#Götterdämmerung is here.
Welcome to the End of the World as We Know it
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!” Nothing beside remains: round the decay. Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare, The lone and level sands stretch far away. So, your first line is part of the words engraved on a pedestal, boasting about the great works of the king Ozymandias. — Percy Bysshe Shelley
The banner you see on the top of my page was placed on the top of my Facebook page 14 hours before the final day of the election began. You see, I don’t trust any system where money is involved and can influence its management.
America has taught me well. Rich people cheat. It’s what they do.
Donald Trump’s pending victory has only reinforced what I already knew. Despite the polling, the prognostication by famous political pundits and systems which assured us Hillary Clinton would be president, I was already aware of the outcome.
What is the outcome which hurts the most people, reverts the most privileges, causes the greatest harm to the greatest number, undermines the opportunities for people of color, minorities, the LGBTQIA communities, and ensures that for another thirty years, laws will favor those with money, power and influence?
President Trump.
If that didn’t send a chill down your spine, you died ten minutes ago. Or perhaps you’ve been brain-dead for decades.
In case this is news to anyone: America is a nation of hidden bigots. Please stop clutching your non-existent pearls and acting surprised. His pending victory ratifies this statement better than anything I could possibly write to demonstrate it. White women choose racial politics (an unspoken acceptance of White Supremacy) over gender politics when the rubber hit the road. They bought into the idea of subjugating the Other rather than trying to promote a candidate who had their gender identity issues.
This is a nation of monsters. A nation of people so afraid of the future, they would harm their neighbors and murder their brothers to maintain control of society just a little bit longer. Exaggeration? Hyperbole?
Hardly. When all is said and done, we are all brothers. We are all part of the same human family, descended from the same tiny tribe of survivors which left the African sub-continent, fifty thousand years ago. But in the next few years, unless we are very lucky, we will be a world at war with itself.
We tell our children to be kind. Not to bully. To work hard. To study to plan ahead. To consider their fellows. Do the right thing and life will work out for you. The world will be your oyster.
Don’t believe that shit. Not for one more minute. Donald Trump is a bully. A bigot. A racist. A misogynist. A race-baiter. Did I mention he’s suspected of more than one count of sexual assault? He’s a manipulative sack of quivering flesh which has never done an honest days work in his life that didn’t require fucking over some person who he just met and had no intention of paying for their services. Just because.
He has presented you with a dilemma. How will you tell your kids about the terrible things which will be revealed in the coming months? It won’t stop his presidency (unless he gets put in jail) in which case, we get his evil political clone, Mr. Pence, who isn’t better, in any way.
Your children will learn the lessons of their president. Lie. Cheat. Steal. Abuse. Malign. Torment. Because that is what he did to get the job. Don’t think he won’t continue to do those things to keep it. He’s even said as much.
Trump has pointed out the true nature of the American party line. Tell people whatever it takes to get what you want. If you have to lie, so be it. Hurt people? It happens. Drop a nuke? What else are they for?
The newscaster are so cute saying: The GOP will keep Trump in line. Whatever. You mean like they did during his road to election? Not a chance. Trump has been incredibly poorly behaved up to this point. Expect it to continue or even increase.
Trump’s election is a White-lash. A response to a Black presidency. Yes, I said it. A president unmarred by scandal, a president who has maintained poise and dignity despite being treated in a manner unbefitting the most humble of lepers during the time of ancient Rome.
Trump’s presidency is an event precipitated by racism, an event caused by the fear of White conservatives who fear losing their power over the money, the media, and the future of this nation. A group of select power-mongers who reserve the right to alter the economic destiny of anyone they don’t approve of, to take the rights of those they deem lesser. By catering to the White Nationalists Trump stoked their fears and produced the inevitable result.
###Not afraid? To quote a tiny green Jedi: “You will be.”
White nationalists emboldened by Trump’s victory will look at this as a reason to celebrate, to arm themselves, to “protect” their neighborhoods, to handle the Muslim “menace” themselves. To let their “hate flag” fly.
The pending president has lied more than any other candidate in living history. He has failed more people today than he could have ever helped. His racist, sexist, misogynistic, discriminatory nature has been on public display since the elections begin and rather than experiencing the censure any sane civilization would have done, he has been enabled, nay emboldened to act with even less restraint, with even less control.
What’s at risk? Everything. Roe vs. Wade is on the chopping block. Gay rights? You enjoyed those gay marriages? Well, kiss them goodbye. Voting rights? You will never see them again in your lifetime. While Jim Crow won’t make an official return, I expect to see race-related crime and attacks against minorities skyrocket in the coming weeks and months ahead.
--From Trump’s First 100 DaysHow can you expect him to protect women’s rights to be free of sexual assault when he is currently pending a trial on this very subject?
