Pro-Trump insurgents on January 6th in front of the US Capitol (Photo: Tyler Merbler; Creative Commons)
By Larry J. Schweiger
Pittsburgh Current Columnist
info@pittsburghcurrent.com
The nightmare with an unknown sociopath who wants to be the dictator at the head of an attempted coup with right-wing insurgents ends on January 20th, if not before. Life won’t get any better until we’re all vaccinated and Joe Biden is sworn in. The pain of our losses will continue for a long time. Few would like to respond to the many failures we have seen in the past few months, but we can never forget those who suffer and the 357,000 who have died. We should not ignore the critical lessons learned from the four-year nightmare culminating in the hellish landscape of 2020 and those early days of 2021.
Long before the 2020 election, voters and lawmakers were warned by 37 psychiatrists and mental health experts who rated Trump’s mental health in a book, The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump. Warning in a salon interview after Trump’s maskless photo op, Dr. Bandy Lee stated, “Sociopathy is dangerous also because it actively wishes people to suffer and die out of other people’s envy of human characteristics.” It would be “no exaggeration to say that Trump takes pleasure in putting people in danger.”
Trump is a sociopath who fueled a deadly pandemic with a self-serving partisan difference. Although Trump was not responsible for creating the COVID-19 virus, its sociopathic misconduct allowed the virus to spread unhindered. Trump ridiculed mask wearers, criticized mandatory measures and repeatedly downplayed the health crisis. He ignored warnings of rising deaths. Trump’s actions killed many of the 350,000 Americans, far too many unnecessarily. He ignores the families mourning empty chairs at the dining room table and continues to claim the death toll is false news. He sabotaged the tests all the time and even called for the tests to be slowed down. Trump shifted COVID responsibility to governors to get the job done with little coordination or financial support. He even attacked governors who followed CDC guidelines and had a dangerous backlash.
Trump didn’t invest in federally funded testing or vaccination sites, and now we know that Trump’s Operation Warp Speed ended at state borders. It’s one thing to deliver vaccines and another to make sure they get into the arms of Americans. Instead of creating a coordinated national vaccination response, Trump took a hands-off approach all the time and was unable to coordinate with governors.
In a December 27thth Trump stated from his Florida golf resort: “Under my leadership, Project Warp Speed was a huge success. My administration and I developed a vaccine that was many years ahead of the wildest expectations, and we will soon be distributing this and other vaccines to millions of people. ” Project Warp Speed promised 20 million vaccinations by the end of 2020. Despite Trump claiming to have developed the vaccines, Trump’s actual adoption of the two approved vaccines was disorganized and alarmingly slow. Hardly a “huge hit” with only four million Americans receiving their first COVID-19 vaccine by December 31st. Worse, it is now clear that the Trump administration has failed to set up a local distribution and vaccination infrastructure or coordinate the final miles of distribution, and has apparently left it to others to find out.
There was a lack of clarity from the state and the federal government. Seniors on social security lists and Americans with comorbidities have no idea how or when or whether to get vaccinated or where to go. Even family doctors and other medical professionals are not in the information loop. With two other contagious variants of the virus spreading rapidly, it is time for state governments to step up and get their work done.
Trump pledged to do America Great Again, defeating the nation with his dishonest, self-glorifying, and dark tweet path. At his boisterous rallies, Trump repeatedly attacked the mass media, elected officials, Black Lives Matter and even the remaining patriots of the traditional Republican Party with venomous, non-presidential rhetoric. Trump attacks anyone who does not want to bow to his undemocratic demands.
Knowing his re-election was in trouble after botching the health and economic crisis, Trump was preemptively promoting conspiracy claims at his numerous maskless rallies. Following the election, Trump and his supporters initiated more than sixty unsubstantiated lawsuits denying the Department of Homeland Security’s findings. Attorney General William Barr, who willingly sabotaged the Mueller investigation, refused to lie about the 2020 election. Given the sixteen federal prosecutors tasked with investigating the elections, even Barr made it clear that there was no evidence of widespread irregularities.
