The End of Trump’s Destructive Presidency
FRED WERTHEIMER’S WEEKLY NOTE | December 10, 2020
“With the end of the destructive Trump presidency in sight and with a new normal presidency coming soon, there is hope for the future.”
President Trump is putting lives in danger in his closing days in office as he rants about how he won an election that President-elect Biden actually won by more than seven million votes and by an Electoral College “landslide,” to use Trump’s definition of the term.
State and local elected and election officials are being harassed, threatened, and endangered by extremist Trump followers, who are responding to his false, demagogic claims that the election was stolen from him and should be overturned.
Of course, Trump has arguably already cost tens of thousands of Americans their lives with his wildly incompetent and irresponsible handling of the nation’s response to the coronavirus. His failure to pay any attention to the virus now – as we are in the middle of its worst surge – will likely lead to many more lives lost.
It is not hard to understand what motivates Trump: his narcissism, self-absorption, and his desire to delegitimize the election and the Biden presidency. It is easy to believe that Trump would have moved to make himself the first American dictator, given the slightest opportunity.
What is harder to understand is how almost all Republicans in Congress have turned into blind followers of Trump when they know he clearly lost the election and there is not a shred of evidence to show otherwise.
Senator Mitt Romney (R-UT) has been willing to tell truth to power at critical times, voting for impeachment, recognizing Biden’s election, and calling the latest Trump effort at the Supreme Court “madness.”
But there have been only a few other Republican Members of Congress who have been willing to speak up.
Today, we are witnessing one of the most disgraceful performances in our country’s history, and a frontal attack on the peaceful transfer of power and the legitimacy of our electoral process.
Fortunately, we are also witnessing heroic performances by a number of Republican state and local officeholders and election officials in states won by Biden, as well as by judges, including Republican appointed and elected ones.
They have refused to be cowed by Trump’s bullying. They have told the truth – an alien concept to Trump – and they have done their jobs as required by law.
With the end of the destructive Trump presidency in sight and with a new normal presidency coming soon, there is hope for the future.
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