The 2016 Election — A Post Mortem
Or: Trump is the President, and we need to find a way to deal with it.
It is the night of the 21st of February, 2017. Donald J. Trump has been the President of the United States of America for more than a month now. And it has been a wild month! From low attendance at the inauguration (I had to get the dig in- any Conservatives who, for some reason, might be reading this get one free shot at me in the comments because fair is fair) to controversial and ultimately suspended executive orders on immigration, to mini-media driven scandals in the top levels of the administration, to protests in the streets, to marginally qualified cabinet picks…
Jesus! One month.
Anyone who has read my blogposts to date knows where I stand on the political spectrum. As a non-Marxist socialist, I am a bit of a rare bird, just in that light. But I am also one of these socialists who pays dues to a membership organization that does good organizing work, that lets other socialists know they are not alone, and spreads good social justice-y propaganda about. Meanwhile, I try, for myself to think of how we can have socialism in the US which would be acceptable to majorities- not electoral majorities, but actual majorities.
I am that guy- the pragmatist aiming at a utopia. And this is fine. If our first act is to alienate the majority of the population, we are doing something wrong on the Left. And this attitude leads me to this post- finally a comment about the Election and its aftermath.
I’ve been to the rallies and marches. I’ve done the memes (and will continue to make stuff I happen to find funny.) I troll the comments section on the National Review (and just as often find myself in agreement with a lot of the things the NR writes about.) I have been the “warrior” and have uttered righteous outrage at how things have shaken out. But tonight is a night to reflect with some sobriety on just where we have come from and think about where we as a country need to go.
Yes! For Leftist readers. Of course Trump is basically a terrible person to lead this country. No doubt. Yes, I know he dogwhistles to people who are eager to get revenge for social change in this country. Yes, he plays the Alt-Right like a fiddle, and benefits from their megaphonic firebreathing. Trump knows it, the Alt-Right knows it (and whorishly like the attention) and we all know it… It’s no big secret that in public Trump utters racist and sexist sh-t over and over again, and does so with impunity, because he has a legion of internet trolls (and robots- See the work that Dan Patterson and I did for TechRepublic, and remember, Hillary used robots too) at his disposal who will just go shout down anyone who raises an issue with all of this.
And YES! I know- there are huge chunks of the American population who are legitimately concerned that the policies they believe Trump will promote, and which he has already begun promoting will lead to horrible outcomes that affect real peoples’ lives (things like: The failed first EO, the new dragnet on illegal immigrants, the defunding of abortion support across the globe and the chaos Trump has created in the domestic healthcare industry by sending mixed signals about the end of the Affordable Care Act, as well as the hatred his mob’s victory has inspired toward immigrants, blacks, gays and the trans community which he has only sort of begun to denounce, to name just a few in this month.) People are terrified, I think more by the uncertainty than by anything real that has happened to them specifically. I don’t see any reason to minimize this at all. It is a real fear for millions and millions of people, and a legitimate concern for millions and millions more.
And YES! I know that the majority of the population does not support Mr. Trump, did not vote for him, and think “Generic someone else” (usually Bernie Sanders… don’t get me started there!) would do a much better job. Maybe so. But Bernie Sanders was not on the general election ballot. At any rate, Trump enjoys a strong and ossifying support among tens of millions or maybe close to 100 million Americans- it’s like an unquestioning and uncritical support, the kind enjoyed by Barack Obama after 2008. Where he could do nothing worthy of criticism for some folks. Nothing sticks to him, and any attacks of him coming from the media are seen as completely baseless. Rather bizarre, but hey… it is what it is,
Pointing all this out is not productive. It doesn’t change anyone’s mind. It is just what it is. There are lots and lots of a — holes in this country who are just like Trump. And they love how he just bats all these true accusations aside without a second thought. Informing Trump supporters that they are susceptible to being tricked by alternative media is met with shrugs and an even closer embrace of Trump. It’s the standard: “And…? He gets things done. So what? Why are you attacking me? My side won.”
I know all that, and yet, I want to step back a bit.