In a sixty-two minute chatter, Trump demanded, “I need eleven thousand votes, give me a break.” Trump’s illegal demands and conspiracy theories were too much for Republican Brad Raffensperger, who warned Trump that people on social media “can say anything.” “Trump replied,” It’s not social media. It’s Trump media. “With death threats from Trumpsters, attacks from Trump media and dishonest tweets from Trump, Raffensperger recorded Trump’s foray to find out what was going on. House Democrats are calling for an FBI investigation to see if Trump broke the law. Cleta Mitchell, who was Trump’s attorney who answered the call, is now involved in some illegal activity and is separated from her law firm.
Trump undermined the constitution and called on Republicans to revolt in a coup d’état by baselessly protesting the results in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin to overthrow the overwhelming voice of Americans. Far too many Republicans base ambitions on democratic principles. The senators Rubio and Cruz are running for president in 2024. They played in a kabuki theater and manipulated and pretended to support Trump’s unsubstantiated claims. They have deceived Trumpsters and undermined millions of voters, and we should never forget that.
Pence eventually broke off with Trump while chairing the joint session of Congress, knowing that his duty under the Twelfth Amendment was explicit. the Vice President “should. . . open all certificates and the votes will then be counted. “In the end, Pence fulfilled his ministerial mandate and confirmed the election results. He headed Trump and called the National Guard. It was an ugly show that dangerously feeds the unstable in our country and engenders the violence that undermines the pillars of democracy.
At 6th In January, Trump set fire to the match when he called our democracy “bullshit” and promised to march to the Capitol with angry and unstable protesters. He used dangerous rhetoric to anger most radical supporters, including the Proud Boys, who fed Congressman Louie Gohmert’s apocalyptic call for a violent coup. I live near Trumpstern at gunpoint and know that pouring gasoline on a raging fire is never a good idea. Trump made everything we saw possible and he needs to be out there and held accountable.
Elections are important and every eligible voter must separate baseless conspiracies, myths and political weirdness from objective truth before voting. Before the 2016 election, any voter who paid attention knew that Trump was born into a privileged life after inheriting real estate in New York City. He had a documented record of bigotry and was documented on video as a misogynist. In his four-year re-election campaign, Trump fueled racism in order to address the worst instincts of ignorant racists. Long before the 2016 election, Trump showed a profound lack of empathy. Trump had a long history of scammers, Trump University students, and contractors. He claimed to be a successful businessman with extravagant wealth when the record revealed that he had filed for bankruptcies; He was a tax evader and a bone spur cheater. Let us never forget the consequences of electing a sociopathic president.
There are no limits when a sociopath lives in the White House. Trump has now spawned insurrection. Obsessed and vicious, Trump is a right-wing thug who has armed latent hatred against neighbors, liberals, and minority immigrants, even against his own vice president. While alienating Trumpsters friends, co-workers, and families, they have promoted and embraced savage conspiracies that Trump reinforced with his endless tweets. At 6th Trump attempted a fall in January. According to the Washington Post In a video posted after 4pm, Trump repeated, “The election was stolen,” and Trump spoke to members of the mob compassionately and lovingly, advising them to go home, adding, “We love you.” Trump did not respect the congressional process to resolve his complaints, he instigated a coup. It is time for Congress to do its duty and remove Trump to keep our nation safe.
President Joe Biden inherits the presidency while many in America suffer from a fast-spreading deadly virus, widespread food insecurity, and the right-wing Trumpsters coup. We have seen a sweeping attempt to overthrow free and fair elections by an angry autocratic loser.
We are in George Orwell’s world with the loss of objective truth. Misinformed or intentionally blind, Trump voters were implicated in the 2016 election failure and must own their role in our national nightmare. We must go beyond the pain and suffering by taking the lessons to heart. Then the House has to indict Trump and this time the Senate has to condemn.
Comments are closed.