WE USED TO BE BETTER

Everyone in this room has some memory of the post WWII period. We saw the war photo's and newsreel footage of the desperate people fleeing the homes they grew up in. Abandoning their friends and relatives, that some might possibly live to carry on the family name. We saw the movies and television shows that re-enacted the horrors of that war, and we saw the movies and television shows that mocked the Nazi soldiers. Many of those people seeking refuge found a pleasant place in this country, and others. They became the leaders who are turning their civic efforts over to this newer generation. They were the writers and humorists that helped us forget the events that we fought to escape.

It's not as if the horrible humans that live in every nations underground networks did not exist. But the people we elected were, generally, a better quality of human. Even at one time, Republicans. The racists and fascists might attain a mayorship in certain areas of our country, or a Governorship. Some even made it to the halls of the legislature, but they were not many, and most of us rejected them. On the chance that one of our highest ranking political leaders might be concealing the racial animus most of us abhor, there was also a higher court that we were sure would preserve the idea of justice for those oppressed people forced to brave unknown hardships to find safety.

What happened? Well, for one we didn't learn from our past mistakes: the fascism that might have succeeded in throwing out the election FDR won. The racism that existed openly in the south, until they could no longer be tolerated by the rest of us, the cultural antipathy that could only exist in small groups over cheap beer. Neither of our two parties, at an earlier age could openly tolerate these people among their higher echelons and face re-election. It happened because of massive amounts of corporate cash after the Citizens United ruling. It happened, much earlier with well-funded think-tanks, poised to poison our polity and misinform the electorate. It happened when the Fairness Doctrine was done away with. Advocacy television had a twenty-year head start before we figured out its objective. It happened when national political leaders were allowed to attack democracy with no fear of long-lasting punishment (kind of an irony because the right wing, who was committing these sins, were profiting from for-profit prisons). It happened a little bit at a time. And none of the elected law-makers who were guilty in fact, were not found guilty of violating those laws. And now that our president prefers to run the Whitehouse like a mob boss, prefers a unitary executive over the 3 branches of government, the stink of trumpism is beginning to rise from the Constitutional ashes. Even now, ICE troops are being poised to mobilize to blue states to surround the polls. This may come to its conclusion soon. Maga are splitting into pro-Israel and anti Israel factions. The president's popularity, and the reputation of the Republican party are on the slippery slope that Republicans have feared since Nixon. If we don't come out of this with the fascist party in complete disarray, we may become more like present-day Hungary than the republic we wished to be. We used to be better.