We have given the monkey the nuclear launch codes and he just can’t wait to have an opportunity to press the button. Our enemies rejoice, cheering a nation whose capacity for reason has obviously failed us in every way. Russia readies its troops for war. NATO is surely going to go on standby. China, while not an active enemy is surely considering at this very moment, what part of the world they will try and claim when the US and Russia go to war.
Will it be a nuclear war? Why not? We have nuclear weapons, right? That’s what they’re for, or so he said.
Are you people unaware of the danger you have unleashed upon the world? Are you aware of the lack of personal self-restraint this man has exhibited during his career as a pompous, spoiled, man-child born to wealth, unfamiliar with hardship, unable to exercise even the dignity of his station?
He has with the threat of his presidency, unleashed a cataclysm across the world. Stock markets are already plummeting across the planet with the fear of a man who has no self-restraint, no skill in diplomacy and a penchant for threatening anyone who gets between him and what he wants. Stock markets are being frozen, in the same way a natural disaster might cause a responsible government to enact controls to mitigate damage.
But its clear we don’t have a responsible government and it will grow less responsible with every passing second. We will have a Republican president and a mostly Republican Congress. A Congress which will likely take its capacity for failure from the last three sessions of Congress, the 112th, 113th and 114th, arguably the least effective Congresses in the history of the nation. Passing less effective legislation than any Congress before it.
A group which has for the last eight years, done all but throw Americans under the proverbial bus in terms of healthcare, spending millions attempting to repeal the Affordable Care Act instead of working toward making healthcare an affordable right in this nation. They continued their failure parade in terms of economic efforts to better the future of their constituency; successful only in terms of their unprecedented obstructionism, literally never seen before in the history of these United States.
###And I bet you are all so pleased with yourselves.
You Millennials who decided you couldn’t trust Hillary. You third party candidate worshipers who thought your vote would be better spent with an anti-vaxxing nutjob or a libertarian parasite. Enjoy those student loans, because you will most assuredly be paying them now. And you will pay them with the most interest the law will allow. (Until they make new laws to raise the profit margin in the name of big business.)
I bet you also thought you were improving your working opportunities. Alas, countries without money, don’t hire people. Ask the people who lived through the 1929 Stock Market crash and the Great Depression which followed it. Curiously they had a Republican president and Congress as well. During a Depression, there’s not much need for an overpriced degree unless you run out of toilet paper.
But don’t worry, at 18% interest it will grow faster than any pension you might have had, assuming you could get a job in the first place. And you older people who thought Trump cared about you, say goodbye to those pensions and anything else you wrapped up in the stock market. I see stock prices plummeting…
Oh and you rednecks: Yes, I am talking about you people who thought “Make America Great” meant you might get to see separate bathrooms for Whites and Colored and whoever else might get between you and your white privilege.
Trump doesn’t give a fuck about you. Neither does Pence. Not your guns, your survival bunkers, your M-rats, your militia groups, or your hate agendas. All he cared about was your votes. On a good day, you will be allowed to roam free, a tool of a system designed to keep you in your place, just above the minorities you despise but have NEVER actually met.
But don’t despair. There won’t be any work for you either. But since you are accustomed to eating squirrels and roadkill everything is going to work out fine, until all the squirrels are gone.
###Yes, the sun will come up tomorrow.
Yes, Trump won’t take the office for another few months, but emboldened bigots might not wait to start their harvest. There are so many Black churches, and Muslim mosques that need burning.
Minorities will most certainly be at greater risk than they have since the 1950s. Will there be more unexplained murders of innocent citizens? You betcha. Police who hate, will take the ascent of Trump, as a certification of their ability to do whatever it takes to keep the peace. Just a hour from when this article was posted, this graffiti made the world a better place.
Goodbye Roe vs. Wade. Women who could have ended this farce instead will be carrying children to term. Again and again. Because you see, Trump will be appointing conservative judges, at least two of them, possibly three (they are getting old) and with a Conservative Congress, they will go through. So if you were comfortable with having abortion rights, kiss them goodbye. Hail our Christian Soldiers!
How about regulation on predatory industries like banking? Nope, not going to have any of those either. Assuming banks are still here in three months, Dodd-Frank or any other significant regulatory protections aren’t likely to see the light of day for the next fifty years. Expect your banks to raise their fees, continue their predation and collaboration with criminal enterprises, money laundering and the like. Remember Wells Fargo’s recent exploits making bank accounts for their customers to boost their numbers? Yeah. I bet you do.
Gay rights? Bye-bye. Gay marriage? See ya. Clean air? It’s over-rated. Who needs it? The Environmental Protection Agency is a scam, right Herr Donald? No one needs them poking their noses into our new energy policies which says: If you can burn it, use it.
Clean coal? Don’t have to worry about it now. Just get whatever coal you can. Oil pipelines? Screw the Native Americans. Drop them everywhere. Who needs water anyway? Oh, wait. That’s already happening. Renewable energy? Get the fuck outta here. We have oil companies who need greater profits.
