The word “incredible” is seriously over-worked, but it fits here: America’s response to recent events in Washington, DC is truly incredible.
“What,” you ask, “is happening in DC?”
How about, for the first time in American history, a serious attempt at a coup d’etat, that is, the overthrow of a duly-elected president? The incredible? Our general attitude about it. Our hair ought to be on fire, but we’re glued to “Cupcake Wars,” either metaphorically or actually.
(1) I am not sure a single anchor on a major television company, excepting Fox, would not be elated if such a coup occurred. And joyously report as news whatever aids and abets such an act, regardless of a total lack of accuracy or pertinence of their charges against the president.
(2) A “special counsel” with immense resources and illimitable time is desperately attempting to find cause to unseat the president. Period. There is no reason to believe they will ever forsake their goal, even if, as currently, not a scintilla of evidence of anything akin to “high crimes and misdemeanors” on the part of the president exists.
(3) Key members of the FBI and Justice Department (heretofore the envy of the world!) have admitted their desire, and actual attempts, to remove the president from office, going so far as to seek out any of the president’s staffers who might help them depose him, confessing a plot to wear wires to catch him out. And casually reporting their efforts to giddy major television interviewers, while getting richer by writing self-adulatory books for their crimes. A dozen of them—and their acolytes—should be in orange jump-suits. No, this is not about a banana republic; this is about the greatest nation that ever existed on earth. And we sit unabashed.
(4) Before the president was actually installed, there were—and continue to be—howls from members of Congress for his impeachment, and it is openly discussed throughout the media/political realm as a real possibility. (Another openly-discussed subject: must the military get involved?)
(5) Etc., ad infinitum!
This is no call for the beatification of our current president; it is to state the facts. Listen up: a coup of an American president! How is that not incredible? Why are not Americans, of every stripe, marching in the streets, screaming by every means possible that this is a violation of the very first foundational principle of American political philosophy and practice—the right of Americans by means of the ballot box to determine the shape and practice—and leaders— of our political process?
In a secularized society, as America certainly is, the right to vote is, to use theological language, sacrosanct, the cardinal virtue. It is at the very apex of American societal practice. And extremely rare on the planet. But we are so far down the road—can you bear to hear it?—that a visceral and cerebral (I admit, with low-powered batteries) hatred for America dominates the seats of power in the country. The proof? Ponder this: he who believes non-Americans should have the right to vote in our elections hates America. What is it but idiocy for census-takers to be disallowed to ask if a resident is actually an American? Further: he who does not accept the absolute necessity of secure borders hates America. How in the name of common logic does either position make sense? You’re reading this and wondering, “Why, in the name of God, are such subjects even up for discussion?” That’s because you’re rational. Rationality, alas, is a foreign country to the America-haters on the left. Think AOC!
Are any serious prosecutions in the works against the coup d’etaters? Surely you jest. Hatred for America in high places is incurably toxic, but very chic. Being otherwise makes it much more difficult to get to DC. Or to stay there.
Bill Anderson
Grapevine, Texas