It is now Election Day.
If you haven’t voted, today is the day to do so.
A Biden-Harris bus was followed by a caravan of pickup trucks waving Trump flags and other symbols stating their support of him on Interstate 35 leaving Austin, TX. One of the trucks attempted to push the bus off the highway. This prompted the campaign to cancel events out of fear that it was not safe to do so. The FBI is investigating it but Trump has undermined their credibility when he retweeted the video praising the incident.
Democrats in Georgia had to cancel an event out of fear they could not obtain the necessary security due to increased threats.
A group of mainly black voters were pepper sprayed in North Carolina that was reminiscent of police charging fire hoses and releasing dogs on Civil Rights marchers in the 1950s and 1960s.
Authorities have thwarted attempts on the lives of the Democratic ticket of Joe Biden and Senator Kamala Harris, and a plot by militia members to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer.
In the first presidential debate, Trump told the Proud Boys white supremacist organization to stand back and stand by. On the campaign trail, he has encouraged his supporters to infiltrate black neighborhoods and monitor the polls there.
The Trump campaign recently lost a suit to throw out 127,000 votes in Harris County, Texas because the county clerk had the courage to allow voters to drop off their ballots while in their cars due to the pandemic. So far, the Texas Supreme Court – all Republicans – and a district level court – appointed by George W. Bush – has rejected this challenge but expect more challenges to vote counts to ensure if the result is closer than expected in certain swing states.
All of these are examples of voter suppression and intimidation and no one should stand for this.
The Navy recently held a ceremony in remembrance of the 20th anniversary of the terrorist attack on the USS Cole that killed 17 sailors. That is an example of the foreign enemies, in the enlistment oath that every service member takes upon entering the military, that seek to do our country harm.
But it is not just foreign enemies that is mentioned in the oath. It also mentions domestic ones and what is to be done about them such as the examples I listed above? They as well do great harm to our country as well as undermine the democratic process to where people lose faith in the electoral system.
One of my favorite movies is Mister Roberts, the 1955 film about life aboard a Navy supply ship operating in the Pacific Fleet. Unfortunately, the only action the crew sees are other ships heading west towards Japan. I highly recommend this movie.
The main character, Lieutenant Douglas Roberts played by Henry Fonda, is begging for a transfer to a ship seeing action so that he can feel like he contributed to the war. He is constantly at odds with the commanding officer, played by James Cagney, who repeatedly denies Roberts his transfer request so that he can reap the benefits of Roberts’ performance as the ship’s cargo officer.
Underway sailing away from their first liberty call in a long time, news reaches the ship that the war in Europe is over. The ship’s medical officer remarks that there is still a little matter of business out here in the Pacific. As we know, World War II ended in September 1945 with the Japanese signing the terms of surrender on the battleship Missouri but at the time no one knew how much longer the war was going to last.
Roberts is sitting on a deck topside lamenting about how he will not be able to contribute to the war as he hears various radio reports cutting in from different locations recounting the celebrations of that Germany has surrendered until he hears one official sounding statement.
Our boys have won
this victory today.
But the rest is up
to you.
You, and you alone must recognize our enemies: the forces of ambition, cruelty, arrogance, and stupidity!
You must recognize
them.
You must destroy
them!
You must tear them
out as you would a malignant growth, and cast them from the surface of the
Earth!
This prompts Roberts to take action and toss the ship’s symbol of pushing the most cargo overboard into the briny deep. I won’t divulge anymore details of this film. Once again, I highly recommend that you watch this film yourself.
We have seen these enemies run rampant for the last four years. Many of us have done what we could to resist submitting to the lies, participated in protest rallies, attended town halls to inform our representatives, and most importantly voted in 2018 to put the Democrats in charge of the House.
I know that I did my part in doing those things as well as my writing (though I wish could’ve written more, but I write very methodically) and donating to campaigns during this election season so that they have the resources to convince other people to vote for them.
Most importantly I voted
But this isn’t over.
The 2020 election does not mean that Trump and his Republican minions will go quietly into history’s dustbin. Should Trump and the Republicans lose the election, there will be attempts to whitewash and sanitize their actions.
It must be called out and confronted if needed.
Much as I did to family members in a series of texts in May 2018 when I confronted two of my mom’s sisters for their Trump votes where I told them off for doing so. One of them said they voted for him because they were thinking about their family but I asked them if that included me, my mother and her husband, my sister and her family, and my aunt and her wife. She was so narrowminded that she did not think about how this administration would harm the people she says she cares about.
I got a pathetic response from her and told her to (exact words) fuck off. Her response was to tattle on me to my mother expecting that she was going to punish me.
She is perfectly fine when Trump says obscene things but when her thirtysomething year-old adult nephew drops a swear, she suddenly gets offended and behaves like a child searching for sympathy to the nearest adult that will exact justice for offending her sensibilities.
I have not spoken to her or any of my Trump voting family members since, and I do not expect to anytime soon.
Some of y'all might need to have those difficult conversations and if necessary, ex-communicate them due to their toxicity as human beings.
Today begins the tearing out of the malignant growth from our political system that is Trump.
That also includes the work to preserve and protect this democracy from ever being abused by someone like him ever again.
Indeed, it is up to us.
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