Did I mention his draconian perspective on immigration? I expect to see families disrupted, refugees returned to their countries of devastation (which I expect to continue in light of the perpetual war policies being drooled over right now by Mr. Pence and Mr. Trump.) People disenfranchised by our perpetual wars will show up on someone else’s doorsteps, at least until our war reaches them next…
###The Fourth Estate
You media fuckers who couldn’t get it right to save your lives, welcome to your worst nightmare. Because you think you have managed to somehow come out on top by not doing your jobs when you had the chance.
You couldn’t be bothered by facts. You happened to just let Trump slide, just this one time, 500 times later. You knew he was not a suitable candidate. Did any of you hold his feet to the fire? Did any of you find his tax returns to reveal whether he is as good a business man as he thinks or is he just a failure in wolf’s clothing. No. You sat there arguing with him like a child, rather than being the only force enabled by the Constitution to protect the people’s access to accurate information.
The Fourth Estate is an epic failure and I will never watch another news broadcast.
There isn’t any point to it, is there? You can’t be bothered with reporting anything that resembles the facts and due to your misinformation, people who are under-educated in every way that matters, voted in, literally, the worst candidate for the job. You disgust me.
###It’s not all gloom and doom right?
Unless you are a woman, a minority, Black, Gay, Brown, Red, Yellow or any other color that isn’t White. God help you if you fall into any of the alphabet soup we have never heard the future President ever speak to in a positive fashion: LGBTQIA. To our brothers and sisters among this beleaguered group, all I can offer you is our apologies.
Since we are on the apologies, let’s go ahead and tell everyone we are going to be bombing in the next four years ahead of time: Not all of us wanted to destroy your country, your civilization, or your cultures. Not all of us are fond of wars that never end, defense contractors growing fabulously rich on their harvest of souls.
Even the soldiers of our military are weary of killing (thought here may be a few here or there which are secretly cheering the opportunity.)
To the children who will not get to grow up (here and abroad) due to Trump and people like him, who fear that which is different from them, who hate those who have never been afforded casual wealth drawn from the suffering of ages past, all we can offer are our condolences.
Like the UK’s Brexit, this is the last gasp of fearful Whites, of brainwashed minorities, of women too fearful to pay attention to the writing on the wall and vote their own interests. This is on you. All the evil he does for as long as he is in office, is on you. If a nuclear mushroom appears on any horizon, anywhere on Earth, blame yourself for whatever cataclysm is unleashed.
It seems all of you who thought this was a good idea will have a nice long time of economic, social and cultural deprivation to enjoy Herr Trump and his Republican Elite Squad as they run roughshod over your rights, what few they will afford you. Donald Trump is a poster boy for bullying through wealth. While he is ruining your life, he won’t even blink.
Sunrise is coming. Hope there will be something left to inaugurate him to (assuming he isn’t residing in a jail cell). What am I thinking? Nothing else has even managed to slow this bastard down. What’s a little rape between friends?
Oh, I am quite serious. I expect attacks on women to rise in the future. Rape becomes fashionable when your President engages in it. Women, get some pepper spray. You’re probably going to need it.
Donald Trump’s candidacy is the first time American politics has left me truly afraid
###“I was voting my conscience.”
To those people, I say: Fuck you, very much.
This was never about Trump. This was about the Supreme Court, where real power in this country lies. This was about the House and the Senate where no decent legislation has happened for eight years. The presidency was the cherry on top. An explosive, got its finger on the nuclear button, in bed with foreign governments and white nationalists cherry on a sundae of suffering.
Tomorrow, they will spin this as an unexpected victory. You guys love those dystopian novels and movies right? Well, get ready. You are about to be living in one.
Know that some of us knew better. Being Black in America has taught me one thing which I have seen repeated across my entire life, again and again:
White people in power, with money and influence will fuck over their own to get what they want.
The rich will absolutely fuck over anyone who doesn’t have the financial clout or legal capacity to say no to them. An inauspicious end to what would have been considered the historic presidency of Barack Obama. To be followed by someone who has been lauded by the KKK, White Nationalist militias, the Russian KGB and shilled for by the FBI’s Comey and Julian Assange’s Wikileaks.
What a clusterfuck. How is there any chance this can work out well for anyone? (Except the rich who have enough wealth to buffer whatever inequities result from his inexperience. Just remember, no amount of money can protect you from a nuke launched at three AM…)
Godspeed, wherever you are.
###Update:
Less than ten hours after the announcement of his impending presidency he declares his First Hundred Days Plan. I will just share the “good” bits (euphemistically speaking)…
Here Is What Donald Trump Wants To Do In His First 100 Days
With a perspective on the impending Trump Presidency and possible end of civilization as we know it (thanks, Chicago Cubs),
My name is Thaddeus Howze.