First of all- by our rules, Trump won the election. There is absolutely no question to this. In 2000, there was some question- the matter, if you will recall was decided by one vote in the Supreme Court, and when the recount was called in Florida, Bush was up and his victory was certified by the Secretary of State, though other votes were found to put this certification into question and … Blah Blah Blah. George W. Bush was our President for four years, legitimately or not, and the world didn’t f — king end. And then in 2004, he earned what eluded him in 2000. He won the plurality and a clear majority of the Electoral College. And then he served another 4 years, and the world still didn’t end.
Who cares about the goddamned popular vote?! We don’t select the President based on the popular vote. WE NEVER HAVE. So why is it that people insist that this is what we should pay attention to? And these same people who care so goddamned much about the popular vote: Where the hell were they when it came time to take over state governments? In 2010, when congressional districts were about to be redrawn which would guarantee Republicans safe districts for the next generation, where were these people then? That’s right. 2010 had incredibly low turnout, and therefore had a Republican Wave at the state level which handed the Government over to these people’s enemies for the foreseeable future.
Demanding that we use the popular vote to determine whether Trump is legitimately the President is like selecting a winner of the Superbowl based on how many layups or home-runs they scored. It’s almost a little like selecting a Presidential candidate for a major Party in this country based on how loud the individual candidate’s supporters yell- that’s basically the untenable Berner argument for Sanders’ candidacy. The demand that we judge the President’s legitimacy based on the popular vote is ridiculous on its face, and really should be put to rest, because it is the weakest argument, not the strongest argument, against Trump’s Presidency. And not only that- it is also fundamentally at odds with our constitutional form of government.
Similarly, so are the calls for Trump’s impeachment. There is strong evidence that Trump’s campaign colluded with the Russians during the election. The National Intelligence establishment basically agrees. Trump has already lost his first round pick for National Security advisor over the matter- It’s safe to say that Mike Flynn fell on the sword for that one.
But what is unclear, to even astute individuals such as myself, is the degree to which anything Trump did during the campaign, or since, is illegal. That Trump talks to Russians now is certainly NOT illegal- it is part of what we would expect from a President, whose primary power lies both in the execution of the law, as well as the conduct of foreign policy. But what laws were broken by his (campaign’s) clear collusion with the Russians BEFORE the election? Distasteful, yes. Abnormal, yes. But illegal? That’s much more difficult to pin down, because as of today, the only thing Trump can be actually tied to is potential conflicts of interest which his opponents suppose must exist due to his reportedly wide-ranging business deals with people all over the world.
But we can’t know for sure- there is no publicly available evidence that these deals even exist. It is odd then, that millions of Americans have made themselves the judges and juries of Trump’s assumed criminality without any sort of evidence. Now, we on the Left complain constantly about miscarriages of justice- Guilty getting off with no punishment, but also innocents being railroaded into prison without adequate evidence. Where is our outrage that a similar thing is going on in Trump’s case? We have no evidence and yet we assume we know the law so well that we can pass judgement on the man without any actual evidence, and we are content to rip the guy apart in the public space because we have no evidence and yet assume that means something nefarious has been done. How bizarre!
Lest we forget, Article II, Section 4 of the Constitution says this about impeachment: “ The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other High crimes and Misdemeanors.”
Treason? Where? Article III, Section 3 of the Constitution has a very specific definition of the word “Treason” as well: “ Treason against the United States shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.” As far as I can tell, nothing Trump has done- that we have any evidence of or witnesses to, constitutes Treason.
Bribery? Again- where is the evidence? You can’t just assert that you know it happened, though you don’t have any evidence. That is not how we do things in this country. We can’t convict someone with no evidence.
“High Crimes and Misdemeanors” are, in this case, whatever Congress says it is: It is a high bar to reach when the Congress is dominated by members of the President’s Party because the Congress itself sets the bar where the Constitution is deliberately silent.
There is a process also outlined in the Constitution for impeachment: The House of Representatives brings charges- basically an indictment- against the President with a simple majority. The Senate then tries the impeachment, with the Chief Justice sitting as the Presiding Officer, and must convict on a 2/3rds majority.
