My Life in a Blue Plastic Capsule

On December 1, 1969 the Selective Service System of the United States of America held a lottery to determine the order in which young men would be drafted into the military to fight a war in Vietnam. The lottery numbers selected in December 1969 were used to call-up men for induction and physical examination in 1970. I was part of that lottery. 

Here’s how it worked. Each day of the year, including February 29^th, were assigned a number between 1 and 366. Each number was written on a piece of paper and then placed in a blue plastic capsule. The capsules were mixed up in a shoe box and then dumped into a large glass jar. The glass jar was placed unceremoniously on what looked like a step stool. Capsules were taken out of the jar one by one. The honor of taking the first capsule from the jar fell to Republican Congressional Representative Alexander Pirnie of New York’s 34^th District.

The first number taken from the jar by Pirnie was 258 which represented the date September 14^th. All men registered with that birthday born between 1944 and 1950 were assigned lottery number one, which meant that those men would be called to service immediately . The second number drawn represented April 24^th and so all men born on that date would also be called up immediately. This process continued until all the capsules were retrieved from the jar. Somewhere between the first birthday drawn and the last, the military reached its quota of draftees for 1970, but at what point that happened was unknown to those of us waiting for the capsule with our birthdates to be drawn. What was clear, however, was that those drawn early in the process would get a call and those drawn late in the process would not.   

Rep. Alexander Pirnie, R-NY, draws the first capsule in the lottery drawing held on December 1, 1969. I was rather offended that a lottery drawn by some stuffy politician would determine my future so I went to the library to study while almost all other men on campus were gathered around radios listening to numbers and dates being read out one by one. I think I lasted thirty minutes in the library. Unable to concentrate, I hurried back to the dorm and started listening. I remember vividly that they were drawing the tenth capsule from the jar when I sat down, which was December 6^th. Time went by with tension filling every room on every floor in the dorm. 25^th number called, 50^th, 100^th, and still I had not heard my birthdate of August 27^th. Somewhere around the 150^th number I started to worry that August 27 might have been drawn in the first nine numbers! I began asking people if they heard August 27^th in the first nine, cursing myself for going to the damn library. What was I thinking? Who was I kidding?

Of course, no one knew. They were only listening for their own birthdates. 250 and still no August 27. At 300 I was truly worried that I was in the top ten for immediate call-up. And then on the 352^nd draw I heard August 27. I was 352 which meant there was no chance in hell, short of WWIII beginning, that I would be drafted. It meant that I dodged my generation’s war.

My roommate got 334 and we but a sign on our door saying: “I’m 334 and I’m 352.” The next morning we found the sign had been burned. We hadn’t meant to be insensitive. We were excited and relieved and didn’t really know how others had faired. Two guys on our floor left college within days. They both were in the first ten. My girlfriend baked me a yellow cake with chocolate icing with the number 352 drawn on the top in yellow icing. I immediately requested my 1-A status from the military.

My excitement eventually morphed into guilt. My cousin was fighting in Vietnam during all this. The unfairness was vivid. I hadn’t been drafted because I was fortunate enough to attend college and thus get a deferment until graduation. When he came home from leave I told him I was going to volunteer and he told me in no uncertain terms to forget it. While he was proud serving in the US military, he told me the whole damn war was drugged and corrupt, and he wasn’t talking about listening to the Who and drinking Bud. And so I stayed in college and he went back to Vietnam.

We all had draft cards back then and one of the most common protests against the war was to burn your draft card. That was not my chosen form of protest. However, I did burn my draft card one evening at Pizzeria Del-Dio, which we all called Dio’s. Here’s the thing: We each had a draft card or a Selective Service System Registration Certificate. Mine was signed by Diane M. Beck. Along with the Registration Certificate we were also given a Selective Service System Notice of Classification card. This card was issued each year when your classification was renewed or changed. With a college deferment I was classified 1-H, until I requested my 1-A (1-A meaning you were eligible for immediate call-up). Well, that night at Dio’s my friend I decided to tell our girlfriends we were burning our draft cards as an act of protest against the war. In fact we were planning to burn our old Notice of Classification card. It was to be a good joke, but I pulled the wrong card from my wallet and actually burned my Registration Certificate. I didn’t discover my error until a week or so later when I tried using my draft card to buy beer. I told Diane M. Beck that I had lost my original draft card and she kindly sent me a Dup. Issued card. By law we were required to have our draft and classification cards in our possession at all times.

In September of 1969 the Beatles released Abby Road which, while not their last release (Let It Be was to come in 1970), John Lennon had left the band by the time we started listening “Here Comes the Sun,” and Paul McCartney quit the following year. In December I didn’t know that and played Abby Road to left my spirits. Also in December of 1969 John Lennon was offered the role of Jesus Christ in Jesus Christ Superstar; in Chicago fourteen police shot and killed Fred Hampton and Mark Clark, members of the Black Panther Party, while they were sleeping; arrest warrants were issued for the Manson cult for murder (you might recall Charles Manson and I had a brief staring contests in prison); Seattle unveiled the new Boeing 747; the USSR conducted a nuclear test in Eastern Kazakh/Semipalatinsk; the L.A. police attacked the Black Panthers;  the first strain of the Aids virus migrated to the US from Haiti; People’s Park in Berkeley was claimed; Arlo Guthrie released “Alice’s Restaurant;” USAF gave up its search for extraterrestrials and closed Project Blue Book; the US performed a nuclear test in Nevada; “Leaving on a Jet Plane” by Peter, Paul, and Mary hit number one; Diana Ross had her last performance as a Supreme on the Ed Sullivan Show; The French Lieutenant’s Woman was a bestselling novel; people all over the US were listening to “Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head;” and I avoided the draft.

Copyright © 2017 Dale Rominger

Coffee with Hermann Hesse or How I Survived the 1960s

My senior year in college, 1970-1971, the German born Swiss author and painter Hermann Hesse was all the rage. Hesse wrote both fiction and nonfiction and was awarded the Noble Prize in Literature in 1946. I suspect his popularity on college and university campuses began with his novel Siddhartha, at least that was the first of his novels that I read. I followed Siddhartha with Steppenwolf, Demian, Rosshalde, Narcissus and Goldmund, and The Glass Bead Game, and probably in that order. If you click on this Wikipedia link you’ll read that Hesse’s novels “explore an individual’s search for authenticity, self-knowledge and spirituality.” As it turned out, just the thing for the late 1960’s and early 1970’s.

If I were to divide my life into periods – you know, Period I: Birth, Period II: Pooping and Pissing – the period in which I was reading Hesse would best be described as my Self-indulgent and Pretentious period. You can’t blame Hesse. It wasn’t his fault. Nor should you judge me too harshly. I really was searching for authenticity and self-knowledge. Unfortunately, I also wanted a rather creative, intelligent, and beautiful woman to know, indeed observe, that I was searching for authenticity and self-knowledge. Often times when we were together I would give the impression of being lost in my search, unware of the mundane reality around me. As Emil Sinclair was led in his search by Max Demian, I too was being led by my unnamed daemon. I did my best to enter a trance-like state of self-reflection, or at least did my damnedest to give that impression. I indicated that I had entered my state of self-realization by staring into space, or at the floor, and pretending I was oblivious to what was happening around me. It’s difficult to attain authenticity when you are working to create the impression of authenticity. What can I say? I was young and falling in love. 

I should also note, that this period defined by my daemon-lead search for authenticity was also my poetry writing period. I wrote my first poem on an anti-Vietnam war march. I remember pausing, retrieving my small journal and a pen, holding the journal against a post, registering that the creative, intelligent, beautiful woman was watching, and wrote. I would wander around the campus by myself waiting for my daemon to inspire me. As it turned out, during that beautiful spring when it only rained at night, my daemon inspired me twenty times, and then thankfully stopped.

I still have those poems and the other day I showed them to my wife. We had killed a bottle of wine at dinner and while doing so, for reasons I don’t remember, I told her I had written poetry and done some drawings while in college. When we got home from the restaurant I handed her both and went downstairs to watch TV. The next day I asked if she had read the poems. She had. I then said, with a sincerity and enthusiasm meant to impress: “Aren’t they great! I never should have stopped writing poetry.” The look on her face was a joy to behold. It was a combination of loving concern, painful embarrassment, and unsolvable conflict. I started to laugh and said: “I’m just kidding! They’re horrible! I mean really horrible! They’re so bad I can’t  throw them away.” Yes, those poems are a proud artifact of my important daemon period. If ever I feel pretentiousness surfacing from the deep dark hole where I mercilessly drive most of my character flaws, all I have to do is read the poems.  

It's important to note that I was just emerging from the late 60’s. Vietnam, and then the bombing of Cambodia, disturbed me to distraction, awakening in me moral outrage. I was playing the White Album over and over again. I was reading Abraham Maslow’s Motivation and Personality, studying the hierarchy of needs, seeking peak experience, pursuing self-actualization. I was reading the Population Bomb by Paul Ehrlich and doing my best to convince my parents that doom was just around the corner if we didn’t act. I was introduced to the new and exotic word “ecology” and began to understand what we were doing to the planet, and in a flash was back to my parents telling them the oil would run out one day. I was traumatized by the killing of four students at Kent State University and then fractured again eleven days later by the killing of two students at Jackson State College.

I was political and practical. I read, wrote, spoke, protested, got arrested, and fell in love. I was hopeful and angry. And I was searching for myself. Laugh now if you will, but the times were inspiring and challenging. A cultural revolution actually was taking place. I walked around barefoot for goodness sake.

