by Roxanne Tellier
What doesn’t kill us doesn’t necessarily make us stronger. Sometimes it still kills us; it just takes a little longer to do so.
I’m hearing from way too many people, from all walks of life, that they’re feeling utterly exhausted and unable to stay awake, and yet, when they finally fall into bed, they’re not making it to a good and lasting sleep place. And they’re waking up still feeling a little beat up.
Biden won, 2020 took its best shot, but it’s nearly over. Why this enervation now?
It’s because we’ve got a kind of psychic hangover. This malaise is about a long-term, exhausting, mental struggle that left our brains feeling ‘broken.’
We’ve been gaslit. It’s been an adrenaline high for nearly five years, from 2015, when the madness began, to last week, when we thought that our brutal emotional marathon had finally come to an end. We’ve been jacked into the media, battered by every new atrocity that’s rained down on us, reeling like boxers as we try to first understand what’s happening, and then to protect ourselves from those who tried to tell us that it was all good, and it was we who were crazy and over-reacting.
And Biden’s win, so ferociously denied by trump and his supporters, a continuation of the complete denial of reality, means that we’re still not able to take a deep breath and relax. Turns out that our tormentors, like every ruthless predator in a horror film ever, are not going away without a sequel.
Trump is determined to hang on to his position, despite a decisive loss that is the exact mirroring of what he called a ‘landslide’ win, when he himself was on the receiving end of the same numbers, four years ago.
Then, President Obama was gracious to trump, despite wide-spread surprise over his election win, saying, “I want to emphasize to you, Mr. President-elect, that we now are going to want to do everything we can to help you succeed, because if you succeed, then the country succeeds.”
His main opponent in the 2016 election, Hillary Clinton, was gracious in defeat, calling him hours after the polls closed to congratulate him on his win, and then formally speaking to the nation the next day, from the Javits Center in New York, saying to her supporters,
“Our campaign was never about one person or even one election, it was about the country we love and about building an America that’s hopeful, inclusive and big-hearted.
“We have seen that our nation is more deeply divided than we thought. But I still believe in America and I always will. And if you do, then we must accept this result and then look to the future. Donald Trump is going to be our president. We owe him an open mind and the chance to lead.
“Our constitutional democracy enshrines the peaceful transfer of power and we don’t just respect that, we cherish it. It also enshrines other things; the rule of law, the principle that we are all equal in rights and dignity, freedom of worship and expression. We respect and cherish these values too and we must defend them.”
But trump doesn’t care about any of that. He doesn’t care about democracy, the rule of law, or that the nation has spoken; he is utterly classless. He won’t concede.
He’s refused to give the green light to the head of the Government Services Administration to acknowledge Biden’s win, and to release the necessary resources to help the new admin hit the ground running on January 20,2021. And that’s impeding President-elect Joe Biden, the man who actually CAN help the nation, from receiving daily security briefs on all the major security issues, along with all of the most up-to-date information on where the country stands on COVID-19.
In truth, the President, like any other citizen, has the right to petition the court. But he doesn’t have the right to hold up the formal transition process for Biden’s succession while he does so. He can’t ‘bookmark’ certain states, claiming them for himself, no matter how many ‘herebys’ he appends to his tweets. The world has already moved on with or without his approval.
He can kick and scream and call himself, ‘your favorite president,’ but in fact, he has now lost the popular vote twice. TWICE. Does he really want to go for a triple? Settle for being out on two strikes, bud.
It’s also become very apparent that a lot of his high-handed decisions, that seemed to be purpose-made to upset groups of people, to bring out those ‘liberal tears,’ or to punish those from whom he failed to receive enough grovelling loyalty, have backfired ‘bigly’ on him.
Trump’s belief that a calling to public service, or the military, was for ‘losers and suckers’ appeared to work against him when General Mark Milley, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said last week, “We take an oath to the constitution, not an individual. We do not take an oath to a king, queen or dictator.”
And the conventional belief that veterans and the military were largely conservative, and had a tendency to lean Republican, was proven very wrong, with an estimated 60% of those ballots choosing Biden instead. Amongst the reasons given for their choices, it seems that the main bone of contention was his selling out of the Kurds, a major ally for American fighting troops for more than 17 years.
The vaunted Million Maga March, meant to protest what he wants to be known as a ‘stolen election,’ fizzled out at a couple of thousand diehards, who showed up in classic clown gear. President ‘Law and Order’ did a drive by on his way to playing golf, giving blanket approval to his followers’ anger and their potential for armed violence. Geez, if only the motorcade had run someone over; it would have been the perfect metaphor for the trump presidency.
Trump’s crack legal team (!!) has had two weeks to find even the tiniest bit of evidence for any election fraud, and have failed. 19 out of the 20 court cases they have brought forward have been dismissed, failing spectacularly, with one judge going so far as to chide the lawyers for providing ‘inadmissible hearsay within hearsay,’ and further rebuking the campaign for failing to include required documentation.
Larry Wilmore on Voter Fraud in the 2020 Election
Off on the horizon, the spectre of ‘faithless electors’ staggering towards the Electoral College like so many Walking Dead extras has been pretty much debunked as being unlikely, and in some cases, blatantly illegal. So, at this point, the only way ‘faithless’ electors’ could be in play would be in the case of an outright, unlawful, coup. Is that possible? Anything is possible. But, again – highly unlikely.
If, during this period, trump was frantically trying to help American citizens by encouraging Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to take up any of the bills brought to the Senate by the House for the nation’s good, including a coronavirus relief package, he might be thought of as genuinely believing that ‘only he could save the country.’
But instead, all he’s done is golf, whine, doomscroll, throw tantrums, and vomit up bitchy complaints and smears on Twitter.
It’s not that he wants the presidential gig; it’s that he doesn’t want anyone else to have it either. And he sure doesn’t want to finally have to answer for all the crimes and corruption he avoided being accountable for, by dint of being a ‘sitting president.’
Even though most people like a good mystery, satisfaction only happens when all of the loose ends are finally tied up, and the bad guy is caught and made to pay for his sins. It’s maddening when that doesn’t happen. It’s exhausting.
Everything about the trump campaign, from 2015 to now, is like a cheap horror film where the monsters are never vanquished. They just keep coming, despite having been shot, stabbed, speared, and set on fire. It’s like we’re in season 125 of the Walking Dead – when will they finally lay down and decompose?
Round and round and round we go. Time for everyone to get off the trump roller coaster. All trump’s really proven to the world is that even the best carnival ride can make you nauseous if it doesn’t eventually come to an end.
frustratedboomers 