I had a dream last night.
I dreamed I woke up on President’s Day and everywhere I looked I was seeing news stories about “President Donald J. Trump Day.”
Everyone had the day off work but was required to gather in the streets, go to their knees and bow to gigantic images of His Royal President.
I woke up, of course, to just another Monday which most folks have off from work in honor of, I guess, all presidents including the orange-headed madman.
I am old. Old enough to remember when we had two birthdays to celebrate – George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. That was it. One president helped give birth to our nation and the other saved it. Nobody had off work as I recall. In school we’d usually spend some learning about George and Abe.
In 1971 the two were merged into President’s Day. It really didn’t have much to do with honoring the two presidents. It had a lot to do with the move to put all big holidays on Mondays so everyone could have a three-day weekend and do more shopping and recreating. Somewhere in the background I suppose there was some talk about the two men but probably not much.
Today I don’t plan on paying much attention to President’s Day other than to look back at the presidents we thought fell short of the mark, who had scandals and think they all look pretty good compared to what we have now.
What we have now is a certifiably mentally unbalanced man-child who over his life has shown he is a pathological liar, narcissistic bigot and crooked businessman. Today he’s most likely entering dementia and turning over day-to-day management of our lives to the some of the worst, most incompetent disgusting toadies who ever have walked through the door of the White House.
In the last few weeks, we’ve seen all manner of disgusting words and actions coming from his cadre of anti-American, anti-Democracy bullies. We’ve had storm troopers put on our streets to gun down citizens, beat hell out of them, kick in doors of houses and cars, blast ministers with pepper spray, separate children from families and basically treat the Constitution like a roll of toilet paper. We’ve seen a president try to put his name on everything and erect buildings ala Hitler, Stalin and North Korea. We’ve ditched science and welcomed back the measles and decided clean air isn’t really necessary for our survival.
If you saw Attorney General Pam Bondi testifying before Congress this past week you no doubt were drawn back to your elementary school playground. If you have listened to ICE leaders you realize we’ve crossed a line moving toward a police state.
I want to make it clear that I don’t agree with those who say “they are just like Hitler and the people around him.” I don’t agree because, in a chilling and evil way, those around Hitler were competent. Maybe it’s a blessing that those around Trump are stumblebums trying to show who can make the biggest mess out of a one-car funeral.
The scary thing is that despite this incompetence, these amoral creatures are having some success in dismantling our democracy, making us a pariah in the world and could end up getting us into shooting wars.
That’s why on this President’s Day I’m sitting by the fire having a whiskey before noon and praying to whatever gods inhabit the universe that we can have a free and fair election come November and take the first steps towards removing this boil from the ass of the nation.
In the meantime, use this day off, if you are still working, to go shop local stores, hang with friends, remember better times and hope they come again. Reality is that what Washington and Lincoln went through to earn their place in our memories was a lot worse than what we are facing today and they prevailed. – By Sterling Fields