In the folder where I keep my magnificently horrible poems are five drawings, not very good, but not magnificently horrible either. They only exist because I was asked to draw them by one of my professors. I took a class on Hermann Hesse in the spring of 1971. I remember the prof was very good and, I realize now, young. I can still vaguely see his face. I don’t remember his name. During the semester we read and discussed the Hesse books I listed above. The class didn’t meet in a proper classroom. We met outside sitting on the grass under trees. I remember I couldn’t hear people very well. We met in a cafeteria, or was it in a lounge. Either way, I remember I couldn’t hear people very well.

The prof asked if I would do drawing of my impression of some of the female characters in the books. I don’t remember why he asked me to do that, nor do I remember how he knew I could draw. I do remember that there was a final “project” in which all the students contributed (there were only six of seven of us), and that those contributions would be shared/displayed somewhere on campus. My contributions were the drawings and it came as a surprise to me, and I suspect the others, that the prof wanted to make public our work. I refused. My drawings were never shown. Why? Well, mostly because they are not that good and I try to avoid embarrassment at all cost. I do not like feeling the fool.

The drawings scattered about this text are they. I don’t remember which characters in which books are represented in the drawings. Obviously the eyes are male and I don’t remember who they represent. Still, the drawings and the poems are miniscule, but nonetheless important, happenings on my journey towards authenticity. Why else would I still have them after all these years? I refused to show them in 1971, but am willing to do so now in 2017. Why? I’m not sure. Certainly not because they are worthy. Perhaps the showing and the vulnerability move me ever so closer to authenticity. Perhaps not. However, the poems will forever remain hidden.

Copyright © 2017 Dale Rominger

Late Night Time Travel with the Beatles

I’ve had a hard day’s night. Actually, I’ve had almost two weeks of them so far. As I mentioned last week, I’m laid up with a bad back – herniated disc at L5. I’ve been dealing with this for years. Thing is, when my back “goes” I can lose weeks, if not months, lying in bed (isn’t it a weird expression to say your back “goes,” I mean where does it go).

When my L5 is having its way with me, I can’t sleep at night, and given that I share the bed with my wife who turns out the light pretty early, I spend those many hours in the dark with a tablet, Kindle with light, headphones, and a CD player. For reasons unknown to me, when I realized I had weeks and not days ahead of me, I decided to listen to all my Beatles CDs, in chronological order of course. Let’s face it, any time someone my age listens to the Beatles in the present, it is in part for hearing the music and in part for traveling back in time. It’s about both pleasure and memory, and perhaps even the reclaiming of my younger self. At the very least, if I can’t reclaim my young self, I can at least visit with him for the during of an album. And so I do.

As we all know, listening to music is like time traveling into one’s past and the Beatles is an express train to my youth. There is a problem, however. I’m an American and thus  grew up with the Beatles’ US releases. When I moved to Britain in 1987 I left my Beatles albums with a friend in California. Once settled in Britain I began buying Beatles CDs only to discover that some albums released in the US were not available in the UK. CDs available in the UK I had never seen in the US. At first I was excited because the British releases seemed more “authentic.” But the thrill of authenticity didn’t last long. What I was listening to didn’t correspond with my memories. Songs were missing, but eventually appeared in two albums called The Beatles Past Masters Volume one and Volume Two. Other songs, while present, were in a chaotic mix and not where they were supposed to be. There were no instrumentals on A Hard Day’s Night. And where the hell were Beatles ’65 and Beatles VI?

It wasn’t until Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band that UK and US releases became identical so you can only imagine the level of stress those earlier albums caused me. As one song was ending I could hear the next one beginning in my mind before it actually started to play, only to be frustrated when a totally different song appeared. If you listen to an album long enough an established order reveals itself. When returning to an album after years, one expects that order to once again and for always reveal itself anew. One does not expect or welcome chaos. Talk about a living hell. The loss of order attacked my sense of identity. After all, our identities are dependent on remembering enough of our lives to guarantee a sense of self through time. Who was I if my Beatles memories, deeply imbedding into my very being, were unreliable? 

Ed Byrnes as Kookie on 77 Sunset StripThe Beatles hit the US when I was in the 9^th grade. I shunned them at first, never being a person who jumped on to popular bandwagons. I thought myself better than that. But their first appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show on February 9, 1964 overwhelmed me. After that show, things changed. My hair style had progressed from a crew cut to a rendering of 77 Sunset Strip’s Kookie’s long waves that demanded a lot of product (to hold the waves in place) and constant combing (to appear cool). But after Ed Sullivan I went to my parents, my sister by my side ready to act as my advocate if necessary, requesting that I be allowed to let my hair grow into a Beatles cut. They said yes! And since I was partial to Paul McCartney, I kept looking at his picture and the mirror until my hair grew out. Pretty exciting times, though I got more than little abuse in public from adults who couldn’t accept that times they were a changin’.

As I write this I’m just about to listen to Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. The Fab Four started to move beyond the typical adolescent pop love song on Rubber Soul and by the time we got to Sgt. Pepper the world had changed. We had moved from “I Want to Hold Your Hand” to “Nowhere Man,” “She Loves You” to “Penny Lane,” ”Please Please Me” to “Here Comes the Sun.” They were everything, and then a cloud appeared from nowhere: the song “Revolution” on the White Album. It was 1968 and John Lennon certainly wasn’t signing up for the revolution or even the resistance. It was upsetting to see the Beatles relinquish authority to the likes of The Rolling Stones and The Who as we created reality through the cultural and political turmoil of the late 1960’s and early 1970’s. “Revolution” made me wonder who was leading us.

Kent State UniversityOn August 28, 1968 10,000 protesters gathered in Grant Park in Chicago during the Democratic Party National Convention. A confrontation between protesters and police lead to violence and rioting. Hubert Humphrey became the party’s nominee for president. Richard Nixon was elected president in 1968, with Watergate lying hidden in the future. In November of 1969 we learned of the My Lai Massacre, where US soldiers killed as many as 50o civilians, including children, in a Vietnamese village. December 1969 the first draft lottery since WWII was held and a whole lot of young men in colleges and universities all over the country held their breath, me among them (as it turned out the blue plastic capsule containing my birthdate was chosen on the 352^nd draw from the TV game show basket making it virtually impossible that I would be drafted to go to Vietnam and fight alongside my cousin). The Vietnam War was insatiable and had to be fed with the lives of young men and women (the average age of a US soldier in WWII was 26, in Vietnam 19). On May 4, 1970 four unarmed students were shot dead by young National Guardsmen at Kent State University. Eleven days after the Kent State killings, on May 14^th at Jackson State College police fired into a group of students killing two and wounding twelve. Between April 29^th and July 22^nd 1970 Nixon conducted the Cambodian Campaign (or Incursion or Bombing) and campuses everywhere came unstuck. American naiveté was swept from my eyes.

Kent State UniversityDuring that time I listened to The Beatles, commonly known as the White Album, Yellow Submarine, Abbey Road, and Let It Be. Loved them all – well not Yellow Submarine – but you can see how “Revolution” didn’t sit well with me. It was the time we idealistically, and perhaps naively, thought we could actually change the world through marches, debates, education, intelligence, morality, poetry, and pure force of will. “Revolution,” sung either fast or slow, didn’t help.

You’re not going to believe this, but on a visit to California, my friend and I took all my Beatles albums and gave them to a charity. Gave every damn one away, with the exception of Sgt. Pepper. How stupid could I be? So, now that I’m back in the US lying in the dark, my time travelling experience is jumbled. Now and forever listening to the Beatles is a clash of my US memories and my UK CDs. As a result, I can’t always find the young me. It can be frustrating. But even so, as I listen to song after song I can sing along to each, never missing a word. Amazing. Kid Dale lost, but every word preserved.

Copyright ©2017 Dale Rominger

Late at Night with Rod Sterling and The New Life Corp

I’ve got a herniated disc at L5 which puts me down from time to time. This is one of those times. What being “down” means is spending a lot of time laying in or on the bed. What a “lot of time” means is anywhere from days to months. I’m a week into this round and things aren’t looking all that good.

Being down means I have a lot of time for reading, listening to music, and watching TV. In the past the TV watching was mostly movies, but over the past ten days I’ve been exploring Netflix and Amazon Video “originals.” Kudos to both companies. Of course, I also watch old time favorites, and this time I’ve been binging on the Twilight Zone.

I watched the Twilight Zone when it was on the air. I had forgotten, or never noticed, how sometimes pleasantly and sometimes painfully sentimental many of the episodes were. Also, episodes often pursed moral issues without subtlety. And on occasion things got down right didactic. Now in 2017, all that sentimentality and moralizing are okay because it’s in black and white, the Rod Sterling intros are wonderful, and watching in the now is always remembering the then.

Season 3 Episode 31 was entitled "The Trade-Ins" and was one of those sentimental morality plays. It was about a company called The New Life Corp, a company true to its name. Nothing metaphorical about The New Life Corp. No, the company only dealt in the literal, and the service provided was literally new life. It promised to eliminated pain while providing rebirth into youth, strength, beauty, and health. This is how it worked: One would go to The New Life Corp to have one’s consciousness transferred into a new healthy young body constructed to last 112 years. In Episode 31 an elderly couple talked to a sales representative. The old man, 79 years old, was in constant pain while the old woman 74,  was relatively healthy. They had been married for 50 years. The sales rep took their information and then lead them to a show room to examine the many models available for transfer. They were all beautiful and strong. The sales rep explained with a preacher’s zeal that signing a contract was a beginning and not an end, that their relationship could live forever. As it turned out, our elderly couple, very much in love, only had enough money for one transfer and since the man was in constant pain, they opted for him. After the procedure he came bouncing into the waiting room, young, sexy, healthy, pain free, and hugs his old wife. With uncontrolled enthusiasm he described what they would do now that he was reborn, all of which demanded a young body. Suddenly he stopped and the young man and old woman just look at each other.