Last time I checked, more than half of the House of Representatives was of the President’s Party, and the Dems are also the minority in the Senate- far from the 2/3rds necessary to convict the President. And the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court is also one of the “conservatives” on the Court. Just speaking along the lines of cynical politics, impeachment is a non-starter. Practically speaking, with no evidence of “high crimes and misdemeanors” available (unless the Congress were willing to set the bar VERY low, which they aren’t) one can’t even make a case for impeachment on legal grounds. No impartial jury in the world would convict Trump based on the case arrayed against him, and no politically aligned grand jury would even bring charges against the guy.
Putting our eggs in that basket is a complete waste of energy and time. So far those who have been advocating this sort of activity against Trump are just helping the pro-Trump side make their case- that the people who are protesting Trump are nothing but sore losers and anti-Trump protestors seem to be protesting just to protest. And believe me- the Right is totally eating it up. A recent editorial from the New York Times described the alienation of moderates, who would otherwise be leery of Trump, as a result of the protests the Left has conducted against him.
In summary- it is possible that the Left truly is the intolerant faux-democratic proto-fascists that they declare the Right to be. And that basically reduces our protests and our punching of actual fascists in the Alt-Right Movement to hollow bitching. We lose the high-road when we seek to undermine the legitimacy of a person who was legitimately elected, enjoys the legitimate support and represents the legitimate grievances of a HUGE portion of the population (even if it isn’t a majority) and is supported by institutions which themselves were democratically, and most importantly directly elected.
We lose by winning. We lose the hearts and minds of our countrymen and women by insisting on winning the debate. Yes- we are right about equality for all people. We are correct to insist on racial justice and accountability for police. We are on the right side of history when we fight for equal rights and access to society for all people. And yet, we do not convince anyone but ourselves that we are working for a better way, because of the other sh-t we are doing- we are playing right into the goddamned trap that the sociopathic minority on the Right have set for us, and we don’t even realize it!
So what is a Leftist to do in the age of Trump?
Well, the first thing we need to do is affirmatively accept that Trump won the goddamned election. That takes one of the Right’s most powerful grievances right off the table. Would we, on the Left, or would they in the Press, have demanded the same scrutiny of Clinton had she won that we demand of Trump? The answer is, of course not- though she was just as much a greasy oligarch as Trump is, and has a number of moral failures under her belt just like Trump does, and paid lip-service to the needs of the Poor in this country to try to trick them into voting for her the way Trump did. Would the Right have protested? Yeah, they probably would have, but we are used to it- the Right immediately set out to delegitimize Obama when he was elected too, and they were vicious in their denunciation of him, both in terms of a political position which he did not hold, as well as with their “othering” of the President. Lest we forget- Trump was a Birther’s Birther and that is why he is the President now. But we know how to deal with all that sh-t.
The one thing we apparently don’t know how to deal with on the Left is the fact that now, the shoe is now on the other foot, and as sour as we on the Left felt with the Right’s unrelenting and illegitimate attacks on Obama and the whole US Government, they now feel about what we are doing. A righteous desire for revenge against the Right for the way the Right treated the Left in this country since at least Nixon is justifiable. But as we can see, with the failure of the Republicans to do anything about the Affordable Care Act (a policy which is universally hated by Conservatives AND most of the non-Dem Party Left), this sort of demand for revenge for what we see as a stolen election is hardly a formula for effective government. The difference between us and them is, when they lost in 2008, they immediately set about to knee-cap the US government at the state level. Meanwhile, we go out and protest to feel good about ourselves, and are pretty slow on the “political organization” part of the “resistance.” Righteous outrage does not make for an effective alternative to terrible government.
