The Biggest Threat to All of Us and Everything Is the GOP Way of Thinking and Acting

I must admit I enjoyed watching President Biden’s State of the Union Speech. Actually, it was one particular moment I most enjoyed, the one reported most in the media afterwards, when he went off script to respond to GOP jeers.

 

He had been talking about GOP plans to cut Social Security and Medicare. And I guess many GOP couldn’t stand their malignant plans being held up so publicly to their faces, so they screamed out “Liar.” It seems Biden expected such a response and had set them up so competently. When Marjorie Taylor Greene and others called him a liar, he responded by asking if their yells meant Social Security and Medicare were now off the chopping block, right? And they cheered. And Biden ad-libbed: “All right, we got unanimity!” The programs might now be safe, for this year.

 

Of course, the GOP did, in fact, plan to cut Social Security and Medicare, and almost all programs that protect the well-being and healthcare of most Americans. And they’ve been doing this for years. In 1935, almost all the GOP voted against the programs. The Reagan era GOP not only proposed big reductions in Social Security but eliminated thousands from the rolls who collected due to a disability, delayed and proposed cuts in COLAs.

 

Recently, GOP Senators John Thune and Mike Lee talked about slashing the programs. Senator Rick Scott famously proposed putting the two programs, along with Medicaid, on the chopping block every five years. Senator Ron Johnson increased it to every year.  Former President DJT proposed, in every year he was in office, to cut the programs. In 2017, the GOP attempted to cut or eliminate not only protections for those with pre-existing conditions, but the Affordable Care Act and Medicaid, all to pay for tax cuts that most benefit corporations and the wealthy, as in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.

 

And in the House, the GOP have recently weighed different ways to target the programs. Back in 2015, most of the GOP now in prominent positions voted to raise the retirement age to 70. Luckily, they failed. They consistently resisted efforts to make these social programs more solvent by the fairest and easiest manner ⎼ raising the payroll tax cap so rich Americans pay taxes on their whole income. They pay taxes now on wages only up to $145,000. Wages above that are untaxed. The Republican Study Committee instead plans to cut or eliminate benefits.

 

The GOP is now not simply the party of DJT. They are not, for the most part, simply a new fascist party, or a party of white Christian nationalists. They are not simply a party of racist, anti-Semitic, anti-Asian, anti-any gender other than male-dominance. Or the party of autocratic, oligarchic, plutocratic, kleptocracy. Or the party of narcissistic hate, greed, grievance, and ignorance. They include, simply, all of these, and continuously make use of all these forms of manipulation and profiteering from undermining others.

 

How else do we explain someone like George Santos, or a party that supported the actions of such a person until he became too toxic? Some Party officials knew about his lies even before the election. Many, including Speaker McCarthy, are working even now to keep him in Congress.

 

Santos is so lacking in a moral compass, and is under investigation for so many possible crimes, the news stories about him are almost unbelievable. He is being investigated for perpetuating fraud against his constituents and donors, fraud in Brazil in 2008, and stealing money from a GOFUNDME for the dying dog of a homeless veteran. He has been accused of sexual harassment by a volunteer in his office. Reliable reports say he lied about his mother being killed in the twin towers on 9/11, lied about his own name, education, ancestry, and history.

 

Or Marjorie Taylor Greene, who heckled President Biden during the state of the Union. According to Salon, she did this under orders of DJT. She already, according to USA Today and her own tweets, had “liked” calls for violence against Democrats, called school shootings fake, staged events, repeated theories that space lasers caused California wildfires, and of course the big lie, that DJT had won the election in 2020, which he didn’t; and that he didn’t initiate deadly events on Jan 6, 2021 to set himself up as a dictator, which he clearly did.

 

Or GOP Rep. Lauren Boebert who followed Biden’s speech the next day by praying for his death; this was not the first time she had done this. Or the sex trafficking and corruption of Matt Gaetz. So many examples.

 

The GOP are not capable of governing. They do want power, prestige, but don’t seem to care about getting the details right or solving the problems we face, or whether they might hurt anyone. They lie instead of studying the reality. They scream and threaten others as if they have a direct line to God and no need to cooperate with anyone who doesn’t agree totally with them. This is an unbelievably dangerous way to think and act.

 

And I am saying all this not because the efforts by many GOP are new; most Americans, I believe, already know what the GOP have done. We’ve been living with these GOP for years. And I am writing not just out of the sheer joy I felt seeing President Biden so dexterously deal with the sneers and jeers.

 

I write about this, so it doesn’t become old and normalized.

 

I write about this because the actions and way of thinking of many GOP constitute a threat beyond anything I ever wanted to let into my mind; a threat so unbelievable, I and others have trouble believing it’s true. But I can’t let myself be frightened into feeling helpless, or so angry I feel we’ve failed if we don’t better the situation immediately. Or give up hope. Or stop caring. Listening to Biden, remembering the last two election wins and the Jan. 6 Committee Hearings, I feel hope.

 

In a democracy of millions, holding the powerful responsible takes time. Seeing the results of our action takes time. We all constantly affect each other in ways subtle and profound. Just imagine the difference being in a room with someone filled with greed, hate, and lies compared to being with someone who acts kindly, compassionately, knowledgeably. So, supporting each other, in what we do, how we think and act, matters. Change creeps, until it erupts.

