When America was great … Happy Thanksgiving

By Mike Weland

Before November 5, I often said that the 2024 election would be the most consequential since the election of 1860. The American people have spoken, and by our choice, we are once again putting to the test whether a nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal, can long endure.

It took four years and close to 700,000 lives to decide that our constitutional republic should endure 84 years after it was established. Now, 160 years after that bloody war’s end, we stand once again on the precipice, awaiting the inauguration of our next president, now as then two factions, citizens of one nation, so diametrically opposed one group has all but decided our differences are irreconcilable.

In 1860, the question was slavery — not whether it should continue or be abolished but whether the institution should be limited to those states where it then existed, as proposed by Republican Abraham Lincoln, that it be protected and allowed in all states and territories, as proposed by Southern Democrat John Breckenridge, or that it be left to each state and territory to be a free or slave state.

When Lincoln won, South Carolina seceded. By inauguration day six other states had followed, making slavery a secondary issue for the president, who would not brook dissolution, declaring that Americans were friends despite their differences, that secession was unconstitutional and that if allowed, it would destroy the world’ s only democracy and prove to the American people and the world the answer to a timeless question he would pose on a terrible battlefield three years later.

By force of will, he held fast to his pledge to “preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution and the union of states,” administered by Chief Justice Roger Taney, whose 1857 Scott v. Sanford decision that black people had no legal rights wrought the division over slavery that would explode into the war that consumed Lincoln’s presidency.

For that he was the most reviled of presidents during his life time, the first U.S. president to be assassinated and after his death consistently judged as one of our nation’s greatest presidents.

He entered his second term humbly, hopeful.

“With malice toward none,” he said on his second inauguration, “with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation’s wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan–to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves, and with all nations.”

In 2024, the question of what divides us almost evenly is harder to define, but one faction and one only seems aggrieved, though they can give no clear explanation as to why. They say those who don’t stand wholeheartedly behind Republican Donald John Trump; liberals, Democrats, the “woke,” suffer a malady know as TDS, Trump Derangement Syndrome. Even those of their own party who aren’t suitably “conservative,” the RINOS (Republicans in Name Only), may be suspect of being afflicted.

Inexplicably, they watch and even abet their adored one in the commission of wrongful, foolish or overtly imbecilic actions and immediately and without shame or remorse blame those upon whom said acts were perpetrated. They listen to what they are told to hear and read what they are told to learn. They get their “news” spun fresh daily over media that sold out to MAGA or from the pulpit and outreach arms of various evangelical groups enamored of a man of immense power and ability who may not be Godly or particularly virtuous, but who has God’s ear and is clearly an instrument of their God against all others, and he hears the lamentations of the faithful. Didn’t he nigh miraculously and by the strength of his will strike down abortion? Can you say amen?

They do as told, vilifying “enemies” ordained for years by small and mostly hidden splinter groups; white supremacists and Christian Nationalists for the most part, groups Trump brought into the light from the lunatic fringe under which they languished, making their enemies his enemies, having them stand back and stand by, giving them power and authority with no countering burden of responsibility, besides being blindly loyal to Trump.

I say they are afflicted with a far more grave ailment, Trump Delusion Syndrome, TDS1, a malady a good many in Trump’s inner circle have already confessed to having and now being in recovery from. As with any cult, those who have it refuse to see it until they are thrown under the bus and out of the glee club they allow to define themselves.

Having never fallen victim, I don’t know what they see when they lay eyes on the man, but I see a spoiled rich kid with unresolved daddy issues who never figured out how to succeed on his own merit and so turned to taking advantage of others. He never had incentive to develop empathy or compassion and so never had need for courtesy, loyalty, manners, truth or decency. The only thing he does well is con people, at which he is a master.

Only the second president to be elected to a second non-consecutive term, when Trump won, he promised retribution to those who abetted his own wrongdoing, to deport millions as a solution to a crisis of his own making, to reshape the government to serve him. He has vowed vengeance on those who had the temerity to attempt to hold him to account.

Idolized by his cult of followers, he is the only man in the history of our nation to survive two impeachments in his first term as president, to get away with soliciting election interference on his own behalf from two adversarial nations, to foment insurrection and be allowed to run for a second term in office, to undermine faith in the cornerstone of our democracy by spreading incessant lies thoroughly disproved in over 60 courtrooms so as to undermine faith in our electoral system, weakening our constitution.

As president, he led the most scientifically advanced and capable nation in the world to the worst infection and death rates during a pandemic by his incomprehensible and erratic leadership, erroneously casting doubt on the sound and simple advice of renowned experts while promoting pseudo-science and conspiracy theory.

He worked hardest while in office and since not in service to the citizens of the United States, but at kicking away the checks and balances of the tripartite government established by the constitution, usurping a political party to weaken and assert undue control of the legislative branch and packing the judicial branch with loyalists willing to serve his interests rather than the interests of the United States.

He is the only convicted felon to be nominated and elected, the only U.S. president to be found guilty in a civil court of rape. He is the only former president to spend his time since election complaining of being falsely targeted, persecuted and oppressed by the liberals, the “weaponized DOJ” and the only president to tell myriad followers “it’s not me they’re coming after, it’s you! I’m just standing in the way!”