It was obvious that the 50 year marriage would never survive the rebirth of only one of them. In the next scene we see the old man returning to his wife in his original old pain ridden body. They quoted some sentimental poem about the best is yet to come as they walked into the metaphorical sunset. And as the show draws to an end, the Rod Stirling voice over quotes The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran:

Love gives not but itself and takes not from itself, love possesses not nor would it be possessed, for love is sufficient unto love.

Sterling didn’t need to send a telegram for us to know what was going to happen. It was clear from the moment we learned the couple could only afford one transfer. Love would win the day, of course. It had to simply because the moral lesson of that time demanded it. And while the episode toyed with the idea, teased us with the idea, that rebirth, or resurrection, could be a literal physical truth with the right technology, it didn’t have the courage to allow the technology (new body and 112 years) to conquer the spiritual (love). No, no anti-heroes in Episode 31.

It was all very predictable and very sweet. But lying there with my L5 giving me all kinds of hell, anticipating the pain I was going to experience in the morning, and dreading going through my day with a back that was hardly functional,  I thought I’d gladly invest in The New Life Corp if only there was a New Life Corp to invest in. I liked the idea of rebirth progressing from metaphor to literalism. Even more I liked the idea of having a young body. Forget the sappy poem about the best is yet to come. Put aside Kahlil Gibran, the sentimentalist. Give me a new body! I would have happily dealt with the psychological and theological implications if I could wake up strong.

Admittedly, when I looked in the mirror no doubt I would have to go through some kind of psychological adjustment, but I was willing to do the work. According to the actuary tables I only have four of five years left so, hell yes, I’d like a new body that would last me 112 years. Sign me up. And if my wife and I couldn’t afford for her transfer, I’d skip the poetry reading and with my newly constructed body find a job and raise the money for my wife’s transfer.

But alas, there is no New Life Corp and no velvet voiced Sterling voiceover. All that’s left is the hope that the poetry will heal the wasteland that is literalism and help me deal with my L5.

Copyright © 2017 Dale Rominger

Accepting the Unacceptable or When May Met Trump

Theresa May, the British prime minister, won the honor to be the first head of state to visit Trump and the Gang in Washington D.C. May, wanting to assure herself that the Special Relationship that exists between the US and the UK was safe in the hands of a television reality star, showed none of the caution of Germany’s chancellor Angela Merkel. It should be noted that the Special Relationship is probably referred to by British officials more frequently than their American counterparts. Nonetheless, it’s safe to say many British people hoped that she would have a Love Actually moment at her first press conference with Trump. Sadly she did not.

As May prepared for her big meet in Washington D.C., during an interview with the BBC she said the following:

I’ve already said that some of the comments that Donald Trump has made in relations to women are unacceptable, some of those he himself has apologized for. When I sit down (with Trump) I think the biggest statement that will be made about the role of women is the fact that I will be there as a female prime minister.

That second thought, that her actually being a female and a prime minister would have an impact on the Great Misogynist, that he would even get the point, was sweet. I’m hoping she didn’t actually believe it, but instead, needing to say something given she was meeting with a man who bragged about grabbing women’s pussies, thought referring to her gender and her position was as good as anything. Goodness knows how she felt when, dressed in her bright read outfit for all to see, Trump actually took her hand. Not good, I’m guessing. But it matters not. The photo will be out there until climate change changes everything. However, it’s the first sentence, the claim that Trump was unacceptable, that interests me here.

What could May have possibly meant when she said Trump was unacceptable? Please understand, I’m not picking on May here. To say that something or someone is unacceptable after the fact, is very common, almost to the point of cliché, particularly among political types. When something horrible happens, any number of people are on TV telling us it was unacceptable. But what does it actually mean to say a past event or utterance, or action is unacceptable? Every time I hear someone say that so and so, or such and such is unacceptable I want to ask, “What do you mean? If you mean it or he/she is really unacceptable, than are you not implying that you are compelled to to do something to maintain your integrity? And if so, what are you actually going to do?”

I looked up the definition of “unacceptable” on the internet and got:

not acceptable (of course); not welcome; not pleasing; not satisfactory; not allowable; intolerable; inadequate; and too bad to be accepted, approved of, or allowed.

So what did May mean when she said that Trump's comments about women, or his advocacy for torture, or his targeting of Muslims, is unacceptable? Something as gentle as unwelcome, or as uncompromising as intolerable? How would she react to the unacceptable? How would she relate to a person who she declared was so bad she could not approved?

If May actually found Trump unacceptable, surely she would not meet with him, which is, of course, an absurdity. Of course she was going to meet with the president of the United States. She had to meet with him. I can’t imagine anything Trump could do, besides nuking London, that would make him actually unacceptable to May. She would and will in reality accept whatever Trump does or says. Paraphrasing Nixon’s comment about the legality of the president’s actions, if the president does it, it is acceptable. Period.

Maybe May didn’t really mean Trump’s comments and behavior towards women, torture, etc., were unacceptable. She might not like them, but she has to accept them. We all know that. The US UK relationship and the must have trade deal are obviously more important than Trump’s mocking of disabled people, discrimination based on religion, or diplomatic ignorance. Perhaps the best we can say is that she was signaling her dissatisfaction with Trump’s remarks and behavior while knowing if relationship is what he demands, or the economic and political circumstances demand given Britain’s Brexit necessities, acceptable he will be.  

But just for a moment, imagine that Trump and the Gang actually do necessitate a Love Actually moment. What if Trump is such a category difference, and there is now some evidence to support that idea, that treating him as if his is a normal presidency is the irresponsible thing to do. Perhaps dangerously irresponsible. What if he actually is unacceptable and needs to be challenged at every turn. Well, if that is what the situation demanded, than obviously May didn’t see the movie. She couldn’t even bring herself to criticize the Trump and Bannon ban on Muslims entering the United States. She rolled out the red carpet and the Queen in a flash (Obama didn’t get his State visit until his second year in office). Maybe, just maybe, she doesn’t find Trump unacceptable at all, but that she actually likes the guy as much as she needs him.

Imagine that. The red carpet for the likes of Trump. Boris Johnson in Parliament defended the invitation by pointing out that leaders like Robert Mugabe and Nicolae Ceauşescu had been graced with State visits (it’s come to that, the American president being compared to despots like Mugabe and Ceauşescu). A UK Government and Parliament Petition seeking to prevent Trump’s State visit, but not a visit as head of state, has, as I write this, over 1,800,000 signatures. There’s a chance it could eventually top two million. May is not moved. Trump’s ego will be stroked. He loves that. And while the visit is acceptable to the prime minister, to millions of British citizens it is not. I say, good for them. Next stop, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. It's not easy leaving the European Union.

Copyright © 2017 Dale Rominger

Trumpland Resistance and the Absurdity of Václav Havel

A human action becomes genuinely important when it springs from the soil of clear-sighted awareness of the temporality and the ephemerality of everything human. It is only this awareness that can breathe any greatness into an action. The outlines of genuine meaning can only be perceived from the bottom of absurdity. (Václav Havel, in Disturbing the Peace)

I’ve been to Prague on many occasions, and while I had not visited during communist rule, I did arrive soon after the Velvet Revolution. Václav Havel was speaking on the high steps of the Česká společnost antropologická located at the southeast end of Wenceslas Square. I entered the square at the other end, at the corner of Vodičkava and Václavské nám. I turned right onto the square and was immediately confronted with tens of thousands of people and an overturned Soviet tank. So began my love affair with the Czech Republic and Václav Havel.

Wenceslas Square from the Česká společnost antropologická I read a number of Czech novelist: Josef Skvorecky, Milan Kundera, Ivan Klíma, Ladislav Klíma, and, of course, Bohumil Hrabal. Hrabal’s Too Loud a Solitude (Czech: Příliš hlučná samota) is still one of my all-time favorite novels. I also read every English translation of Havel’s work: his essays, meditations, and plays. Havel was a man apart: playwright, dissident, president. He did his best to be, in action and character, a moral politician. Some say he succeeded and other that he failed. Either way he was a bright light at the time when the Soviet Union collapsed in what seemed like a breath.

Samizdat was a significant form of resistance among dissidents across the Soviet Union, but it is now, at least in my mind, most closely associated with the Czechoslovakia opposition. Of course, samizdat was an underground movement in which censored or dissident, alternative, often subversive publications were written, copied, and passed around, primarily by hand. In an essays, Havel explained how seemingly insignificant barely noticed acts of resistance brought down the Soviet Union. He gave the example of a man writing an essay, making ten carbon copies and passing it around to ten friends and acquaintances. Let’s assume it stopped there, that only ten people read the essay before it was destroyed. Ten readings against the established might of the Soviet empire. It certainly seems like an utterly futile effort. And yet, Havel says no. That every tiny act, every whispered word, every quickened heart reading a faded copy, eventually had an accumulative affect that brought down communist rule. The insignificant is significant.

Of course, the insignificant becomes significant in the company of other insignificants. There are two things to say about this company of irrelevance. First, the moral integrity of an act is not determined by its efficacy. Second, its efficacy is only realized in community. Our imaginary writer’s integrity was assured through the act of resistance, in this particular case the writing of an essay. That would be so even if only one person read his essay. Second, because he was a part of a community of resistance that took many forms, he brought down the Soviet Union. The accumulation of insignificance is powerful beyond appearances.

Václav Havel When I first read what Havel claimed I was quite moved. I thought it was, well, significant. Recently I pulled Havel’s books off my shelf and looked for that samizdat story told in an essay. I couldn’t find it, though I would bet my fortune the essay is in Disturbing the Peace or Summer Meditations. And though it’s been a long time since I thought of those words, they once again seem important. They seem a necessary encouragement for Trumpland resistance. Why? The reason is simple. I’m insignificant and nothing I do will make that much difference. 

