I feel like I should be writing about the New Year here, and yet I am hung up on what is happening in our country right now. So I will ask the questions that are heavy on my heart right now. What is going on? When did we become a country of people so intent on cheating and doing things their way? How did we get to this point where so many people are in the “I got mine, screw you” category? How did we get to this point where people don’t care about other people?
My heart hurts. We have become a nation of people who seem to be willing to do anything and everything that will be good for the people at the top. And there are many people who are willing to do that without realizing what it is doing to themselves. We seem to have a huge batch of people who will do anything to enrich themselves, and another huge batch of people who they have convinced to support them despite what it will do to them.
We have a president – elect who has been outrageous in what he has said. And we have a bunch of his supporters who think they know that he didn’t really mean it. So he said he would lock up his opponent, kill the ACA, and he has said that it is okay to grab women by the p&*$#^ if you are rich and famous enough, he has had many women come forward and say that is exactly what he did. And yet, his supporters say he didn’t mean it, and he won’t do it. He said he will get rid of the ACA and millions of people, including many of his supporters, will no longer have health insurance, but many of his supporters say that he won’t do that. So tell me, is it worse if he said it and doesn’t do it, or worse if he said it and does manage to do it?
He doesn’t pay for work he has contracted for, he hires non-citizens at low wages, and then pays them nickels on the dollar, he is supported by the KKK, he is a bigot and a misogynist, and all of that is okay with a whole lot of people in this country. He refuses daily intelligence briefings because he says he is a smart guy. He refuses to believe that Russia has been hacking us and affected the election. (Please note that I did not say that he wouldn’t have won if it weren’t for that – I don’t know.) And now he claims to have a mandate and claims to have a huge electoral college win. He did not win the popular vote by a pretty large margin, and he may win the electoral college, but it will not be by a large margin – except in his head.
I have news for all those people out there who think that if they say something enough times and loud enough then it is true. Nope – it’s not. I know this seems to be turning into a fact-free world, but just because you believe it doesn’t make it so.
And then there is North Carolina, where the Republican legislature thinks it is okay to strip power from the incoming Democratic governor that the outgoing Republican governor had. And they think it is okay to do that. Surely there must be some Republicans in North Carolina who still have a shred of decency in them. This is so beyond the pale that I am flabbergasted. This sounds like something 5-year-olds would attempt on the playground. I am truly shocked and appalled.
I guess I am getting old, but I do remember a day when the people who were elected to govern our country paid attention to what was good for the people and the country, and not just to what would line their own pockets and serve their own interests.
I have heard many people complain that we legislate too many things that should be common sense. Well – here, I guess, is one reason that we do that. I never knew that it was not a law that every incoming president put their assets into a blind trust so that there would be no conflict of interest, and no appearance of a conflict of interest. Apparently every president that we have had has been decent enough to do this on their own, without being required to. Â Now we have a president-elect who is not decent enough to do this on his own (at least not yet). So I think one of the first things Congress should do is to make this a law, so that we as a country are not faced with this again.
And perhaps North Carolina, as soon as it gets a legislature with some brains, should put something into effect that does not allow the ridiculousness that is happening there now to happen again in the future.
Maybe we do have too many laws, but when you have a populace where a large portion of people have no shame, I guess you have to have a lot of laws. None of this stuff should be a party vs. party thing – it should be a “what is the best for the country” thing. It is important to remember this: what hurts one, hurts us all.
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