Believe me, I’m as satisfied as anybody with yesterday’s election results.
I’m not giddy, though, and neither should you be.
Here comes a bucket of cold water. Don’t think the huge swath of the American electorate that has revered Li’l Duce since the day he descended the golden escalator at Trump Tower has suddenly come to its senses. No. Those people have not, in the snap of a finger, come to tolerate immigrants, liberals, progressives, social democrats, the rule of law, decency, and civility and/or embrace others whose skin color happens to be represented by any Pantone® hue a shade darker than theirs. They still voted in large numbers yesterday. They still live among us.
June 16, 2015.
And they’re not going away.
The seismic shift from a Republican-dominated Congress to a Democratic majority in both legislatures came about because that weird little 15 percent, the swing voters, got sick of paying four and five bucks for a gallon of gasoline. Nothing more. Not Caligu-lite‘s outlandish pronouncements; his insults; his misogyny, his racism, his jilting of America’s traditional allies; his spooning with Vladimir Putin, his pointless Iran War, his dismantling of federal protections in banking, food, drugs and the environment; or his masked, armed thugs snatching Latinos off the street and occasionally summarily executing anyone who gets in their way. Swing voters would tolerate any and all of that as long as gas remained affordable.
That’s nothing new. The average American has voted for her or his purse or wallet religiously since the Sons of Liberty dressed up as Indians and dumped a shipment of tea into Boston Harbor.
The hatred and the hallucinatory view of the world that US President No. 45/47 has spewed, allowed, licensed, and encouraged remains. It isn’t going away.
Luckily for us, the US Congress will longer be his rubber stamp.
But there’s one more thing. We might kid ourselves that the American political system has triumphed, that good will out, that there’s wisdom in democracy. Maybe that’s all true, somewhere. But not here. Not where politicians and elections are bought and sold by oligarchs, plutocrats, and international corporations. Not where social media discourse can be infected by Russian, Chinese, and other bots.
Most importantly, though, politicians and elections must play by the rules imposed by the US Supreme Court’s 2008 Citizens United decision. Siince then, sure, your vote means something. But it’s something vanishingly small when compared to Elon Musk’s half a billion dollar injection into the mainline of this country’s political circulatory system.
Until Citizens United is overturned, there’s no cause for giddiness.