We are now facing rule in the United States by a demagogue who has called the oligarchy and military into his administration. For eight years President Obama made little effort to resist the American oligarchy (either because he didn’t want to or because he decided the effort would be counterproductive or useless). They have the money, which means they have the power. And now that power is aligned to Christian fundamentalism and an extreme right wing ideology. We even have an open and proud white supremacist working in the White House itself. If a president doesn’t want to give it a go, why in heaven’s name would I try? Any effort I could make to change the rising tide of right wing oligarchy would be foolish and futility. Nonetheless, Havel gives me heart.

I have no doubt only a handful of people will read this blog, not unlike the ten carbon copies handed around the Czech samizdat. I will join the women’s protest march this coming Saturday (men are welcome!) here in Seattle and will be lost in a crowd which some estimate will reach 50,000 people. My words and my protests will be insignificant in the face of the man-boy in the golden tower, his one percent friends, and angry old soldiers. My resistance will be ignored by the Republican Party that now controls the House, Senate, White House, federal courts, and Supreme Court. But if Václav Havel is correct, my insignificance is significant. No one thought and few dreamed that the Soviet Union would and could collapse so suddenly. But it did. And according to Havel, that guy and his ten carbon copies is responsible.

I need to do two things. First, act even if it does seem foolish and futile. Second, trust that others are just as foolish and that our accumulative impact will bring change. So, perhaps it is time for me to reread Havel’s writings on resistance, political morality, the art of the impossible, and the politics of hope.

Time to gear up everyone. A hard rain is coming. Reading Václav Havel is not a bad way to prepare.

Copyright © 2017 Dale Rominger

Notes from Trumpland ~ The Boy Who Cries Wolf and Gets Away With It

The Boy Who Cried Wolf, one of Aesop’s fables, is a widely known morality tale in the Western world (to read various version see Fables of Aesop). It’s a fable about lying in general and patterns of lying in particular. It raises the vexed question: When does someone who lies become a liar? It describes the consequences of lying and being a liar. In one version the shepherd boy’s sheep are eaten by the wolf and in another the boy himself is also eaten. The Greek version of the fable ends with the moral: “this shows how liars are rewarded: even if they tell the truth, no one believes them.”

While we can debate endlessly about whether or not a particular utterance is a lie, we do agree that there is something we recognize as truth and something we recognize as falsehood. In most cultures truth-telling is considered to have prima facie value, which is to say that truth-telling is good in and of itself, needing no further justification. This prima facie assumption, the ability to distinguish between a truth and a falsehood, the willingness to pass judgment on those who lies, the willingness to hold the liar accountable for their words and actions, all depends on an agreed and shared understanding of what is necessary for human beings to live together in social organizations. It depends on our agreed understanding of what human reality actually is. Remove that understanding, and a language to speak of that understanding, and we destroy our moral and ethical foundation.

Of course, it is all much more complicated than this. We all lie (action) from time to time, but most of us are not pathological liars (character). While sometimes we get away with it (not eaten by a wolf, for example), most of the time we know we have done something wrong. A situational ethicist would interpret Aesop’s fable differently than a duty/consequence ethicist who would interpret the fable differently from a virtue/character ethicist. There are a zillion books written about morality and ethics, but here I want to focus on the relationship between politics, truth, falsehood, and our agreed reality. (If you are interested in exploring the world of ethics I think Ethics in Star Trek’s Delta Quadrant is a quick and, hopefully, enjoyable way to do so.)  

Joseph GoebbelsJoseph Goebbels, Hitler’s propaganda chief, famously said:

If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie.

It’s a disturbing, by nonetheless, interesting statement. First, it recognized that the State, or its representative, is indeed telling a lie. Second, the success of the lie is grounded in its audacity and the State’s ability to “shield” people from its consequences. One gets the impression that Goebbels was speaking about things like justifications for conducting a war or denying the reality of the Holocaust. I think also Goebbels is speaking about long term deceptions, not to be revealed in even the distant future. However, he seems not to be denying the reality that there is truth and there is falsehood. The people come to believe in the lie’s truth, but Goebbels, the State, nonetheless knows what is the lie and what is the truth.

It’s not difficult to imagine that Trump, an apparent admirer of some of Hitler’s speeches (a little bedside reading - see Mother Jones) , might also admire Goebbels’s claim, but there are differences between the two men. While Trump can tell huge lies, he does not seem to be interested in the long view. His lies are blatantly opportunistic and for the moment. For example, during the campaign he said over and over again that the election was rigged. However, after he won he said: “now I don’t say it because I won. Now I don’t care.” During the election campaign, fact checking organizations siting real evidence reported that Trump lied every three to five minutes (see Politicususa and Politico). He’s the boy who cries wolf with no fear of consequences. He exposes his own lies with a casual ease, obviously feeling no necessity to “shield” people from the consequences of his lies nor fearing there will be any costs he himself might have to face. So far, he has been right.

Trump’s use of lying is bold and utterly without embarrassment. At the Golden Globes Meryl Streep called out Trump on his mockery of the New York Times Reporter Serge F. Kovalevski who has arthrogryposis (see New York Times). Of course Trump denied ever having done such a thing even though he was seen by millions doing just that (see CNN). His ability to continue lying even as evidence to the contrary is available to the country is ominous. At some level he is attempting, perhaps assuming, he can define reality to his own liking and benefit. In Trumpland there is no objective truth and falsehood. This is not hyperbole.

Scottie Nell Hughes, a Trump surrogate and supporter, made a remarkable claim. She said on a the Diane Rehm Show:

Facts aren’t really facts. If we believe something to be true it is true. So when Trump says 3 million people voted illegally for Clinton, if he believes it and his followers believe it (I guess because he said it) than it is true…And so one thing that has been interesting this entire campaign season to watch, is that people that say facts are facts—they're not really facts. Everybody has a way—it's kind of like looking at ratings, or looking at a glass of half-full water. Everybody has a way of interpreting them to be the truth, or not truth. There's no such thing, unfortunately, anymore as facts (to listen to her comments go to Diane Rehm Show starting at the time marker 14.40).

She is saying, reminiscent of Goebbels, that if Trump says it and believes it, it is true. If Trump’s supporters believe it, it is true. What Hughes is claiming is that there no longer exists a shared agreed understanding of truth and falsehood, there is no longer such a thing as a shared understanding of reality. Reality, truth, falsehood are what Trump says they are. This is the man who will run the United States government and control the country’s military.

Trump has a pattern of lying that long ago crossed over the invisible line separating a person who occasionally lies and a person who is by their character a liar. Does Trump actually believe this or is it a strategy? Does he actually know that there is no evidence that three million illegal votes for Clinton, or does his own claim that there were shield him from the truth? I don’t know, but either way, we cannot let it stand. We need to continually call him on his lies, and then call him on his denials. We cannot let Trump and his gang define reality.

Copyright © 2017 Dale Rominger

A Christmas Carol for Trumbland

{For the past couple of years I've posted an article I wrote on Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol. Now that the US has become Trumpland, where billionaires rule and the president communicates and sets policy in 140 characters, it seems important to be reminded of what Dickens was saying in his carol. A hint. Worship of the wealthy and sugar coated sweetness was not the message.}

Scrooge had no further intercourse with Spirits, but lived upon the Total Abstinence Principle, ever afterwards; and it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us! And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God bless us, Every One!

One of the saddest events in popular culture is the continual distortion of a great literary character through the romanticizing of Tiny Tim, transforming him into a sentimental, sweet character, whom we can first pity and then exploit, using him like a sponge to soak up our spilt Christian goodness. In fact, Tiny Tim is one key to "Keeping Christmas well”.

Charles Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol in 1843, the first of five "Christmas Books" written from 1843 to 1848. In each book a central character suffers from a loss of faith in human dignity, but is eventually brought to realize the value of human spirit. The transformation each character goes through, and we must call it a transformation and not simply a change of mind or even heart, is accomplished through spirit intervention, or in other words, by spiritual means. In the preface to A Christmas Carol, Dickens wrote he hoped the story would "Awake some loving and forbearing thoughts, never out of season in a Christian land." In fact, he wrote the story because, in his opinion, "Keeping Christmas well" was out of season all the time. Dickens' ultimate hope was, of course, that through the power of his narratives the reader would, like the main characters, be transformed as well.

A Christmas Carol is not about a sweet little crippled boy, but instead is about the social conditions of Dickens' Britain. The story had (and still has) a strong social message. In and through the story, Dickens was appealing in general to the people of Britain to lead less selfish lives, and in particular to the rich to take seriously their duty of care for those less fortunate. He had visited Cornish tin mines early in 1843 and saw children laborers at work. He visited the Field Lane Ragged School in London, one of several institutions trying to educate hungry and illiterate children. After these experiences, he wrote A Christmas Carol in six weeks. During the writing of the "hymn" he said in a letter that he "wept and laughed and wept again...and in thinking walked the black streets of London...when all sober folks had gone to bed". In fact, the magic and mystery of his literary hymn exhibited a "strange mastery" over him, but a mastery of joy and love which he was impatient to return to each working day.

Dickens had a lot to weep and laugh about. For years the poor had not only been neglected by society, but also lived under the burden of a social philosophy and political policies that actually justified that neglect. In 1803 Thomas Malthus wrote the essay entitled Principle of Population. In it Malthus argued that any human being that could not be supported by his or her parents, and could not provide labor that was useful and required by society, had "no claim or right to the smallest portion of food." He went on to say that such people also had "no business" even being in society and that their death would "decrease the surplus population."

