A series of essays….
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A DARK DAY FOR DEMOCRACY WITH GOP BLOCKING VOTING RIGHTS BILL |
….as seen through my eyes!
By: Jacqueline E Hughes
A very wise person and good friend of mine once predicted that our great nation would self-destruct from the inside out. This was nearly fifteen years ago. I debated with John as to the validity of his words and often wondered (worried) if he might just be right. I prayed that he wasn’t. Today, I sit here and contemplate the reality of it all as his words continue to ring in my ears.
Naivety. While most of us were still under the impression that good would always overpower evil, the underbelly of the ‘beast’ was being exposed, inch by painful inch. And, most of us weren’t even aware of it happening. Innocence. We were incapable of understanding that as we lived our day-to-day lives, others were working hard to undermine the freedoms we took for granted. And, had been doing so for many years. After all, isn’t freedom what our soldiers fought and sacrificed so much for in the Great Wars and more?
It has taken an evil, selfish, and hateful man/child to enter our lives, spread his tentacles of lies for years while holding the highest political office in our democratic government, before we so much as acknowledged the lasting harm he and his ilk were creating within our country. “Oh, he’s new to politics,” they said. “He’ll learn as he goes and we shouldn’t worry.” Naivety. We listened, initially. Many fell under his clownish spell and hoped for a better life because his lies had become their lifebouy connected to the sinking ship they felt they were on.
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THE ORANGE LIFEBOUY WAS TOTALLY UNINTENDED? |
Journalist didn’t know how to handle this ‘orange mess’ and used his antics and childlike behavior as fuel for higher ratings, more popularity. As if laughing with, as well as at this arrogant buffoon, his family and intimate cronies, would ease the tension of what was happening right under our noses in Washington D.C. How many presidents would have gotten away with his open friendship with Vladimir Putin and been allowed to meet privately with him with no one witnessing or recording what was said? He allowed Russian diplomats into the inter sanctum of the White House. He failed to answer a natural disaster by actually helping the people affected by it. He allowed thousands of Americans to perish because he felt that, financially, it would be detrimental to him if COVID-19 was even acknowledged.
You and I both know that I could go on and on with many more prime examples of his treachery before, during, and after his presidency.
But, we all see and feel the results of his abusive behavior. Between the pandemic we’ve been attempting to cope with and the continuing power grab of this unholy person and the monsters he’s helped to create within the Republican Party, we are being overwhelmed by all of the emotions projected by our initial naivety, innocence, and intense underestimation of what was actually going on. Physically, it is taking a toll on us. The term psychological warfare comes to mind with his use of various techniques, such as propaganda, terror, and fear, to induce or reinforce attitudes favorable to a war effort among our population and government. The insurrection of January 6, 2021, being a direct result of this.
Garry Kasparov, Soviet-born chess master and writer, recently said, “The point of modern propaganda isn’t only to misinform or push an agenda. It is to exhaust your critical thinking, to annihilate truth.”
Now, we are suffering for our lack of an appropriate response by not identifying this man and his negative policies even before his presidential campaign began. We are exhausted but, some of us, still search hungrily for the truth. We should be ashamed for not exposing him as the monster he was and remains to be today while holding him, and everyone who regarded him as their personal ticket to ripping-off taxpayers, unequivocally responsible. Hillary Clinton tried her best, but not many listened to a woman.
Instead, we viewed him strictly as the bloated clown he has always been. If we make it through this era of greed vs. law in one piece, Constitutional law has to be placed under magnified scrutiny as we enter the phase of understanding how we’ve been so manipulated by the same people we voted into office to represent us. Fifty Republican senators are now wiping our faces in the muddy politics of their own greed and fear.
As I type this piece, the year-long Democratic push for federal voting rights legislation neared a futile end tonight, after Senate Republicans blocked an elections bill for the fifth time in six months and Democrats appeared unable to unite their caucus behind a plan to rewrite the Senate’s rules and pass it anyway—as stated by the Washington Post.
And, the beat goes on. Even with a gentle man now in office who is utilizing his many years in the Senate as examples of what to do in times of crisis and peace, our country is divided, with the chasm that separates us growing larger every day. If you see our nation as being a white man’s world, having elected a black man as president must have certainly put you over the edge, challenged every fiber of your being. If you acknowledge and believe that all men and women are created equal and deserve the right to be treated as such, it is difficult to understand why everyone doesn’t share these same, basic views of respect and love.
But, blatantly disregarding the law by thinking that the right to vote is only for a chosen few instead of for all is unfathomable! This goes against everything that we understand to be important and believe in as a nation. Or, so I thought.
Instead, we have become a nation divided and, with each passing day, democracy slips further away. John F. Kennedy wrote, “Democracy is the superior form of government because it is based on a respect for man as a reasonable being.” Respect for mankind has hit a new low tonight. If it slips even further down this slippery slope led by the Republican Party, even a good man like Joseph Biden as President may not have the support to correct the decline in time.
I will place my head on my pillow tonight and dream of what could be, pray that we are much stronger than my friend John’s prediction of self-destruction, pray for democracy to rule this midterm election, and attempt to fall into a deep sleep. The last part is becoming more difficult as time goes by.
“I never imagined that today’s Republican Party would not stand-up for democracy.” —Senator Maggie Hassan from New Hampshire, January 19, 2022
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EVERYONE DESERVES THE RIGHT TO VOTE….! |
Copyright © 2022 by Jacqueline E Hughes
All rights reserved
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