The Left needs to stop demanding that Trump leave office. Those demands are fruitless and alienate those who actually still do care about the fact that elections have consequences. Does it mean we have to just roll over and give the President a free hand? Certainly not- I think we need to call Trump on the things he is doing which actually break the law and oppose all unjust laws by any means necessary (including, for those of us who are under actual threat, reconsidering our opposition to gun ownership.) We can make the case to the moderate center who is being pushed by our righteous outrage into the Trump camp that many of the things Trump has ACTUALLY done seem to violate the spirit of the institutions of this country. His general disdain for checks and balances expressed by his minion Stephen Miller is a good starting place for the Left, and even freaks out some Conservatives.
This understanding leads us to a method of opposition to Trump which the Right cannot argue with, and claim to be supporters of the Constitution at the same time. Concretely, those who wish to oppose Trump should be working to re-establish credibility of and faith in this country’s institutions. The hardest-core members of Trump’s administration (and apparently the Russians) thrive upon the delegitimization of our nation’s institutions- specifically those which are listed in the US Constitution. The way to undermine those people, who actually are doing great damage to our Government, is to re-establish public trust in those institutions. It starts with letting Trump be the President. He made his bed, and while we don’t have to make it easy for him, he still has to lie in it. I say let him fail on his own because he is woefully unfit for the office, and if he is not incompetent, let him prove it though good government.
I don’t think he will be able to, but I officially join the “Give him just enough rope” club. And then, if he demonstrates his criminal incompetence, THEN we let the system take care of him. Let him actually do something which couldn’t be mistaken for anything other than a “High Crime and Misdemeanor”, and then let the Congress decide to impeach him for that. It lets the system do what it is supposed to do, and kneecaps those who think that impeachment would be politically motivated, instead of in response to something which is actually illegal.
Meanwhile, we who oppose him should use the full force of our national Government to prevent bad policy from coming out of his office. We press our lawmakers to check him at every turn, and we don’t let up on those bastards. They need to start using their power to do something constructive: Every Dem who gives him a pass on a bad law or policy is complicit, and every single Republican who obstructed Obama’s agenda because they supposedly hated “big Government” so much had better do exactly the same thing when Trump attempts to expand the Executive even further. If Congress refuses to perform one of its own essential tasks in checking the power grab on the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue, we need to get rid of them. Congress is the easiest to overturn- in many parts of this country, Democrats don’t even seriously run candidates. They need to pick up some of the slack that we on the Left have been carrying, and actually start competing again, EVERYWHERE.
And then when Congress slips, we need to use the Courts. Sue the hell out of the government whenever Trump violates the spirit of the law, not just the letter of the law. We need to not give that person a free pass anywhere. And we need to check him everywhere. We beat him by trusting our institutions to do their damned jobs, and by pushing them to get back on the right track when they fail to do that themselves. We as a people need to rebuild our Government which has been undermined by anti-institutionalist sympathizers of autocracy for years. I know this is a hard pill for many of us on the Left to swallow, but I am sure we will find some willing allies on the Right if we are truly sincere about rebuilding the institutions of Government and protecting it from the corrosive and caustic influences of unchecked Trumpism. After all, support for Government against mendacious rebels for the good of the whole is a classically conservative idea (whatever the “Conservatives” of today’s America claim.) I imagine that if we were sincere about it, we would get the cowed “Never-Trump” set of the Right to declare a tactical alliance with us.
And we should continue to protest and demand a hearing of our grievances on the Left, under the aegis of 1st Amendment Speech. We should be willing to consider arming ourselves if we are under threat, under the aegis of 2nd Amendment Freedoms. We should fight for our right, and the right to others, to due process under 4th and 14th Amendment Freedoms. We should refuse to comply or to incriminate ourselves under 5th Amendment Protections. We should demand fair and impartial, and more importantly, speedy hearings under our 6th Amendment Rights. We should continue to fight unjust and excessive policing and sentencing under our 8th Amendment Rights. We should continue to fight for universal suffrage under our 15th and 19th Amendment Rights.
We should hold the tyrants accountable who will use the Government to violate our rights. But MOST importantly, we must let the Right know that we also support civil liberties and civil rights, and not heed the siren’s call of “liberty for some, but not for others, in the name of comfort.” We must let the Right know that we know what our Rights are, that we will practice them for ourselves, and we will defend them for others. Without exception. They had their TEA Parties, and now we are going to have ours. And they are invited.
