Greatness, Revisited
For the past year-and-a-half we’ve been listening to Donald Trump and his supporters insist they’re going to ‘Make America Great Again.’ Now, ignoring the fact we’ve had a presidential candidate so clueless - and followers too clueless to realize - that his campaign slogan is a direct insult to this country and its citizens, I thought as election day nears we might want to take a look at what Trump and his supporters apparently think a ‘Great America’ looks like.
Granted, this isn’t an easy task. The candidate himself is notoriously short on policy specifics (and finger length), and I have yet to hear a single one of his followers articulate any coherent reason for their support - unless you consider anger about brown people, anger about women, anger about Jewish people, anger about imaginary conspiracies, and basically just anger in general as somehow ‘coherent.’ (SPOILER ALERT: I do not.)
So let’s look at some of the stream-of-consciousness ramblings that have spewed from the Donald’s mouth over these past, seemingly interminable months, to try and determine just what form Trump and his supporters think a ‘great America’ takes. In the interest of fairness - something Mr. Trump has no interest in or concept of - I’ll stick to citing parallels from America’s past. In other words, there’ll be no Hitler talk, here. Though I can’t promise Nazism won’t make an appearance.
"We are cutting the regulation at a tremendous clip. I would say 70% of regulations can go. It's just stopping businesses from growing." - Donald Trump on how his administration would approach government regulations on business.
Ah, okay! Well, gosh, this seems like an actual proposal. And how shocking - a man known for dishonest business practices wants to cut government regulations on business owners! Because, y’know, government is evil and all that malarkey. So judging by this proposal, Trump and his supporters want to return to a time when big businesses didn’t have pesky ol’ laws to get in the way of their profits. Worker safety and decent working conditions? C’mon, the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire wasn’t THAT bad! (Plus most of the dead were women and immigrants - the very groups that aren’t gonna vote Trump, anyway.)
And I guess we’re all okay with returning to the days of Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle - because who needs health regulations with regards to the preparation of our food? I suppose if we want to make America great again, it involves eating a little shit. Literally.
And labor unions? The ones responsible for protecting the rights of workers? I suppose they’d have to go, as most of the regulations Trump and his followers want to eliminate were adopted as a result of long, hard, and often bloody battles with bosses more interested in their personal profits than the health, safety, and quality of life of their employees. And because the thugs Trump seems to attract aren’t known for their sensitivity and subtlety, it’s not a stretch to envision a return to an era where union busting was achieved not using legal or political means, but by using good old fashioned bricks and baseball bats.
Wow! This IS sounding great! What’s next, Don?
“I like it a lot. I don’t think it’s tough enough.” - Donald Trump on waterboarding.
“When you get these terrorists, you have to take out their families.” - Donald Trump on torturing and killing the families of suspected terrorists.
“You know what? If it doesn't work, they deserve it anyway, for what they're doing." - Donald Trump on the use of torture.
One of the through-lines of the Trump campaign has been the candidate’s enthusiasm for the use of torture. Heck, he loves it so much he thinks it should be used not only on suspected terrorists, but everyone the suspected terrorist knows. In fact, he loves it SO MUCH he thinks it should be used just out of spite - who cares if it’s effective?
We don’t even have to go back very far for an example of this kind of ‘American greatness.’ Journey with me to the year 2004, to the nostalgia and Norman Rockwell-like images that poured forth from the military prison in Abu Ghraib, Iraq. Remember? That time the U.S. Army and the C.I.A. engaged in a series of grotesque human rights violations, including torture, rape, sodomy, and murder.
You know - what a President Trump would think of as the ‘good old days.’
It’s funny, but I always thought one of the supposed hallmarks of ‘American greatness’ was the idea that we, as a nation, tried to set the moral example, to be the guiding light - the “shining city on a hill,” as someone once said. Granted, that’s a difficult, if not impossible, standard for any country to live up to 100% of the time (and we haven’t). But it seems if you want to achieve that kind of greatness, you have to at least AIM for it.
The Abu Ghraibs, the My Lais, the Guantanamos - these should be aberrations, not aspirations.
“I believe it is a personal decision that should be left to the women and their doctor.” - Donald Trump on abortion.
“There has to be some form of punishment.” - Donald Trump on women who have abortions.
“I'm totally against abortion, having to do with Planned Parenthood. But millions and millions of women - cervical cancer, breast cancer - are helped by Planned Parenthood. So you can say whatever you want, but they have millions of women going through Planned Parenthood that are helped greatly. And I wouldn't fund it… But millions of women are helped by Planned Parenthood.” - Donald Trump, with regards to Planned Parenthood.
So, okay. Trump is all over the map on abortion rights. Not all that surprising for a right-wing politician who spent years publicly claiming to be Pro-Choice. But now he’s Pro-Life! He’s seen the electoral light! How does this help reclaim America’s greatness?
