By Mike Weland
Growing up I learned to distrust those who felt the need to proclaim their virtues, especially those who did so as a matter of course, when there was no need. Such as those who professed, “no lie,” at every statement (this does not, of course, apply to the telling of gross-out stories, wherein such phrases are de riguer, “An’ he was standing there holding his bloody, lopped off head, and his neck was spurting blood, and then his eyes opened and he looked right at me … no lie! … and then he whispered, ‘my mom’s gonna kill me!’ … if I’m lyin’ I’m dyin’!”).
For grown men, an exception may be made for fishing stories, but little else. If you are what you say you are, it should go without saying. It should be obvious by your example. Yet in today’s political world, candidates tell you with impunity what they’re not, and a faction of voters will believe and applaud. Then they’ll blatantly belittle and with a brush dipped in lies, baselessly paint their opponents, their “enemies,” as two steps left of pure evil. Blaming them, often as not, of the very sins of which they themselves are guilty.
I received my first such flyer for this election cycle Thursday and it’s deja vu 2022; CONSERVATIVE. CHRISTIAN. REPUBLICAN. Scott Herndon, protecting Idaho families. Telling us “Liberal Jim,” portrayed in a medical mask in memory of the COVID days, beside a derelict van with “free candy” painted on the side, is guilty of a sampling of the tired “woke” non-issues trumped up by this new and radical breed of would-be politicians solely to stir up their MAGA base and let them safely sidestep real issues while doing absolutely nothing of consequence but serve themselves and pave the way for voters’ choice 2024; “Trump II: The King’s Return,” or “Insurrection Bigger and Better: The Sequel.”
Those are the two choices we confront this election cycle. Not Republican or Democrat, not Trump or Biden. For the first time since the U.S. Civil War, is up to us to again answer Abraham Lincoln’s question, shall we “nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of earth?” It is the fate of our nation’s Constitution at stake, nothing less.
I won’t speak to his contention that he’s Christian, but Scott Herndon is not conservative and he is not Republican, those appellations having been ingloriously usurped by Trump and his merry band of misfits almost a decade ago to be bestowed on those such as Herndon who faithfully do as they are told by their local wing of the Liberty Lovers or Freedom Faction or whatever organization is puppeteering for the radical masters at the moment.
More words usurped to cloak the hollow ugliness of what they are and what they’re attempting to do; tear down the constitutional republic established by our founders whose Army, in throwing off the yoke of England, “manned the air, it rammed the ramparts, it took over the airports, it did everything it had to do, and at Fort McHenry, under the rockets’ red glare, it had nothing but victory,” according to the stable genius who would be our first king.
By looking at the “leadership” displayed by his sycophants and minions; from Lindsey Graham, Mike Johnson, Matt Gaetz, James Comer, Marjorie Taylor Greene and many more all-star misfits who have so gummed up the works of our nation’s Senate and House as to render them ineffective and useless, to the Scott Herndons in every state capitol to clueless radical rebels like Brent Regan and Mark Moseley who man the precincts and others who waste space in countless elective and appointed offices great and small across the land, we have seen in the last few years a microcosm of what they would tack up to replace it with.
Repressive and regressive “policies” that would affirm and strengthen a quiet but strict caste system in which rich white Christian men would graciously take their place at the top and all others would gratefully take their places below and stay there, where mores, morals and religion of the elite apply to all without question or argument.
A nation in which the rule of law applies only to whom the kingly one say it do, where infidelity to the king is punished rather than crime. Where the party is the priority rather than the people and the party is ever embodied by the king.
There was a time when such rude and callous falsehoods as seem normal in today’s politics would have been condemned by most, not applauded. Sadly, today is not that day.
There was a time when most Americans, seeing despots rise, recognized the threat they posed and steadfastly marched off to face their military forces on war fronts around the globe. Today, too many of our GOP leaders concoct imaginary enemies to distract while appeasing stalwart enemies engaged in combat with those who are or would be our allies.
It’s hard to believe that so few today seem to see the threat when it’s our own constitution besieged, not by foreign enemies or agents, but by those of our own who drape themselves with the trappings of patriotic words that once meant something but are now antonyms of their original definitions.
We who will stand to protect and defend our constitution have heard the plans from the lips of those who would destroy it. We have read their manifestos. We know from whence comes the threat.
We in Idaho are down to one last chance to thin the ranks of the radical faction before the issues are decided and the stage set in November, and that is the primary election on May 21. Vote out every right wing scalawag Trump released from the bilges and imbued with confidence that through him, they could Make America Great Again on a foundation of fairy tales, lies, conspiracy theories and false assumptions.
Because of the closed primary, it’s going to take not only a major turnout by reasonable-minded registered Republicans, but a full out showing of those of other parties who met the deadline to register as Republicans and all the unaffiliated voters, who can register their affiliation at the clerk’s office up to election day and at the polls on election day and vote as Republicans.
This isn’t a threat that can be pushed off or kicked down the road. It will be decided with the November 5 general election.
We who believe in the promise of our constitution must hope for the best and be prepared for the worst. What we cannot be is complacent, unprepared. We who’ve taken taken the oath to protect and defend our constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and who take that oath seriously must stand ready, even if our terms of service ended many years ago.