When society refuses people food, shelter, and work, there is only one place for them to go, or to be, and Scrooge, the character representing the Malthusian position, had no difficulty in saying precisely where or what that place was -- death. Scrooge, of course, had no time for the celebration of the child of salvation. For him Tiny Tim, whose parents could not support him and whose ill health made it impossible for him to become a good laborer for society, could simply die. When just before Christmas Scrooge was asked to make a contribution to help provide for the "Poor and destitute, who suffer greatly at the present," people in the thousands lacking common necessities and in the hundreds of thousands wanting common comforts, he responded:

"Are there no prisons?"
"Plenty of prisons," said the gentleman laying down his pen again.
”And the Union Workhouses?" demanded Scrooge. Are they still in operation?"
"They are. Still," returned the gentleman, "I wish I could say they were not."
"The Treadmill and the Poor Law are in full vigour, then? said Scrooge.
"Both very busy. sir."
"Oh! I was afraid, from what you said at first that something had occurred to stop them in their useful course," said Scrooge. "I'm very glad to hear it."

The gentlemen, not giving up, explained to Scrooge that such provisions hardly "furnished Christmas cheer of mind or body to the multitudes" and that they were collecting funds to give the poor "meat and drink, and a means of warmth." But again Scrooge refused to give saying he wished to be left along. He then said, in full Malthusian passion:

"I don't make merry myself at Christmas and I can't afford to make idle people merry. I help to support the establishments I have mentioned--they coast enough; and those who are badly off must go there."
"Many can't go there; and many would rather die."
"If they would rather die," said Scrooge, they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population."

Hope and warning are powerfully told when Scrooge met the Spirit of Christmas Present. As the evening passed the Spirit took Scrooge to homes where they stood beside the bedsides of the sick who, nonetheless, were cheerful. They visited those who struggled and were still living in great hope. They visited those who lived in poverty and were rich in spirit. And they visited the almshouses, hospitals, prisons where people experienced misery but had not "made fast the door and barred the Spirit out" thus allowing him to enter their misery and give the gift of blessing.

As the long night unfolded before him, time and space seemed to lose meaning for Scrooge, except that he noticed the Spirit was growing visibly older. He asked if life was so short for all spirits and the Spirit replied that his life would end that very night at midnight. As the chimes rang three quarters past eleven, with death approaching, hope turned to warning. Scrooge saw something in the folds of the Spirits clothing...

"Forgive me if I am not justified in what I ask," said Scrooge, looking intently at the Spirit's robe, "but I see something strange, and not belonging to yourself, protruding from your skirts. Is it a foot or a claw?"

"It might be a claw, for the flesh there is upon it," was the Spirit's sorrowful reply. "Look here!" exclaimed the Ghost. "They were a boy and girl. Yellow, meagre, ragged, scowling, wolfish; but prostate, too, in their humility. Where graceful youth should have filled their features out, and touched them with its freshest tints, a stale and shrivelled hand, like that of age, had pinched, and twisted them, and pulled them into shreds. Where angels might have sat enthroned, devils lurked, and glared out menacing. No change, no degradation, no perversion of humanity, in any grade, through all the mysteries of wonderful creation, has monsters half so horrible and dread.”

Scrooge started back, appalled. Having them shown to him in this way, he tried to say they were fine children, but the words choked themselves, rather than be parties to a lie of such enormous magnitude.

"Spirit! are they yours?" Scrooge could say no more.

"They are Man's," said the Spirit, looking down upon them. "And they cling to me, appealing from their fathers. This boy is Ignorance. This girl is Want. Beware them both, and all their degree, but most of all beware this boy, for on his brow I see that written which is Doom, unless the writing be erased. Deny it!" cried the Spirit, stretching out its hand toward the city. "Slander those who tell it ye! Admit if for your factious purposes, and make it worse. And abide the end! “Have they no refuge or resource?" cried Scrooge.” Are there no prisons?" said the Spirit, turning on him for the last time with his own words. "Are there no work-houses?"
The bell struck twelve.

Dickens speaks with passion and power about the Spirit of Salvation. He sings the Spirit's blessings, for where he visits there is health, joy, home, and hope. Where the Spirit smiles, needs are met and comforts are offered. Dickens does not, however, sentimentalize the vision, for wrapped within the very clothing of the Spirit is the misery caused by human thought and deed. We shutter when we realize that the grotesque monsters revealed are the results of human exploits. We reel at the devils before us are in fact human beings and, once again, children. We desperately reach for a self-defense, any self-defense, when we are reminded that such human suffering belongs not to God but to us. We ache when we see how the suffering cling to the Spirit and look upon us with fear.

Perhaps it is time we re-read Dickens. If we were to "keep Christmas well" we would experience the wholeness of salvation's blessings. We would be filled with joy and pierced through the heart. In this world, both must be ours.

A Christmas Carol Scrooge ends with these words:

Scrooge had no further intercourse with Spirits, but lived upon the Total Abstinence Principle, ever afterwards; and it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us! And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God bless us, Every one!

 Copyright © 2016 Dale Rominger

US Democracy Versus Voter Suppression and the Rise of the Oligarchy

It sounds so melodramatic to suggest that Donald Trump may be a threat to American democracy. Because the United States has been a relatively stable democracy for 240 years it’s easy to assume it will continue to be so in the future. That’s not to say the country has not had its crises, but so far the system as always self-corrected. However, to say the nation has self-corrected in the past is not a guarantee that it will do so in the future. Melodramatic or not, the coming together two elements in our society does seem quite threatening to our democracy: Voter suppression and the rise of the oligarchy.

Trump has shown little respect for democracy and democratic institutions, from his attracts on freedom of speech (freedom of the press) to the integrity of the election process. His numerous claims before November 8^th that his losing the election would be de facto proof that the election was fraudulent were unprecedented. When asked if he would accept the results of the election he would only say we would have to wait and see – the first candidate to challenge the US tradition of accepting the outcome of an election to assure the smooth and peaceful transition of power. Now that he has won the election by means of the electoral college, he is claiming that he would have also won the popular vote if it were not for millions of people having voted illegally for Hillary Clinton. What is amazing about these proclamations is that we already are taking them in our stride when they are actually a threat.

His unparalleled claim that the election would be rigged if he did not win was not only an effort to undermine the legitimacy of the then expected Clinton victory. The claim also undermines the validity of the democratic process itself. Even before the voting was completed he was campaigning to convince people that American democracy itself was untrustworthy and that he alone good makes things right again. The “he alone” claims were always referring to his personal authority, not necessarily the application of democratic institutions and the rule of law. He continues to do so even now with his tweets asserting massive voter fraud. It doesn't matter that there is no evidence of such fraud and never has been (see The Washington Post).

I have been reluctant to fully embrace the “we live in a post-truth age” stuff, but now I’m thinking I have been slow to catch up with others. The election of Trump, a known and acknowledged liar, makes me wonder if, as some are claiming, we are a post-truth nation, where the distinction between truth and falsehood is lost (remember all the false news reports taken as truth) and the difference between fact and opinion is only a distant memory.

The Republican Party now controls all aspects of government - House, Senate, and soon the Supreme Court. Trump will be appointing federal judges, the attorney general, at least one supreme court judge, and thousands of government positions. He now has nothing to fear from the Republican Party. It will, no doubt, approve his appointments without delay. Checks and balances will be put on hold for at least two years, and probably four (Democrats don’t like to vote in the midterms, though they do like to complain about how the Republicans run the country). The complete control of government by a party made up of pre-enlightenment, religious fundamentalist, right-wing, alt-right, racists, xenophobe, radical capitalist is frightening for many reasons, but here I am focusing on the GOP’s program of denying the vote to certain groups of people joining forces with Trump’s undermining of the electoral process.

Republicans are getting good at voter suppression. Strict voter ID’s, restriction of early voting, limiting the number of voting places, false claims of voter fraud, are all part of a  successful voter suppression program. North Carolina official even bragged that their efforts had caused a significant drop in African American votes and a rise in white votes. Given Republican commitment to voter suppression, Trump’s claims of voter fraud, his agreement with the implementation of voter ID’s,  and the appointments he is making to his administration, we can assume that both the GOP and the Trump administration will more aggressively pursue voter suppression.

So, complete control by one party, post-truth politics, and voter suppression. Now add to the mix the 1% and the 1% of the 1%.

It fascinates me that a billionaire who lives in a golden tower high above New York City (hardly the heartlands) is, so I’m told, the American workers' hero. You would have to say the American oligarchy is damn clever. Most of the American oligarchy keep a low profile. We’ve all heard of the Koch brothers and Sheldon Adelson, but most of them fly under the radar (see OpenSecrets.org: Center for Responsible Politics – Top Individual Contributions to see just how much these few individuals contribute to influence the democratic process [top giver $67,286,217 to Democrats!]). But not Trump. He bragged about his wealth and convinced workers around the country that he actually cared about them. Amazing! Bottom line, the oligarchy is rarely concerned with the needs of the worker, as an estimated 20 million Trump voters about to lose overtime pay will soon find out.

The Princeton Report, Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens by Martin Gilens from Princeton University and Benjamin I. Page from Northwestern University, on the oligarchy is both informative and not a little frightening. When the report came out, the popular press used headlines saying the authors had declared America to be an oligarchy. The report didn’t quite go that far, though it got so close to the line it is hard not to jump to that conclusion. Among a wealth of information, it also stated that the likelihood of a popular consensus among average Americans on an issue was unlikely to become law, while the desires and demands of the 1% had a strong likelihood of becoming law. This is not surprising. Billions of dollars are spent influencing politicians. Only a fool would think that the billions do not buy political service. Money is political power. The oligarchy is served well by our elected officials. (Also see: Democracy, Oligarchy and a Manifesto for Resistance and The Plutocrats versus the Precariats: Or the 1% versus the 99%)

Some believe these and other forces are an existential threat to American democracy. Comparisons with German of the 1930’s are nowcommon, pointing out how that country rather peacefully and democratically became a fascist state of incredible violence. Here in the US the Nazis, fascist, racist, xenophobe are feeling empowered and are openly attacking those who they judge do not fit into Trump’s America. Resistance is necessary, but we all better buckle up because the darker nature of the United States has been let out of its cage. Silence is irresponsible.