By returning us to those sepia-toned days of yore in which a woman’s only option with regard to her reproductive rights were back-alley abortions performed by dangerous amateurs in unsanitary conditions. It brings back memories of soda fountains, sock hops, and dying of internal bleeding. Good times, America, good times.
Before moving on, I feel compelled to make two statements…
First: Trump’s quote about defunding Planned Parenthood while acknowledging all it does to help women and support women’s health issues? The only acceptable response to that is a firm and disgusted, “Fuck you.”
Second: Anyone who references those who are Pro-Choice as being ‘Pro-Abortion?’ The only acceptable response to THAT is a firm and disgusted, “Fuck you sideways.”
NOW we’re moving on!
“He’s a Mexican. We’re building a wall between here and Mexico. The answer is he is giving us very unfair rulings - rulings that people can’t even believe.” - Donald Trump on Judge Gonzalo Curiel, who is presiding over a class action lawsuit against the for-profit Trump University.
“I think the guy is lazy. And it’s probably not his fault because laziness is a trait in blacks. It really is, I believe that. It’s not anything they can control.” - Donald Trump describing an African-American employee at one of his casinos.
“When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best… They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.” - Donald Trump, kicking off his campaign in a way that made every rational human being believe he wouldn’t last a month.
To be fair to the Donald, what’s more American that some good ol’ down-home racism? Shitfire, man - we fought a war because half the country refused to abolish the most inhumanly racist practice possible. Our Founding Fathers deleted any reference to slavery in all the holy founding documents of this nation. And even after that war was fought, and those documents amended, African-Americans have been treated as second-class citizens at best, and targets of violence, hatred and discrimination at worst.
So hey! I guess that means Trump and his followers consider Jim Crow worthy of a triumphant comeback! Golly, just imagine all the wonderful images of a ‘great America’ THAT brings to mind: George Wallace blocking schoolhouse doors… Bull Connor releasing the dogs in Birmingham… Emmet Till lying in his coffin after being tortured and murdered for daring to speak to a white woman… Hooded Klansmen gathering around a burning cross… The four little girls killed in the bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church… the list goes on and on.
And on and on and on and on and on.
And gosh, why stop there? There are so many minorities from which to choose! Gathering up Mexicans for deportation? That’s gonna bring back warm memories of the internment of Japanese citizens during World War II, right? And how about the Jewish community! Judging by the hatred spewing from the alt-right, they’re determined to play ALL the hits, sending death threats and images of concentration camps to any dissenter whose name even sounds remotely Jewish. George Lincoln Rockwell would be proud! (And there’s your Nazi reference, as promised.)
And let’s not forget, the one thing that doesn’t discriminate is hatred. Hatred hates everyone and everything. So let’s go back to the days where women were publicly attacked and beaten for daring to want things like equal rights and the vote. To when homosexuals were terrified to self-identify lest they be beaten and tied to a fence and left to die like Matthew Shepard. And when Hispanics trying to enter this country are denounced as being rapists and drug dealers. Oh, right - that last one’s actually really recent.
Bigotry is a stain on this country - and, indeed, the entire human race - that is still sadly prevalent. What Trump and his followers (especially his white nationalist followers) threaten is to make their hateful and despicable beliefs part of the mainstream. To bring back the ghosts of George Wallace, Bull Conner, George Lincoln Rockwell, Roger B. Taney, John C. Calhoun, Nathan Bedford Forrest, and every other historical embarrassment and celebrate them as heroes rather than the pariahs they are.
(sigh)
Fuck, I can’t keep going with this.
I mean, I COULD keep going. There’s a seemingly bottomless source of material on how the stated beliefs of Donald Trump would affect the country in ways that would return us to the most disgraceful, least ‘American’ moments and events of our shared past.
But Jesus. Spending the afternoon Googling information on Donald Trump feels like spending the day slogging waist-deep through a sewer. Which is an apt description, because at the end of the day - when all the records and evidence are taken into account - Donald Trump is filth.
Donald Trump’s stated beliefs, if allowed to run rampant with the power of the Presidency behind them, would return us to our less enlightened past. A past we should have learned not to repeat, rather than long for a return to.
If you truly believe he can, or even really WANTS, to return the country to some antiquated notion of ‘greatness,’ you’re a sucker at best. And at worst? Well, say hello to David Duke next time you see him.
And I haven’t even touched on the fact that he’s a complete hypocritical ignoramus with an extreme case of Narcissistic Personality Disorder who doesn’t know how anything works, wants to kiss Vladimir Putin square on the mouth and has skin thinner than a grape!
AND I still haven’t mentioned his hair!
Look, I’ll end by being as blunt as possible, and then you can get back to surfing the Internet for whatever horrible kinks you indulge in your private time: A vote for Donald Trump is the single least American thing you will ever do in your life. The only thing less patriotic than Donald Trump is anyone who votes to make him the President of the United States of America.
So don’t. Please.
