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Debra Spark is a Maine novelist.
Whatever you believe about the issues that divide us, I am assuming you do not believe in murder, that you are not a fan of the KKK and that you do not want to live in an America where dissent is treated as it is in Russia and China. I am assuming that you don’t want a handful of people to have all the power and money in this country while you and your family and neighbors suffer.
According to recent polls, the federal government is deeply unpopular, but not so unpopular that everyone in the country is against the president, though the majority are against him. What will the polls look like after the absolutely repulsive social media post, in which President Donald Trump depicted former President Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle Obama, as apes?
Because right now, there is nothing unclear about what is going on, and I don’t believe you can support this president (who I think is our Adolf Hitler) and this Republican Congress (who I see as equivalent to Nazi collaborators) and be on the right side of: God (if you believe in him); history (I pray we will have our Nuremberg trial equivalent, and there will be justice for the people who have been murdered and unlawfully imprisoned and attacked); or human decency.
I think Trump’s approval rating should be zero. And the fact that it isn’t makes me despair of this country.
Everyone should be screaming at the top of their voices right now, and the people who should be making the most noise are the people who brought us to this horrific moment: the Republican Congress and the U.S. Supreme Court, and the voters who put Trump and his cronies (who don’t believe in science or knowledge, just their own hate) in power.
And the people who have a special obligation to speak up are the ones who can most safely resist. By which I mean, those in power. Specifically, everyone who runs a business or an educational institution or a law firm or leads a congregation, etc. There’s been a lot of trying to play it safe to stay out of Trump’s crosshairs, but right now, it should be a point of pride to be in Trump’s crosshairs.
Minnesotans might be suffering right now, but we can all see that they care for each other, and are trying to protect each other, that they are risking themselves in the way certain Europeans risked helping Jewish people during World War II and certain Americans risked helping slaves before the Civil War. And, as we see, some are dying for their efforts.
And by the way, for those of you wondering if we will have a free and fair election this November, there’s growing evidence we won’t, if Trump has his way. And what about
Trump launching a nuclear attack on another nation? I think he is as unhinged and criminal as they come, so why wouldn’t he?
Have you no sense of decency, sir? That’s a question famously asked of Sen. Joseph McCarthy. It’s the question I want to ask everyone who I believe is on the wrong side of the polls. And I don’t want to believe 40% of the people in this country aren’t decent.
“I still believe, in spite of everything, that people are really good at heart.”
Of course, that’s Anne Frank I am quoting.
