This is my political post of the day. It is brought to you by the fellow who responded to a post on Rep. John Lewis by saying “Those who refuse to accept reality are welcome to leave.” The bad mood is brought to you by having to do a whole house repipe on top of a reroofing on top of having to replace a double wall stove on top of having to replace the struts on my wife’s car and all other such similar expenses.
To the Conservatives:
- I am sick and tired of being called a libtard.
- I am sick and tired of watching you count down until Trump’s inauguration.
- I am sick and tired of you calling our legitimately elected President names.
- I am sick and tired of you wanting to take health care away from people that really really need it just because you hate anything Obama has done.
- I am sick and tired of you wanting to shove your religion down my throat and enforce it on everyone else because you believe you are the arbiter of whether we go to heaven. Related to that, I’m tired of you believing in Christ so much you feel you need to hasten Armageddon.
- I am sick and tired of telling people to shut up simply because you don’t like what they are saying.
- I am sick and tired of you spreading false news just because it appeals to your biases. You can check your sources. Further, Snopes is a legitimate fact checker who cites their basis, so check their facts if you don’t believe them.
- I am sick and tired of you discounting our journalists. They may not be perfect, but they are the best we have.
- I am sick and tired of you wishing all liberals would die, or that all people from a particular minority group would be locked away.
To the Liberals:
- His name is Trump. Not Drumpf. Not “He who will not be named”. Not any of these silly names you make up. Didn’t Harry Potter teach you anything? You use the name of your opponent; not naming him gives him more power.
- He is President. If you claim to believe and support our constitution, you have to accept that. However misguided, the Electoral College voted for him. So don’t call him illegitimate or any other such nonsense. We have to accept that he is President.
- He is doing enough stupid things that you don’t need to go around spreading fake news. All of these stories of “oh that’s gotta hurt” and other fake news. Don’t spread them. Don’t be like the Conservatives were during the Obama administration. Here’s a simple test: Would you have wanted a story like that spread about Obama? If not: Don’t share.
- Act like an adult. Pure and simple. If you are behaving as childish as the other side did during Obama’s presidency, you’re only perpetuating the partisanship. You’re better than that.
- Protest like an adult. Do you want to go out and peacefully protest? Go for it. Do you want to write letters and petition Congress? I’m all for that. Call your congresscritters. Write letters. Protest and exercise your right to free (adult) speech while you have it.
- Insist that Congress behave towards President Trump as they did for President Obama. Just because the President is from the same party doesn’t mean he gets a “Get Out of Jail” card for himself or his nominees. Investigate, investigate, investigate (but only for legitimate crimes). Insist on ethics disclosures and no conflicts of interest. Insist on the absence of influence from foreign powers.
- Remember that President Trump has a very thin skin. When pressed by legitimate free speech and criticism, he will do something impulsive and stupid — impulsive and stupid enough to get Congress to investigate, and potentially impeach and remove him from office. President Obama was able to deal with the pressure from the haters. If Alec Baldwin can rile Trump, just imagine how he will deal with 4 years of pressure. This is why you must behave like adults. Childish taunts can be ignored, and responded to childishly. Adult legitimate criticism creates investigations.
Excellent points!
One thing that really makes me bristle is that “Not My President” crap. Signs, T-shirts, hashtags, etc.
If we are citizens of this country, he’s our President!
It especially rankles because during Obama’s presidency, it was the other side saying “Not My President.” It was unpatriotic and childish and unproductive then, and it is now.
As for Trump’s presidency, I don’t expect it will last more than a year or two before he bails out on his own or gets the boot from his own side (for whom he is becoming a real embarrassment and it’s only going to get worse). Then we get Pence. Out of the frying pan, into the fire. 🙁
Makes it all the more crucial that we be adults, be rational, use our brains, make plans and act on them. Also, start finding a decent candidate to go up against Pence in four years.
Thanks for the rant, from a longtime lurker, first time commenter, from LJ.
I agree. We need to ask ourselves, if the other side did this during Obama’s administration, would we like it? If no, we shouldn’t do it.
As for Pence: He’s an overly religious whack-job. But he’s also been a governor, knows how government works, and knows the constitution. I think he would at least understand more what he can and can’t do as President, and would be more temperate in his communication especially as it relates to foreign policy. That’s better than Trump.
At least with Trump, no matter how dire his promises, there’s the likelihood he’ll change his mind. Whatever group or individual he’s talking to, he’ll say what they want to hear. Nothing to do with what he actually plans to do, if anything at all.
But Pence is even more dire (imo) in what he wants and he’s actually competent. That’s why he scares me more.
We desperately need a decent candidate for the next election. I can’t even imagine who that might be. Can you? I’d love to know.
Thanks for the conversation.
I agree with everything you’ve said except that he is a legitimately elected president. It’s not that he was elected by the electoral college, it’s not that he was elected by gerrymandering, closing polling places, removing names from voter rolls and other political shenanigans. It’s that our intelligence agencies knew about the Russia connection and stonewalled and kept it from the American public, at the same time as announcing bogus reopening of an investigation that had found no actionable wrongdoing after over a year of intense digging, for the pure purpose of influencing the election. This is unprecedented and for me invalidates any results until all investigations into collusion with a hostile foreign country have been concluded. The inauguration should be postponed until we know whether he and his team were colluding with the Russians to win this election.
That could all be true, but according to the Constitution he was elected by the Electoral College. That makes him, despite all that, legitimate. The Constitution, unfortunately, has no provisions to address invalidating the election results due to this meddling — they expected the Electoral College to do their job. At this point, the only constitutional options are impeachment and removal from office, declaration by congress that he cannot fulfill the office, or his resignation. Remember, if we don’t follow the constitution, they won’t follow the constitution.