Thursday, November 10, 2016

Love Trumps hate, but only when they don’t love Trump’s hate

The world is unified in shock and sadness. As astonishment and disappointment transitions to fear as we comprehend how intertwined nature of our success and failure is with that of our American counterparts. There is no point going into the character flaws of the man, the president elect. The American media illustrated the character of the man in the lead up to the election in a ‘gloves-off’ appraisal. There will be no, “OMG WTF, we didn’t know!” crying out from the trailer parks along route 66. The question is, why did the unwashed masses elect this popular sovereign? Economic factors have impacted middle class manufacturing America, shifting the ground and pushing the content middle classes down. A healthcare system that considers finance before need violates basic human rights and will in my mind foster an anti-establishment sentiment and a feeling of insecurity, either consciously or subconsciously. The winning campaign was underpinned by the notion that if elected, ‘I am going to drain the swamp in Washington’ referring to removing the corruption. That people voted for Trump, despite his enormous deficiencies, indicates that the disgruntled ‘have-not’ camp has become the majority.

Vox populi, vox dei - latin for ‘The voice of the people is the voice of God.’ The US election result shows the masses did not have a voice or feel they had the ability to affect change in the democracy. A ridiculous man now controls the fate of millions. His election ran on a platform of division; rife with nationalist and racist rhetoric - rhetoric which contradicts the notions of liberty and justice for all. The pillars of the constitution groan under change and control in the new regime. How did the majority become so disgruntled, disenfranchised, so excluded from opportunity that they burnt it all down? This was a massive donkey vote and now we have an ass elect. Every upper-middle American with an investment property, private health insurance, and two cars needs to look at who has no car and fears their child getting sick.

The land of the free and the home of the brave could now become the land minorities flee, where freedom is enslaved. Racism from the highest elected office can only provide a leg up for for the nationalists, supremacists, and the harbourers of hatred. On day 1 on Trump’s presidency his website page calling for a ban on Muslim immigration to America was taken down, possibly heralding a shift from the extremes. Lincoln’s conception of America as ‘a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal,’ is now more relevant than ever. These words are the bedrock upon which the American dream is build. This notion is woven deeply into the fabric of a diverse nation; this is the joker card that cannot be trumped. I for one am going to get Thai food, sit on the couch in my underpants, and watch Rome burn. No, no, no, that simply won’t do. In the spirit of - the glass is half full, mostly backwash, but half full none the less - we must band together. We must be the change we want to see in the world. The day of the benign passive liberal with a social conscience are numbered. When those that oppose equality and decency are in power, the humanitarian in us must rise, the martin Luther King, the Nelson Mandala, the Gandhi within us all must rise up and actively make the world our own. Hard times demand great leaders to rise; we must all call out injustice, open our hearts and homes, sacrifice for what we believe.

Love trumps hate is not a sign you wave on Election Day, it is a manifesto, a mandate, a call to action for the morally responsible. Good luck America. I leave you with the Gettysburg Address. If ever there was a time to ponder the sacrifice made on the altar of freedom, it is now.

Abraham Lincoln, November 19, 1863:
‘Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
Abraham Lincoln