My sense of innocence erodes further each day our pseudo-President exists. The biggest shock was that he got elected in the first place. The day after that event, I hoped that he would take the office seriously. Alas, that lasted all of one day. Every day since then, I've had to confront more and more shock to my system.
I'm sure that there's a tipping point somewhere here. I don't think I'm the only one that is struggling with this. Where is that tipping point and how will it manifest itself? Will we see a move from the members of Congress to take his head symbolically via impeachment? Will we see mass defections from his Republican party to the point of it being ineffective? Will we see outright insurrection in our country?
I can only hope.
The latest display of ineptitude is his utterance regarding the immigrants from certain countries. Specifically, during an Oval Office meeting on immigration Thursday, January 11th, Trump expressed frustration with people coming to the United States from "shithole countries." (I can't believe that I wrote that phrase--disgusting) He slandered African countries and Haiti. But, that wasn't enough--he wants more people to come from Norway.
There has been a lot of back pedaling since then, of course. Nevertheless, several sources have stated that he said the unfortunate phrase. There was silence on the part of Washington at first, then the pseudo-President tweeted that he did not say such a thing. Of course, he's going to do that. He just got caught being the racist-in-chief.
The basic naked truth is that we have lost our moral willpower to fight this. It is wilting in the face of an inscrutable person that defies logic and understanding. Instead, we retreat into our comfortable homes, turn off our sources of news, and cocoon into an endless binge participation of entertainment. I can't say how many times I have heard otherwise normal people tell me that they do not watch the news or allow it to populate their feeds in social media. This is how a descent into democratic hell begins: with a conscripted and permitted neglect of information.
Without information, people won't understand how to fight to keep democracy alive. They'll think that they can't do anything about it. They'll think that the police will protect them (ask people of color about this). Worse, they'll think that their government has their interests in mind. All of this is lost when people don't pay attention. It's a benign form of the rapture where they think turning their attention elsewhere will help them live through this and be chosen to be alive after it. At the same time, they can't take their eyes away from it.
It's not unlike a dumpster fire. A dumpster has all kinds of garbage in it. You don't know what's in it, but it accumulates over time. You're fascinated by it, and you're afraid to search through it. At some point, you need the dumpster to be empty so that you can throw more garbage into it. The dumpster can be taken away and then come back empty. Or, you can take things into your own hands. That's when a fire can be lit. Keep in mind that the dumpster is sometimes full of garbage.
Dumpster fires can be symbols of social unrest. Fire in garbage cans and dumpsters have been powerful images of protests and revolutions. This is a universal symbol throughout the world. Fire in a can alarms people when it is not being used to warm them.
And so it is with this president. Can we continue to let him normalize this otherness? Face it, this is a #dumpsterfire in the making.
In our travels, we saw this t-shirt worn by an American in Cuba. We join him in asking the rest of the world to accept our apologies.