At the VERY least, we need to stop defending indefensible positions. For example- complaining about how Trump wants to sidestep the “media” is actually counterproductive because most people, Left and Right do not trust the corporate press anymore (though slightly more than half of Dems trust the “media” still. Given politicization of Trump’s fights with “the Media”, it is interesting, but not surprising that it is that low on the Dem side.) We have already self-selected into our own little camps. And if this or that news source says something contrary to what our preferred news source says, we automatically discount that contrary news source, while becoming more convinced in the correctness of the line we have ourselves opted to be fed. We are becoming a nation guided by selection bias. Defending the Corporate Press is a losing battle, and so we should stop doing that, if for no other reason than it gives the Right ammo to use against us.
A Call for Unity and Realignment
Instead, we SHOULD focus on the fact that the poor are getting screwed by our Government, by the GOP and by the Dems, too. We should focus on points that we have in common, rather than how we are different. We can, and should get the hell out of our Cities and go out and meet some people, find out what their complaints are, and debate those people as equals, and then work with them on things that will finally benefit all of us as people. I assure you that when we meet conservatives and talk with them about gay rights being a civil right, and civil rights are meant to increase the ability for more people to participate in the system we all claim we love, that is an easier sell than telling those people that they must adopt an agenda which they don’t otherwise support or else we will label them a bigot. We can have our disagreements about abortion- that one will likely never go away. But calling people bigots even when they actually ARE bigots doesn’t stop them from being bigots.
The only person who can change someone’s mind is the person him or herself. In a sense then, we have to depersonalize our politics. I know- Leftist always say “The Personal is political.” But to some degree, that is really the problem, because that divides people, especially in the face of such a chaotic and actually amateurish administration which threatens to upset the basic foundations of our democracy. It makes the matter not about what you believe, but about who you are. And people who find their identity under attack can do nothing but dig in and fight back. We don’t have reasonable discussions about differences of opinion, because all attacks become personal. And to some degree then, it squanders the strength we DO possess on attacks which get us nowhere- it is a gross misallocations of our resources.
As a straight white dude, I am not the best ambassador for women’s rights, I can’t represent #BlackLivesMatter, and I can’t speak for the LGBT community. Those groups don’t want me doing that anyway, and I really wouldn’t do it well even if I wanted to. But the one thing I DO have going for me is that I can safely depersonalize my own political discussions, and make the politics about ideas rather than identity. Leftists don’t like to admit it, but this depersonalization of politics, and the basic maxim to “treat those who disagree with me with love and compassion, as my equals” actually disarms my political opponents AND makes me a bit more willing and able to see things from a different perspective.
We may not ever agree, but I get the distinct sense that millions of people in this country feel that nobody listens to them, but just treats them paternalistically. We can’t build alliances which are not based on mutual trust and respect. And that sort of mutual trust and respect are dangerously absent in this country, because the Left has a distinct attitude of moral superiority, and the Right has a bunker mentality.
We on the Left have got to come out of our trees, and people on the Right must come out of their holes, and we must meet in the yard and break bread together. It really IS possible. Black people in this country want to be treated the same under the law as white people do. Gay people want access to the same rights and privileges that straight people take for granted. Transgender people want to know that they are also safe and will be protected by the law the same as the cisgender people are. Nearly all want basically the same thing from our society- the opportunity to raise our families in peace, as equals, and some degree of physical comfort.
And there are other things too- for example, we all basically eat pizza of some kind. I have never met a person, Left or Right, who doesn’t enjoy pizza. Left and Right can demand pizza and we can also demand fair and equal treatment in the courts, honest pay for honest work, equal treatment in all aspects of public life, a government and a press which we can actually trust, a social system which works for the needs and the wants of the people rather than the profiteers... I don’t see why it is so hard then for us all to work together to ensure that we all have that?
