There have been several opinion pieces in the past week that should be required reading. I will give the links to them at the end of this monologue, but they are worth reading because they clarify some of the ideology of certain elected officials. Like many Democrats, and possibly some Republicans, I have wondered for the past four years who would even consider voting for Trump, not just once but more than once. I cannot understand that mentality, but then I am not a white Christian nor am I a white supremacist and I do not have a Republican ideological background.
I am certain that all Republican voters do not condone or agree with what happened at our nation's Capitol on January 6th. I am also certain that many elected officials do not condone or agree with what happened at our nation's Capitol on January 6th. The outcry from both sides of the political spectrum has shown that to be true.
However, there is a large faction of the Republican party that still and will always believe in the far right values of the Trump platform. If the values of that platform were simply far right, that would be one thing. But they are much more than that. Those values hold that unless you believe their way, you are wrong and deserve to be scorned, punished and put away. Those values believe in the subjugation of anyone not of their race. i.e. white. To those people, and there are millions of them, there is only one just, righteous value system. There is no compromise, there is only good and bad as they see it.
I have said it before and will say it again: we, meaning moderate Republicans and all of us Democrats need to be very, very vigilant in the next few years. Fascism is an insidious ideology, easily disguised as the Major Good, and there are countries where Democracy was tossed out in a matter of days and Fascists took hold and ruled the country. A smooth talker, a young, energetic politician could be the key to really destroying what we have left of a Democracy. It is not an impossibility. Thus the need, the desperate need, to watch what happens in the next two years at mid-term elections and then in 2024. The turn to the middle, the election of two new Democrats in Georgia is a good start but it is small. We all must commit to working for justice, working for the Democratic party in the next two years to push for a more balanced government. The rise in power of white, Christian bigots has got to stop. The power of white supremacists, fueled by the current President, must be diminished. The fact that a noose was hung by the insurgents in front of the Capitol last week is a clear indication of that.
The links below are to the two NYT articles that I think are pertinent. The first one is stellar, powerful and incredibly important. It's long, but read on. The second explains the rise of elected officials like Josh Hawley. Very pertinent as well.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/09/magazine/trump-coup.html?searchResultPosition=1
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/11/opinion/josh-hawley-religion-democracy.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage
I understand when you say you don't get these people who rioted last week. I think you answered it when you refer to the "subjugation of anyone not of their race". We, as a country, have not dealt with slavery. We are supposed to just kind of apologize and then move on. It has has allowed this serious wrong to fester and grow deep within our culture.
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