linnposts.com

It is clear that the 52-54 percent of those of us who disapprove of, dislike, are disgusted by, Trump’s presidency will have to save our democratic republic.

It’s for sure no one who approves of the job Trump is doing will. They don’t believe anything bad is happening.

Why they don’t remains an enigma to most of us.

They may have drunk the cool-aid characteristic of members of cults, or simply choose to be Republicans before being American, or perhaps they see themselves in Trump or see in him what they want to be.

Doesn’t matter, really. At this point, what does is that they will continue to support the fall of American democracy because he’s their guy.

That leaves the rest of us to stop him and them. To be successful, though, we need to remember a few essential things.

The first is to believe our cause is righteous. 

I don’t mean feeling morally superior, rather, a righteous cause means we know that what we are doing is right and good and serves all of us rather than only a few of us.

This is the mentality everyone engaged in combat must have to be victorious, and make no mistake, this is political combat, which means we are in conflict, in a fight, against Trump and MAGA Republicans.

The advantage we have is that we ARE right and they ARE wrong. There is no ambiguity here. Trump is an incompetent, selfish, arrogant, destructive, and morally corrupt man and there is nothing he can do that will serve what is good and right.

Some Republican leaders and voters who are silent in the face of what he is doing know how bad a man he truly is. Many don’t, but some do, and that gives us an advantage. 

They know we are right and Trumpism is wrong. They won’t join us in the fight, but neither are they fighting on his behalf either.

What we are doing is what we must do to ensure that the future of our government rests solidly on the Constitution, but it is also the right thing to do.

Second, another reason our cause is righteous is because we want the truth to prevail.

The foundation on which everything Trump says and does and everything MAGA Republicans say and do is dishonesty.

We saw an example of that this week when the incompetent Trump officials who participated in the Signal Chat told bold face lies about what they said even after reporter Jeffrey Goldberg released the transcript of what they said that proved they were lying.

That’s what liars do. They lie even when they know everyone knows they are lying. Trump does and he has chosen members of his cabinet who are willing to do the same thing, as their excuses for the Signal Chat proves.

Nothing good, absolutely nothing, can come from people who have no regard for telling the truth. You cannot have a meaningful conversation with someone who will lie to your face without blinking an eye, and you certainly cannot trust the future of a country to them.

We who are trying to save our democracy from Trump believe in telling the truth. We obviously spin things from our perspective, but the one thing we don’t do is to tell an outright lie and then expect everyone else to accept it as true.  

Trump does, all the time, and now he has a cabinet who do the same thing, as does his press secretary, as do Fix News hosts, as do all right-wing talk jocks. 

You never hear a Fix News host or anyone who supports Trump ask a guest if their summary of a situation is accurate or mistaken as hosts on other networks often do. The reason is, they know it’s not so why ask?

They live in what scholars are calling a “post-truth” era wherein they not only don’t tell the truth, they don’t believe in objective truth. Truth is whatever they say it is.

No one who thinks this way can serve a righteous cause. At minimum you have to be willing to seek the truth to stay on a moral track that leads to what is good and right.

Third, we have to stay together. 

Democrats and independents are by nature diverse. We believe in diversity, but that makes tolerance all the more important. We can disagree, but we cannot condemn or refuse to work with each other.

I think what Chuck Schumer did on the budget deal was weak. He should have gotten something from Republicans before agreeing. But I also think what he did was at the end of the day the better thing to do. 

That said, I wish he would step aside as leader of Senate Democrats, but I don’t believe he is the enemy. Senate Republicans are as long as they stand with Trump and that is what we must focus on.

Divided opposition is weak and ineffective opposition that cannot defeat Trump and MAGA Republicans who no longer believe in our government. They want to break it, reduce its power, cut its income and services, based on the unvetted belief that all of us will be better off without a strong federal government.

We won’t, at least most of us won’t. A few who are wealthy will be, but only a few. The real irony is that most MAGA voters will not be among the few. They will be left out of the money circle with the rest of us.

Trump and his wealthy co-conspirators want freedom for themselves, wealth for themselves, power for themselves, but nothing for anyone else.

That is why we must stick together, work together, and fight together. 

Finally, we must resist discouragement by focusing on the victories we are achieving rather than the destructive actions Trump is taking on a daily basis.

Discouragement is a serious problem when you’re fighting a battle whose end is not in sight and whose outcome is not assured.

The source of our discouragement is two-fold. One is not being able to prevent the damage Trump is doing to institutions and the serious harm he is inflicting on people. The other is the imbalance of power we are facing because Trump is president.  

The combination of power and the will to destroy anything (and anyone) that doesn’t support him makes it easy for Trump to discourage opposition to him, but only if we allow it. 

Given the stakes, discouragement is simply not an option. It never is when you’re at war. You have to fight with all your might to your last breath and trust it will be enough. 

If we do, we will win because our cause is righteous, we believe in telling the truth, we will stay together despite our differences, and we will not let discouragement stop us.

So, to say again, this is our fight, and it is ours to win.