 

*This post was syndicated by The Good Men Project.

End the Shocks and Remove the Presidency of Hate: Hopefully, an Administration of Justice, Rationality and Democracy is Coming

I am almost disappointed in the impeachment. Almost. Although there is great hope⎼ ten GOP did vote to impeach DT and President-elect Joe Biden will (hopefully) be inaugurated next week. But DT is still in office, and 197 Republicans, all but 4 of the rest of the GOP in the House, voted against impeachment.

 

Despite being attacked by a mob intent on violence and vengeance against fellow Congress members, and intent on stopping the operation of the Congress to which they belonged, many GOP remained silent or even tried to deny or cover-up DT’s role in the violence.

 

Some claimed impeachment would make matters worse, totally ignoring the deleterious effect of the continued lies about stealing an election and the incitements to further violence by DT and other members of their own party.  A few, like Rep Matt Gaetz of Florida, tried to equate the Black Lives Matter protests and the Capitol assault, equate protests over the murder of African-Americans with a deadly attack on the government of the U. S.. The lies and racism supported by these GOP was an assault in itself.

 

Washington Post Columnist Greg Sargent wrote that the GOP claims that impeachment would further divide us is part of an attempt to obscure their guilt, and blame the violence not on the people, like DT, who fueled and directed it, but to a generalized divisiveness. It’s not a generalized anything, but one side, DT’s side, declaring civil war against everyone and anyone who opposes his efforts to steal power for himself.

 

Such statements by the GOP during the impeachment debate followed a week of lies, distortions, and blatant efforts to cover-up DT’s culpability. It began by trying to claim, crazy as it sounds now, that it was members of a non-existent group of Anti-fascists who assaulted the capitol dressed as DT’s supporters. It continued with the Department of Defense creating an official timeline for the public that expurgated all of the actions and incitements by the President and other GOP.

 

The January 6th Assault on the Capitol was the latest in a long line of deliberate shocks administered by the DT administration. The Assault on the Capitol⎼ it sounds like a movie title. From the beginning of his run for office until now, DT has done everything he could to attack democracy, the rule of law, our humanity, our trust in others, our lives, and our hope for the future.

 

He started back in 2015 with racist attacks on President Obama, falsely claiming that if he had lost the 2016 election, it was due to Democrats committing voter fraud, while simultaneously calling for Russia to interfere in the election. He continued to ignore or lie about the threat of COVID while thousands died daily. He made a phone call on 1/02 to threaten a public official into manufacturing votes for him, and later urged on an actual assault on the Capitol building and the Congresspeople meeting in that building.

 

This wasn’t the first time he called for violence. Last year, for example, his comments contributed to attacks on the Michigan statehouse and an attempted kidnapping of the Governor. And he continues to cite malignant, irresponsible falsehoods, deny that he badly lost an election, deny that the only large-scale fraud was committed by him, deny any culpability in violence. According to the Washington Post and other news media, intelligence agencies, Governors, at this moment Right-wing and White Nationalist groups are planning ongoing attacks and a possible disruption of the inauguration all based on the alternate reality DT created for his followers to preserve his power.

 

Is he deliberately trying to use the Shock Doctrine, using “the public’s disorientation following massive collective shocks” to force his way on the American public? Or is he simply shouting, tweeting who he is and spreading his diseased mind?

 

In an article called “What the Science of Addiction Tells Us About Trump,” the author, James Kimmel Jr. describes how the brain of someone who carries a long-term grievance or who desires revenge is like the brain of someone locked into an addiction. Harboring a grievance, defined as a perceived wrong or injustice, real or imagined, activates the same neural circuitry as taking a narcotic.

 

And this revenge addiction can be easily spread. In the case of DT, we have a politics of grievance meant to manipulate feelings of hurt and humiliation into an addiction to hate and a blindness towards the truth, just like a heroin addict might not see the reality of what the drug is doing to them. Kimmel says DT primes our brains for revenge. He is addicted to being aggrieved and blaming others.

 

Racism, sexism, anti-Semitism, and other forms of hate are not only attempting to hold onto power but are also addictions that undermine or destroy community. They make everyone feel threatened, not only those the hate is aimed at, but those who allow it and those who hold to it.

 

I don’t know if DT is deliberately applying increasing shocks to the citizens of this country (or the world) or it is just his malignant, addicted and demented sense of self-importance, but for the health and well-being of all of us, he must be removed from office and his agenda of hate ended. The assaults, and the lies and crimes that incited it, must be investigated and prosecuted not for revenge but to discourage further violence and place justice and the rights and well-being of “we the people” first.

 

We need an inauguration of hope. We need to do all we can to pressure more of the GOP to speak honestly about the election (and COVID), put democracy first, and treat the new Biden Administration as people⎼ if not as partners, then at least not as enemies. We need to pressure 17 GOP Senators to join with Democrats, to remember their oaths, and complete the impeachment.  To protect our voting system and prevent future DT’s. To protect us from the virus, rescue the economy from the super-rich, end institutional racism, and create a more democratic nation.

 

This post was syndicated by the Good Men Project.