Yes we can, again (Part One.)

 And so tomorrow, as we take the campaign south and west as we learn that the struggles of the textile workers in Spartanburg are not so different than the plight of the dishwasher in Las Vegas, that the hopes of the little girl who goes to a crumbling school in Dillon are the same as the dreams of the boy who learns on the streets of L.A. we will remember that there is something happening in America; that we are not as divided as our politics suggests; that we are one people, we are one nation. And, together, we will begin the next great chapter in the American story, with three words that will ring from coast to coast, from sea to shining sea, Yes, we can. ~Barack Obama

I've got news for the Republican establishment. I've got news for the Democratic establishment. They can't stop us.

That was Bernie Sanders at some point yesterday.

The. Fuck?

I'm not going to lie, I'm about as sick of Bernie as I am of Trump, and so far as I know I'm not the only one. It doesn't help that I'm a one issue voter at this point...and that one issue is getting rid of Donald Trump and getting Republican assholes out of power.

Mostly, I'm sick of the entitlement, and I'm sick of this stupid idea that there are something something Gazpacho secret hordes of "Progressives" in places like Iowa and Wisconsin just waiting to vote for this guy.

And that's a bunch of crap. I literally know one rabid Bernie fanatic. To my knowledge, he doesn't vote.

Yes, a hell of a lot of (white) people seem to like Bernie, but just as many people (in general, in more demographics) don't. Lots of Black and Brown people do not like Bernie, and while he seems to resonate with a small sliver of the Republican electorate...most of those people fall into two camps; They're either Never Trump and thus provisionally on our side anyway...or they're "burn it all down" upset-the-apple-cart, we just want to have a revolution types who ought not to be listened to anyway.

And then Bernie, or somebody who's running his Twitter account, Tweets this silly bullshit?

Let me tell you why that's a bad idea; It's a bad idea because the other side's silly bullshit is "Should Black people have rights?" or "Should our global economy and modern society exist?"

That's what Trump is saying when he's saying that Gone With The Wind, which came out in 1939, should still be winning Oscars in 2020. In 1939, Isolationism and Segregation were ideas that were alive and well in the United States of America, although at least for some (mostly white) people, Democratic Socialism was very much a thing. Abroad, fascism was also on the march, and even here in America, Nazi rallies filled Madison Square Garden. Yet also, at the same time, Communist Party USA was very much at the apex of its existence...though it'd soon be kneecapped by the Soviets themselves by changing priorities when the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact was signed...something even the Soviets at the time admitted would likely only buy them a few more months to prepare against the German war machine...months that, as history would have it, they didn't take advantage of because Stalin "had faith" in Hitler's word.

Remind you of Putin and Trump? It does me.

The more things change, the more they stay the same, I guess.

Ya know I've been studying this period of history, along with the Civil War, since I could study things...and the war that started that September, two and a half months before Gone With The Wind was even released...was pretty goddamned bad for a lot of people, and shattered the Eurocentric international order that had existed before.

What Trump is saying, is that he wants to go back to the way things were when he wasn't even born yet. What Trump is saying, is that he wants to go back to a time when Black people could only be in movies as servants, and then they often weren't allowed to attend the premieres of films they were in.

And the drooling mob, most of which has never actually seen Gone With The Wind, roars its approval. Hell, I'm 46 and I've never seen the whole thing and I never cared to. Outside of "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn" I'd be hard-pressed to quote anything from it.

This is the kind of backward stupidity we're up against.

And for all this, Republicans effectively treat Trump as God.

Sovereign?

Unlimited grace?

I'm a bit confused here, whether Matt "Drunken Ambulance Chaser" Gaetz is referring to Trump as if he were Jesus Christ, or a king.

Neither is good, neither is what America is supposed to be about.

If you, whatever your politics, cannot see that America was not designed for this kind of crap and that it's dangerous no matter who does it, you're part of the damned problem.

The absolute truth is, fuck anybody who looks at their one group and says "you can't stop us." I don't give a fuck, your group is not as big as Trump's cult and that's all there fucking is to it. The absolute truth is that if we as a people want to take our country back from all these fanatics we have to stand together. Because if we don't, fuck Afghanistan, fuck Iraq, fuck Syria and fuck Ukraine, the next war Americans fight in is going to be right here in America and nobody in their goddamned right mind wants that shit. The problem, of course, is that there's too few people in their right mind in the first place.

I'll vote for Bernie or whoever, if I have to, because like I said I'm a one issue voter and that one issue is getting rid of Trump.

But I ain't gotta like this situation, and I don't.

We've reached the point where neither Barack Obama, nor John McCain, let alone Jimmy Carter or Ronald Reagan, could likely get elected on their own party's ticket...and I'm going to be honest, that scares the shit out of me, because I remember what I saw and what things were like in certain places 25 years ago and I've studied what happened 46 years before that, and I know what's next.

Imagine if you will, a second US Civil War, but with three factions, rather than two...the only people who will profit are the weapons manufacturers and the coffin-makers. That's where this mess is taking us.

It's got to stop.

It's a mess now, but it will only get worse if America keeps dividing itself into far-right and far-left camps and the center evaporates...and because there are a hell of a lot of people like me who'll vote Democrat no matter who they put up...oh yes, the center will evaporate. I'm a goddamned centrist former Republican. This Trump situation has already pushed me further "Left" than I ever imagined I'd be in this life...and part of that is simply because that's where the "decent person" line has moved to.

While we're at it, it might just pay to take a hard look at who's on the other side of that line, and for what reasons. Republicans have, functionally, broken the country...because they thought they would get money and power for doing so.

Whatever direction the Democratic party is moving in ideologically, they're all we've got to stop this mess. We gotta get Trump out, we can fix the rest later.

And that will take decades, which will also have to be spent dealing with armed idiots who will still be referencing Gone With The Wind like it's a good thing, in 2039. If you don't see that as a problem, or think we need to start trying to do something about it, I can't help you.

Bowing down is not an option, but neither is giving up your soul, and the more divided we are, the easier it is for the bad guys to win. We don't have to like it, but we do have to live with it.

We can do this, but we need to stop making things harder on ourselves.

With the destructive power of today's weapons, keeping the peace is not just a goal; it's a sacred obligation. But maintaining peace requires more than sincerity and idealism—more than optimism and good will. As you know well, peace is a product of hard, strenuous labor by those dedicated to its preservation. It requires realism, not wishful thinking. ~Ronald Reagan

Part 2.