Copyright ©2016 Dale Rominger

Not My President ~ Where I Stand

I confess it was difficult for me to accept George W. Bush as my president, but I did. I didn’t like it, but I did anyway. I didn’t approve of what he did to my country, but I didn’t deny he was my president. He was an embarrassment, but I never advocated his impeachment or his assassination, as did many conservatives concerning President Obama. But now I’m confronted with something new. For the first time in my life I find I cannot say this president-elect will be my president. 

A question: In a democratic society, can a citizen divorce him or herself from a legitimately elected official? 

By “divorce” I mean separate from, detach from, dissociate, disconnect. I mean to politically, emotionally, psychologically, spiritually, practically, existentially, to declare the relationship between citizen and elected leader to be non-existent, to say: “Though I am a citizen of the United States, President Trump is not my president.” I’m aware that the word “divorce” implies a legal separation and so my use of the word here is qualified. The only way I can legally divorcee myself from President Trump is by legally giving up my citizenship. I’m not willing to do that. 

I am saying this because for the first time in my life I cannot maintain my personal integrity and accept Trump is my president. He so tarnishes the presidency. His lack of character defecates all over the Oval Office. I would have thought his publicly mocking a disabled person alone would have disqualified him for the office. Or describing how he abuses women. Or inciting violence at his rallies. Or his support for nuclear proliferation. Or his claim that climate change is a Chinese hoax to undermine the US economy. Or his several bankruptcies. Or his complete and utter lack of experience. Or his pathological lying. Or his refusal to make public his tax returns. Or his support by the KKK and Nazi organizations. I would have thought any one of these things would have disqualified him. But no. My problem is, however, to claim him as my president stains who I am and I won’t do it. 

This does present me with a problem. During the election I was less than impressed with people who indicated that voting was a purely personal matter, that they would vote based on their principles alone. My response was, yes, vote on your principles, but also remember voting is a civic act and that, therefore, we have to also ground our vote in what we think is best for the common good. This is both a political and practical statement. It is practical in the sense that I have never known a candidate that fully embraced my values and principles. As such, I’ve always voted for the person who I thought most closely approached my values and the one I thought would best serve the common good. It is not that Trump does not share my values and my concept of the common good. It is that he is anathema to them. So here I am declaring that this time, for the first time, I am rejecting the legitimately elected president because I cannot both claim him as my president and maintain my integrity. (I realize that the 60 million people who voted for him and Trump himself could care less about my dilemma  and point of view, but I care and the integrity of my political and ethical position is not determined by or dependent upon its efficacy.) 

Practically and politically what does all this mean? Well, first I do not hope Trump succeeds as the president he says he will be. I cannot hope he succeeds in undermining the First Amendment because he doesn’t like being criticized. I cannot hope he succeeds in deporting millions of people. I cannot hope he succeeds in building a wall on our southern border. I cannot hope he succeeds in registering all Muslims in the country. I cannot hope he bans all Muslims from entering the country. If he were to succeed at these things, we would be close to living in a police state. However, I do hope he succeeds in not running the economy into the ground. I do hope he succeeds in not nuking some country somewhere in the world. 

It makes me feel weary just thinking about the implications of my position. As I write this I think of the Vietnam war, Nixon, Watergate, Reagan, Nicaragua, El Salvador, South African apartheid, George W., Iran. Not to mention trickledown economics, bank deregulation, and the one percent. And here we go again, facing what might be an even greater threat to the constitution and American democracy. Therefore, I will continue to write about political issues, will demonstrate when I can, will resist, will not forget who Trump is. We  should all be clear. Remembering and reminding are both political actions of resistance. 

As for accusations that I am not patriotic, don’t even start (See The Rights of Election Losers). Complaining, organizing, resisting, protesting, and civil disobedience are all legitimate and lawful acts in a democratic society. Democracy is an adversarial system of government. We all have the right to disagree. Calls from conservatives and the Republican Party for unity are at best humorous and at worse hyper-hypocritical. These are the people and the party that raised obstructionism to a political principle. When they thought Trump was going to lose the election, they started announcing their plans to obstruct a Clinton presidency days before the election was completed. Trump himself hinted that there could be a violent uprising if he lost. All I can say to their calls for unity is, “Give me a break.”   

Some might say I should at least give Trump a chance, to wait and see. While that sounds reasonable, the signs are not good. He is selecting white supremacists, racists, gay bigots, politically inexperienced rightwing radicals for his administration. It is beginning to look like our new government is going to be a alt-right gang dressed up in nice clothes. He is an authoritarian, deplorable, brutish man and I would suggest that instead of waiting and seeing, we organize now. 

President Trump is not my president.  

Copyright © 2016 Dale Rominger

The Rights of the Election Losers

By its very nature democracy is an adversarial system of government. People compete with each other for the right to exercise power authorized by the electorate. Elections legitimize the use of power. People who vote for the winning candidate feel good and never hesitate to let everyone know. The people who voted for the losing candidate feel lousy and do a fair amount of complaining. It’s the way of democracy.

However, it doesn’t take long for the winners to grow weary of the losers complaining and start demanding they stop their bitching and accept the outcome of the election. It’s not uncommon to declare that the complaining indicates a lack of patriotism and the unwillingness to accept the outcome of a legitimate electoral process. Neither is necessarily true, but the important thing to remember in this tug of war is that we all, including the losers, have particular rights in a democracy.

If you lose the election you have not also lost the right to complain, organize, protest, and even participate in acts of civil disobedience. If you have lost those rights you are no longer living in a democracy and may be living under an authoritarian system of government. In a democracy you can complain all the way to the next election if you want. It’s your right. It will get old and perhaps distract you from doing something more fruitful, but it’s your right.

Losing an election does not mean you have to accept the results and the subsequent policies. In a democracy you have the right to argue for the position you believe better serves the common good. To do so is not claiming the election should be ignored, invalidated, or is in some way illegitimate.

Therefore, losing the election does not give you the right to dismiss the election if, indeed, the process was legitimate. You can accept the legitimacy of the election and at the same time not accept the results. It is the loser’s responsibility to accept the legitimacy of the election, but this does not mean you cannot complain, organize, protest, and practice civil disobedience.

To accept of the outcome of the election and to protest against the newly elected official, administration and/or government is a legitimate position to hold in a democracy. Admittedly, it means living in a state of political tension, but it is legitimate.

So, I accept that the US election completed on November 8^th was fair, legal, and thus legitimate, which means I accept that Donald Trump will be the next president and that the Republican Party will control all aspects of the federal government. To say I accept these facts is not to say I approve. I do not. In fact I’m appalled. I feel I must be hallucinating of that I have slipped into a surreal alternative reality. Therefore, while I accept the election was legitimate, I also claim my rights to complain, at least for a while, to organize against elected officials and the government, and to protest. If you are on the winning side of this election and demand I cease, then I suggest you read up on the what democracy is all about (and remember what the GOP has been doing for the last eight years).

I must confess, I do not look forward to the struggle. The process of normalizing Donald Trump, perhaps the worse president elect the nation has ever known, is already underway (see Respect President Trump? Forget it!). As such a significant part of resistance this time around is remembering and reminding. People won’t want to be reminded of who their president actually is, but forgetting is not an option. We have to acknowledge that this is already an up-mountain battle. For example, when you have to make the argument that grabbing a woman or girl’s pussy is a violation of her rights and dignity, you are already way behind the game.

So don’t forget the president elect has argued for the proliferation of nuclear weapons, publicly mocked disabled people, accepted the supports of the KKK (indirectly), stigmatized Muslims and Mexicans, abused women, knows nothing about foreign affairs, has white supremacists in his inner circle, and lies with an ease and frequency that is unsettling. Welcome to the United States of America.

Copyright © 2016 Dale Rominger

Respect President Trump? Forget it!

When Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush were elected president I was depressed and angry. I moaned and protested, but they were my presidents so I got on with things. It was hard respecting them, especially George W, but I always respected the presidency. Not anymore.

Respect President Trump? Forget it!

This time conservative America has gone too far. No one who voted for Trump can pretend they didn’t know what kind of human being he is. I realize they couldn’t know what he would actually do as president. He lies so easily and frequently that it is impossible to know which of the things he said he will actually act on. But they did know who he was. Did it ever give them pause that the KKK and various Nazi groups enthusiastically supported him? Did they think it was a good idea to hand the world’s largest economy over to a man who has declared bankruptcy several times? Did they want him to grab their daughters’ pussy? Did they even think about his questioning why the US doesn’t use its nukes more often? Not only is what they’ve done stupid and against their best interests, it is dangerous. How dare they let this man into the White House. They have shamed the Oval Office.

Respect the presidency? You can forget that too. The presidency is an idea. Unlike the divine right of kings and queens, the idea’s integrity, legitimacy, and power comes from the people’s integrity, legitimacy, and power. Conservative America has become a deceit, a counterfeit, an abuser of power. When the people fail, the idea fails. The people’s voice is not sacred. Conservative America let itself be bought by lies, hatred, and fear. It has polluted the idea of the presidency with a brutish male bogus of a champion.

Have those who voted for this great pretender ever pondered the very close relationship between democracy and fascism? Do they know what fascism is?