Once the poor and working classes in this country get together over the things we have in common, we will realize we have a lot more in common than we have differences. And THEN we can easily identify those who actually do not share these mutual ideals, those who actively work to suppress other people’s rights and freedoms. And we can tear them the hell down! The white supremacists in the Alt-Right won’t be able to blend into the population anymore. And the uncompromising Bolsheviks on the Left won’t be able to use the oppressed groups of our society as a human shield in their attempts to force our society to conform to their idea of the way the world should be. We will actually be able to separate reasonable people from those who just want to f — k with the country, and we, as a society will be able to deal with them, for the betterment of everyone.
While we remain at each other’s throats, this separation of the poison in the society from the society itself is not possible.
In Conclusion
I know that any modern Leftist, who has cut his or her teeth in the school of modern cultural warfare, will likely have a problem with what I have written here. A lot of folks make their careers on outrage… Whatever. Some minds ain’t ever going to change and some people you just can’t reach. Nonetheless, it is incumbent upon us all to remember that our country is sick right now. About this, the Right is correct.
But blaming the patients is not a good way to cure the disease. We should not blame the sickness in our society upon those who suffer just like we do, though their symptoms may present a different way on the Right than they do on the Left. There are poor folks on the Right too, and there are Rightists who get harassed by the cops too, and Rightists who get used by their Politicians too, and Rightists who actually are legitimately fed up with being lied to, constantly, by people in power who have hijacked the institutions of our society for their own individual gains. We ALL have our enemies list in this regard, and guess what? Most of the time, those lists overlap. Blaming a Trump supporter for suffering from the alienation that takes place under Capitalism in the US, and its related diseases is completely inappropriate, and weakens our ability, as a whole country, to fight back.
Just like we shouldn’t blame the victims of the disease, we also should not look to cure just the symptoms. Trump, and his brand of neo-fascist authoritarianism are merely symptoms. Racism is a symptom. Mysogyny is a symptom. The destruction of the Union and a good life for workers is just a symptom. And so is the distrust that permeates our entire society of the motivations of our fellow countrymen and women. A divided society is an easily ruled society. And due to a general civic illiteracy of the people of this nation (also a symptom), we are even LESS prepared, if that is possible, to approach treatment of the actual disease in the correct way. The result is that the Left struggles to cure the symptoms without addressing the disease, and meanwhile, the Right has adopted the anti-vax stance toward the disease all together, trusting in prayer and/or snake oil to treat the sickness that they experience.
No- we must get together with one another. We must agree that there is a problem that it will require all of us to fight. And we must learn to trust one another again. Only when we figure out how to knit our society back together again, and allow all members to participate as equals, both in law AND in practice, will we be fit to push back the darkness which is currently threatening to consume us all
Otherwise, if we refuse to do so, because it is just easier to attack the other side, and call each other the most hateful and vulgar names, then we don’t just have Trump, but we deserve him.
Finally- ALWAYS punch up. Our leaders do not deserve courtesy. We have the right to hold them to a MUCH higher standard than we hold each other, and a MUCH higher standard than they are currently being held to. But our fellow countrymen and women are our brothers and sisters. Left and Right, Black, White, Latino/a, Indian, Chinese, Arabic, Native American, Gay, Straight, Trans, Cis, and anything in between: we are all in the same boat together and we are all getting f — cked by those in power, as well as those who have the ability to shape our opinions when we don’t want to take the time to learn things for ourselves…
But, coming full circle, when we punch up, we better have something behind it. For the Left, this means a willingness to organize and actually launch ACTUAL challenges for state, local and federal offices, with the aim of restoring an actual political opposition in this country (attending a rally doesn’t really do sh-t to change the minds of those who are in power and who are basically unaccountable due to locked and non-competetive districts). For the Right, it means you all have to stop with the “We don’t need stupid facts” business. Because yes you do. And if we both have the same set of facts, which are the ACTUAL facts, and not just those which support our point of view, we can stop bickering over the preliminary stuff and focus on the real problems.
Otherwise, if we are unwilling to actually back our punch up with something else, it’s like we take a half course of penicillin- we just make the disease stronger and more resistant to us next time we need to fight it, rather than doing anything to actually cure it. And then we just get another Trump.
