think he is doomed to failure and, using flatly ageist rhetoric, think he should retire from the race, or ‘pass the torch’ or ‘preserve his legacy’ or any of a odd-thousand other ridiculous bullshit cliches you drop on someone whom you just want to go away
And it has made me angry. For obvious reasons...but my therapists tell me that when I express anger, I have other deeper emotions that manifest themselves as anger. Fear, despondency, insecurity, things no one wants to admit. Well guess what; I’m going to do it. At the base of my anger, disgust, loathing is another basic human ignoble emotion: that of envy.
I’m envy of the followers of Tumpy the clown. I cleverly call them the Trumpies (‘deplorables’ has been taken).
Now I don’t want to feel envious of hateful people like that. I’m a liberal elite, I’m supposed to feel superior. I’m educated, I have a very secure job, I have a happy marriage to a loving Asian wife, I’m financially secure, Im somebody. I have a deep interest in politics for the purest of motives, I tell myself: To help other humans. To make the world a better place, to give all Americans universal healthcare. Yeah, I'm not into politics for self interest or personal gain, I leave that to the grifters and phonies. So why would I feel envy?
I think the reason is simple: The Trumpies for all their bovine stupidity have a candidate that they and everyone else like them, believes unto their last breath. They hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil against their chosen messiah, his very rancidness, Trumpy the con. Tell him He’s a treasonable seditionist, they say his re-election was stolen by a vast conspiracy. tell them about his 34 felony convictions and they’ll spout bile about a corrupt justice system and proudly wear his mugshot as a souvenir t-shirt. Tell them that his businesses go bankrupt, they’ll say he’s strategic. tell them that he’s a tax cheat and a swindler, they’ll say he’s smart with his money. Tell them that he’s a bully and attacks the weak and disabled, they’ll tell you he’s a warrior who defies political correctness. Tell them that he is a philanderer, a twice divorced unrepentant lech, and they say he’s their fantasy, cause that's who they want to be, complete with a third foreign born escort girl wife, past affairs with a porn star and a license to walk into the dressing rooms of the miss teen USA pageant contestants.
And then contrast us, our leaders and our media figures and our mentors and tell us that we have an amazingly successful President, who beat the Dragon Trumpy four years ago, who with a divided congress and very thin majorities, managed to conjure legislative wins almost out of thin air, who has a booming economy and record low unemployment, who helps and cares for the marginalized and has done more to combat climate change than any other president (low bar, I know), and , though being a straight white catholic came out for marriage equality ahead of most other politicians, and what do we say?
Oh he’s old, he can’t compete, he can’t win. Oh no, we’ll lose in a landslide. The goddamn NY Times and the Washington Post, you know, those liberal media publications, keep running tallies of Democrats who have said, or hinted that he should somehow resign or decline to run even though he was overwhelmingly the choice of Democratic primary voters everywhere just this year. A candidate for Senate in a safely blue seat now shoots off his mouth about Biden stepping aside, seeming to forget how he led the charge to impeach his contestant in this race in the first place, bore the brunt of his childish insults and who, if the apocalypse happens as a white and privileged type will just figuratively and maybe literally retreat behind the blue wall of his wealthy blue state and all the marginalized people, living in Missouri and Luisiana? oh well, we tried.
Well allow me to suggest we should try a little harder. Surely you all remember the kerfuffle of October 2016 when recordings surfaced of the clown, and his bragging about his hobby of female genital grabbing. Oh no some said, he should drop out, that will make him unelectable, he will lose in a landslide.The New York Times was strongly disapproving; I think Senator Collins herself was ‘very disappointed’ You know what his base said, his stalwarts, his enablers and flunkies? It starts with ‘F’ and ends with ‘you’. And guess what the result was. Sort of like the primary of 2016 when the National Review did an entire issue of how he was unsuitable for the nomination. Base says: same thing. Oh, and that Republican primary this year, after he was twice impeached and had said more lies and dumb, ignorant hateful things then I or a dozen people have time and energy to list. Won that one too. See a patten here? See, even I grasp that you win elections not by how many words the New York Times writes in your favor, but in how many of your own followers you get to go to the polls and vote. Yes it helps with gerrymandering and voter suppression, but you get the general idea. Wouldn’t it be nice if we took a page out of that book, shut up about his perceived flaws and stopped trying to be cognitive psychologists, called the media twerps of The New York Times out for the twerps they are and not only voted for him, but said that same charming two word response, the one that begins with’F’ and ends with you to every pollster, media pundit, Economist inspired concern troll who is outright sabotaging the candidate and started controlling this narrative. Loudly, consistently and over and over. Biden’s our guy. This cognitive decline [even if it's real] is bullshit. Look at his accomplishments and look at the horrific Project 2025 dystopia that will happen if he loses. We're voting for him. Oh, and that charming phrase which begins with ‘F’ and ends with ‘you’.
Is that who we really are? Do we deny reality? no, but that is the reality. You fight the enemy the way he fights us. You don't throw away your best weapons before the battle starts. When the bullets start flying, that's when dissension in the ranks ends. And you never know, you just might win. Which kinda beats losing. And gives the phrase which starts with ‘F’ and ends with ‘you’ a decidedly delightful feeling to utter