Here’s a very simple definition for them: an nationalistic right-wing and authoritarian system of government and social organization. Is Trump a fascist? Well, it depends who you ask, but have a look at Trump’s ideas, speeches, proclamations: He uses ethnic stereotypes and racist identifiers; he plays on and manipulates people’s fears of foreigners; his campaign slogan, Make America Great Again, is reminiscent of past American fascist flirtations; his proclaiming and persuading people that the nation is in decline even when it is in recovery; his aggressive foreign policy to defeat our enemies and arrest the decline of the nation.

Is Trump a fascist? We hesitate to use the word, but all the above are right out of the fascist playbook. Trump is not Hitler. Only Hitler is Hitler. But it’s not too much of an exaggeration to suggest Hitler would have approved. Do I think he will usher in a fascist regime in America? While I think he has the potential to do considerable harm, no I don’t think that will happen. It’s the next Donald Trump who comes along who scares me more. As I said in Election Day Hopes or The End of the Dream is Being Televised:

Trump is to politics what porn is to the internet: something that should have been controlled, limited, and generally unacceptable has gone mainstream. Every society has its dark side, or dark underbelly. It will never be expunged, but a good society keeps its less desirables under their rocks. Trump has lifted all the rocks and the racist, xenophobes, misogynists, fascist bastards are out and shouting and packing and just being themselves.

The alt-right has found its voice in Trump. It’s loud and aggressive. During Trump’s victory speech a supporter shouted, “Kill Obama” loudly and at least twice. True to form, Trump did not rebuke the man. Think about it. The president-elect has encouraged violence at his rallies and let the suggestion that the standing president be killed go unchallenged. What we have witnessed is demagogy and violence in our political life become normal and acceptable to many. But what is really frightening is the thought that the next alt-right hero will have a ready built platform on which to call out our darker selves.

This is what conservative America has married to the idea of the presidency: The alt-right, KKK, Nazi, fascist, brutal male playbook.

Do I think all the 59,427,652 Americans who voted for Trump are fascist thugs? Of course, not! But I do think they saw what was going on and voted for him anyway. And to those almost 60 million voters I say: He’s yours now. My friends and I will pay the price along with you, but he belongs to you. With nude photos of your future First Lady flying around the internet, your president elect due in court over alleged fraud and the rape a thirteen year old girl, with the New York State investigation into his charitable foundation beginning and the possible federal investigation into some of his advisers’ links to Russia, it’s time for you to step up and take ownership. Talking about emails won’t wash anymore.

Donald Trump is not my president. I would rather be in the political wilderness, dislocated, homeless.

To the 59, 626,052 people who voted for Hillary Clinton, the 4,054,130 who voted for Gary Johnson, and the 1,206,015 who voted for Jill Stein, come January 1st the majority of elected officials and their staff in the majority of state legislatures, governorships, the House of Representatives, the Senate, the White House, and soon to follow the Supreme Court, will be people embracing a kind of pre-enlightenment, anti-science, and, for many, religious fundamentalist worldview. If you've not worried about climate change, this will be the time to start. If you thought the fight to secure the rights of the LGBT community was nearing a victorious end, think again. If you thought Obamacare was finally secure, don’t look now. Abortion rights? Marriage equality? The social network that many depend upon? In fact, most everything you thought was good in the last eight years may be up for grabs. Conservative America has given complete power to a party in disarray, controlled by right-wing ideologues and religious fundamentalists. Conservative America has handed the presidency to a man with absolutely no experience in politics, as if it had elected a man to a council seat in a town of 500 people, with a temperament which is frightening. As Bob Dylan said, a hard rain’s a-gonna fall.

A good number of my friends and acquaintances have already begun the rallying cry to fight the good fight. I’m glad they are doing so. But for me, it’s a bit too soon. I’m not yet in a mood to make lemonade, to make the best of a bad situation, to keep the faith. This election was a game changer. I’m psychologically weary, morally exhausted, emotionally drained. These will all pass in time. But for now I'm getting my head around the reality that the Uniited States of America just elected a despicable and dangerous man to the precidency.

Copyright @ 2016 Dale Rominger

Election Day Hopes or The End of the Dream is Being Televised

The end is near. It’s election day. Presidentially speaking, a big decision will  be made. As Benjamin M. Friedman said: “The paramount question is whether a person exhibiting no qualification for the office – neither experience, nor preparation, nor personal character – is nonetheless to become president.”[1] The person Friedman is referring to is, of course, Donald Trump, and as I write it’s not looking good for The Donald. Nate Silver has Trump at a 28.6% chance of winning the election. Silver gives Clinton as 55.1% chance of winning Florida. Let’s hope superstar Silver is correct. Still, I’ve always been intrigued by the fact that millions of Americans really do want a person, probably a man, with absolutely no experience to take the most dangerous job on the planet. It’s not as if Trump were running for a council seat in a town with a population of 5000 people. It’s the presidency! 

Actually, it is more accurate to say that the decision is in the process of being made and has been for weeks. As of Sunday over 44 million people had already voted, myself included. Here in Washington State we vote by mail. There will be no polling stations and long lines in Washington today, and thus no fear of voter intimidation. But also no thrill of doing one’s democratic duty, or indeed doing one’s democratic pleasure . 37 states and the District of Columbia offer some form of early voting. The Republican Party has done it’s best to end early voting in those states, because it tends to favor the Democratic Party candidates. For a while it looked as though the GOP’s effort to restrict voting for certain groups of people (not white people, obviously) was having some success. However, in the last couple of days there has been a surge of Hispanic and African Americans going to the polls. Can only be good news for Clinton. 

This is my first election day back in the good old U.S. after thirty years away. In Britain watching the results on the BBC was an all-night affair, given the differing time zones. My wife and I would sit up all night eating nachos, drinking red wine, and either celebrating or mourning. I figure by the time the polls close here on the West Coast (also known as the Left Coast – Silver gives Clinton a 97.5% chance of victory in Washington, a 93.4 chance in Oregon, and a 99.9% chance in California) we’ll  know who the next president will be, whether or not the Democrats took the Senate (not looking good right now), and by how much the Republicans maintain control in the House. By nine in the evening the adventure will all but be over. Not much time for nachos and wine. 

Trump is a GOP creation. Trump is to politics what porn is to the internet: something that should have been controlled, limited, and generally unacceptable has gone mainstream. Every society has its dark side, or dark underbelly. It will never be expunged, but a good society keeps its less desirables under their rocks. Trump has lifted all the rocks and the racist, xenophobes, misogynists, fascist bastards are out and shouting and packing and just being themselves. A man at a Trump rally got beat up the other day for holding up a sign. Trump supporters didn’t like the sign. 

The GOP has been a slow motion train wreck for years now and it’s not been good for America. Republicans have promised, even before election day, that they will tie Clinton up in special investigations and prosecutions, will refuse to hold hearings on any and all Clinton Supreme Court nominees, and will impeach her within her first year in office. This is the No Party at its best. The only hope of having a somewhat functional government is for the Democratic Party wins the Senates. But our best hope seems to be a 50 50 split with a Democratic vice president breaking the tie. Welcome to the circus. 

Here's the problem. The GOP used to be a political party committed to governing, fighting for what it believed was best for the country, compromising with political opponents when necessary. Now it is a pseudo religions/ideological organization fighting evil, and as we know one should not, cannot, compromise with evil. One must totally defeat evil even if it means shutting down the government, denying people the right to vote, and exhibiting an impressive lack of respect for democracy itself. The will of the people is only authentic when it matches the will of the GOP. Otherwise, fuck the people. 

Unfortunately, the GOP will not be routed today. I had hoped it would guessing that a route might force the party to recreate itself. In fact, the US needs a legitimate conservative party. It doesn’t have one now. But, if Clinton wins and the Senate splits perhaps we can avoid the worse of the zealots masquerading as politicians. 

Copyright ©2016 Dale Rominger

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[1] Friedman, Benjamin M. On the Election-III. The New York Review of Book. November 10, 2016, Volume LXIII, Number 17.

Big Week in Bookland: Books, Betrayal, and Bereavement

Nell ZinkNell Zink has a new novel out called Nicotine. Zink first came to prominence when the public learned that she and Jonathan Franzen exchanged several emails, about birds. Eventually, Franzen decided she needed to be published and she resisted. She says, “I was, like, either you’re going to support me in practical ways, or you’re going to shut the fuck up about my talent.” (See Outside In, The New Yorker) 

Apparently Zink had been writing for fifteen years, but only for her pen pal Avner Shats, shunning the publishing industry. Reviewers love her writing – I ‘ve not read a bad review yet. But they also love to point out that she wrote The Wallcreeper and Mislaid each in three weeks. She’s a speed demon. And what’s more, the books are great. If they were lousy we’d hear a lot about how good writing takes time and that Zink’s frivolous attitude demonstrates a disrespect for the art. She must be a nightmare for every creative writing instructor in the land. On the other hand, it fills the hearts with hopes of every aspiring writers who get the job done demon speed. After reading about Zink I stopped feeling guilty about finishing a first draft in three or four months. All hail, Zink!

Arundhati RoyIn the same week it was announced that Arundhati Roy, author of The God of Small Things, will be publishing her second novel, The Ministry of Utmost Happiness, in 2017, twenty years after The God of Small Things made such a big splash. The reviewer I read dramatically proclaimed that the book was twenty years in the making, conjuring up images of Roy sitting at her desk writing and revising and editing for twenty years until the masterpiece was perfected. How you reconcile Zink and Roy, I don’t know, but many people believe that for writing to be good, it must take time, and must be difficult. How often have a read authors describing the agony they go through year after year, compelled to write because that is all they can do, but nonetheless suffering mightily? You’d think they worked in a deep coal mine. Ten years, twenty years, thirty years of suffering so we had better like the damn book. Now that’s what real writing is all about. And if you don’t take decades to write your book than obviously it’s a piece of shit.

Actually, I’d love to be Franzen’s friend, though I’m pretty sure anything I wrote in three weeks wouldn’t impress him. Perhaps I should send him a copy of The Woman in White Marble and The Krewe of Boo Murders in the hope that he would send them immediately to his publisher. Actually, I met Franzen once at a book signing in Seattle. He noticed one of the books I handed him was published in the UK and I cleverly brought up his last visit to London when a man stole his glasses off his face and Franzen chased him into a pond. He laughed at my retelling, but unfortunately did not ask for my email address. I should have talked about birds.

Truth is, I doubt I could write a book in three weeks and I don’t have twenty years left on the planet. Bottom line, when successful writers write about how to write, what they are really doing, and only doing, is telling us how they write books. Nothing more, nothing less. Their advice may help you or it may not. I’m sticking to about three or four months for the first draft, and then forever for the revising and editing. FOREVER!

Claudio Gatti Writing fast, writing slow, birds, publishing are all very interesting, but Bookland was rocked in this week when a case of brutal betrayal was revealed. Elena Ferrante was unmasked! Boy, I read nothing good about this treachery. Ferrante is a bestselling novelist writing books located in Naples under a pseudonym. A journalist – a two bit bastard of a journalist, if the few articles I read about this affair are correct – by the name of Claudio Gatti outed Ferrnante and did so as a public service, or so he claimed. If you want to read what this apparently despicable man, nay less that a man, wrote go to The New York Review of Books, which also took a hit for printing this self-righteous intrusion.

According to Gatti, given that Ferrante wrote a book about Ferrante, Ferrante (whoever she really is) opened herself up to public scrutiny. Basically, this fifteen minute seeker of fame thinks authors do not have the right to write themselves out of their writing. As for me, I don’t care if people know I wrote White Marble and Krewe of Boo. In fact, I insist they know. I haven’t managed fifteen seconds of fame yet, and I’m still waiting to go viral. Perhaps, if one day it does happen, the viral thing, I may wish I had written under the pseudonym Drake Ramsey. Truth: I’m not losing any sleep over the possibility. Still, the morality and ethics of punishing the hidden, is worth thinking about.

Gloria NaylorFinally, Zink, Roy, Franzen, Ferrnante, and Gatti all took a back sit towards the end of the week when it was announced that Gloria Naylor had died. She died of a heart attack at 66 years old. This news hurt. Years ago a friend gave me a copy of The Women of Brewster Place. I went on to read Lindon Hills, Mama Day, and Bailey’s Café. Naylor won the National Book Award, the American Book Awards, and was awarded the National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in 1985 and a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1988. She wrote about strong African American female characters dealing with issues of racism, sexism, poverty, gay rights, and spirituality. Her books are alive with sex, birth, love, grief, and death. At times she embraces magical realism and at times the grittiness of life.

She wrote: “Not only is your story worth telling, but it can be told in words so painstakingly eloquent that it becomes a song.” I doubt I’ve ever written anything that has become a song, though I have painstakingly tried on occasion. Still, trying is one thing and doing is another.

There’s a good chance you have never heard of Gloria Naylor, but she has left her books behind. She is best known for The Women of Brewster Place, so I would suggest you start there. But I must confess, Mama Day and Bailey’s Café are probably my favorites, so much so I bought first editions. They sit on a book shelf in my living room, pride of place. She’s gone, but the books are not.

Copyright © 2016 Dale Rominger

The Normalization of Demagogy

I’m hoping these are not ordinary time, politically speaking. If they are then the United States is in trouble. For the first time a fascist, racist, xenophobic demagogue is the presidential nominee of a major political parties. Though it sounds melodramatic, these are dangerous times. But let’s start with a little good news.

Nate Silver plots the likelihood of Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton being elected president on his website FiveThirtyEight. As I write this on the morning of October 18, 2016, Silver calculates Clinton’s chances of winning at 87.7% and Trump at 12.3%. (He predicts that the Democratic Party has a 76.0% chance of gaining control of the Senate.) This wasn’t always so. Even two weeks ago many polls indicated the race was close. But by now we all know what happened. The infamous video of Trump and Billy Bush speaking abusively about how they treat women was released by the Washington Post. Finally, upon hearing Trump say he could freely grab women’s pussies because he is famous, Republican leaders began withdrawing support. But let’s just remind ourselves what was acceptable for the GOP before the video. Trump:

• Encouraged Russia to hack Clinton’s email and impact the US election;
• Says he admires Putin;
• Incites actual physical violence at many of his campaign rallies;
• Suggests his opponent can be stopped by assassination;
• Calls his opponent a devil;
• Says he will imprison his opponent when he’s elected president;
• Calls Mexicans rapists and criminals;
•  Advocates racial profiling;
• Advocates killing of terrorists families (a war crime);
• Advocates using torture;
• Denies climate change, declaring the idea is a Chinese plot to undermine the US;
• Denigrates prisoners of war;
• Criticizes a Gold Star Family;
• Declares he will build a huge high tech wall on the Mexican US border;
• Advocates expelling 11 million people from the US;
• Advocates refusing all Muslims entry to the US (unconstitutional);
• Declares a judge is not suited to reside over cases he is involved in because the judge is Mexican (the judge, of Mexican descent, was born and raised in the US and is a US citizen);
• Implied a female moderator at a Republican Party debate was unfair to him because she was menstruating;
• Uses derogatory and sometimes brutal and violent language towards and about women;
• Publicly mocked a disabled journalist;
• Promoted changes to the libel laws that would restrict freedom of speech;
• Claimed he knows more how to defeat ISIS then US generals even though he has had NO military experience;
• Threatened to undermine NATO by refusing to automatically support NATO members in times of conflict;
• Seems relaxed about the proliferation of nuclear weapons and even using them in Europe “because it’s a big place”;
• Claims, because of his fame, he can grab women by their pussy.

 I know this is not an all-inclusive list of Trump statements and policies, but nonetheless, at this point we should all be alarmed. This is a candidate for the presidency! And remember, most GOP leaders and millions of Republican voters supported Trump through all the above outrage. It seems many candidates for public office are first concerned about their own careers, second their party’s success, and third the common good and the welfare of the country. But given the nature of Trump’s political movement, it’s support by most, if not all, Nazi and white supremacist movements, its undercurrent of violence, we must ask why it took so long for the Republican leadership to unendorsed Trump.

There are several things disturbing about the Trump candidacy. First, of course, is the man himself. He is a dangerous, inept, unqualified, pathological liar. Nonetheless, we have been, and continue to be, inundated by the media coverage of Trump. As Les Moonves, CBS Chairman, said:

"It may not be good for America, but it's damn good for CBS…Donald's place in this election is a good thing. Man, who would have expected the ride we're all having right now?...The money's rolling in and this is fun. I've never seen anything like this, and this is going to be a very good year for us. Sorry. It's a terrible thing to say. But, bring it on, Donald. Keep going."

It is naïve to think that the CEO of a major media company would consider the common good and the health of the country over profit. But what happens when a people see and hear a demagogue day after day? Well, at least in part, the person and his (in this case) rhetoric become normalized. It’s like pornography going mainstream. We cannot keep up with his blatant lies and so we make jokes. Shock fatigue begins to set in. And while Trump may still surprise us from time to time, it is possible that when the next Hitler/Putin admirer and hero of the alt-right comes along, we won’t be surprise but will take it in our stride. The media embrace of Trump is normalizing demagogy.

Second, the Republican Party leadership has been, by and large, cowardice. This mess belongs to the Republican Party. The Party over the past few decades, moving ever rightward, embracing Christian fundamentalism and right-wing ideology, created this monster. Unfortunately, what Republicans created is now a problem for all of us. I have come to believe that the best thing for the country is for the GOP to be crushed in the election, thus forcing the party to recreate itself. I actually do think the US needs a good conservative party. Unfortunately, given the way the congressional districts have been established, it is unlikely that the Democrats will retake the House. Will losing the White House and Senate (and thus control over the Supreme Court) be enough to force change upon GOP? We can only hope.

Third, millions of American have voted for Trump and will vote for him on November 8th. When we Americans lose an election we grumble, complain, and often protest. However, Trump is adding a new and dangerous element to the mix. He is openly declaring the election is fixed even before it has taken place. No other presidential candidate has ever done this before. The man who often suggests violence is a legitimate reaction and solution to a problem (let 2nd Amendment people take care of Clinton if she is elected), and at other times actually calls for violence (telling people to hit protesters at his rallies), is now priming his followers to reject the the election results if he loses. It does not matter that there is no evidence of electoral fraud being orchestrated, that state governments control the electoral process in their states, and that there has never been any evidence of large scale electoral fraud in the US. As President Obama said, Trump should stop his whining. 

Nonetheless, he has told his supporters to monitor polling stations, and he obviously doesn’t mean their own. The racism in his speeches is not subtle. One supporter is reported as saying:

"It’s called racial profiling. Mexicans. Syrians. People who can’t speak American. I’m going to go right up behind them. I’ll do everything legally…I’m going to make them a little bit nervous."

So, if Trump loses the election, which is looking likely, what percentage of his followers will accept Clinton as their president? Will any become violent? Dan Bowman, a Trump supporter, was quoted in the Boston Globe literally calling for a revolution:

"If she’s in office, I hope we can start a coup. She should be in prison or shot. That’s how I feel about it. We’re going to have a revolution and take them out of office if that’s what it takes. There’s going to be a lot of bloodshed. But that’s what it’s going to take… I would do whatever I can for my country."

Trump has given people the permission to hate, to use violent language, and in some cases to use physical violence. He is making no effort to dampen down the anger. Indeed, in continues to encourage it. Civility is out the window. Rejection of the electoral process is now his main thrust. These are not good times for our democracy. But then again, demagogy never is.

Copyright © 2016 Dale Rominger