He is also the only former U.S. President to aver that a president needed a wide latitude of immunity from criminal prosecution in order to effectively carry out the demands of the office and to receive it.

Technically, Joe Biden, as sitting president, is now above the law, armed with a terrible power granted inexplicably by a judiciary of equal power and authority expressly to prevent such travesty, showing us, and especially Trump, how weak the reins intended to hold him in. Biden, however, holds fast to decency, to the rule of law, to knowing that though imperfect, as are all things wrought by the hand of man, it must apply equally to all citizens or none.

And Trump has his cadre, his core group now close to ten years in the making, ensconced at almost every level of government in the nation. “Conservative Republicans” in offices great and small not only in statehouses and Washington D.C., but in cities and counties, school boards, library boards, all of whom swore an oath to the constitution but all giving allegiance to the plethora of “Freedom” entities now proliferating, groups that rate and coerce Republican politicians at all levels to do what their consciences tell them, so long as their vote is “conservative” precisely as they define it.

And they all seem to be following a playbook drafted by the Heritage Foundation, a self-proclaimed “historic movement, brought together by over 100 respected organizations from across the conservative movement, to take down the Deep State and return the government to the people. Its Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise, published in April 2023, is a product of more than 400 scholars and policy experts from around the country. The book offers a menu of policy suggestions to meet our country’s deepest challenges and put America back on track.”

While Trump claims to have never heard of it, have had no part in it or to even have any idea what it says, it echoes with uncanny accuracy the bugaboos Trump has lamented since his ride down the golden escalator; the liberal left, the “Deep State,” immigration, brown immigrants, “woke,” ad nauseum, and its list of contributors seem to be getting an inordinate number of nominations in the confederacy of dunces he is now introducing for admission into what he for now refers to as an administration.

Not surprisingly, though the irony undoubtedly goes unseen by the delusional, Deep State is defined as “a type of government made up of potentially secret and unauthorized networks of power operating independently of a state’s political leadership in pursuit of their own agenda and goals.” Why ( reads it again) that describes precisely this Heritage Foundation! Color me surprised.

Few of the “crisis” raised in the last decade were on the national radar or even existed prior to 2015 except as promulgated quietly during Barack Obama’s term and greatly amplified by Trump.

No president before Donald Trump did so little or lied so much, so blatantly abused his office and his powers. He did run the executive like a business, but his own, not the people’s, and poorly, surrounding himself with the most corrupt and criminal administration in U.S. history.

No president before Trump had or has a more blindly loyal cult of followers, who will castigate any other for a minor mistake while overlooking, ignoring or heaping accolades on The Donald for even the most egregious of unethical or felonious transgressions. Few of his cult will countenance the allegations made here, all easily proven, but will instead malign the messenger.

They will not believe the well documented data proving the accomplishments and successes of the Biden administration, achieved with little fanfare, zero self-congratulations or bluster, zero drama and no chaos, but will instead berate and belittle a dedicated and capable public servant whose record eclipses that of the predecessor who refused to concede defeat and promulgated the lie that did lasting, if not irreparable damage to trust in our electoral system and so our constitution.

And they are here. For the past three years, Idaho has been one of the fastest growing states in the nation and Boundary County one of the fastest growing counties in the state. They aren’t coming here for the jobs, the world-class accommodations, the huckleberries or the hunting. They are instead here to be among the like minded.

While there are a few here welcoming them with open arms, the like minded aren’t us but those who, like them, packed up and fled the liberal, the woke, the all-powerful shadow figures like George Soros who are central to so many outlandish right wing conspiracies. They are here not to become part of the community, but to be ready to stand up for their conservative ideals, to stand back and stand by for Donald Trump to call them to the fray, to put finish to liberals and their Godless degeneracy. To return God to his throne in our classrooms and boardrooms and bedrooms and to the halls of government.

But they make one fundamental error, which I’ll explain momentarily.

Trump is the first president ever elected to criminally violate the laws he swore to execute, the only U.S. citizen to so brazenly escape sentencing for crimes of which he was convicted and first to be spared prosecution for felony charges brought against him fairly and impartially by a grand jury of his fellow citizens by being elected again to an office he is unfit to hold and to which, by virtue of his insurrection, he should be legally disqualified.

And here we are, and perhaps the delusional are right. Perhaps we are deranged. We have reelected a viper who has bitten repeatedly with fangs purposely held back. We are watching him prepare for a second term that will obviously be nothing like the first. We have read his blueprint, we’ve heard him tell his plans. We see him sharpening his fangs, selecting and nominating people for positions in his administration who are clearly as unfit as he is, yet we talk about laws that will constrain his worst impulses.

We forget that the moment he’s taken the oath and said “I solemnly swear,” he becomes even more iron-clad than he is right now as his presidential immunity kicks in. Because he has such immunity, you can refrain from thinking the Judicial system will ensure Trump will be constrained by or be subject to the rule law.

Look at some of his more “reasonable” appointments and you might speculate he’ll hear and heed their counsel, not seeing that Trump isn’t looking for counsel, he’s looking solely for affirmation of his brilliance. Remember, as part of Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation is said to have already vetted those whom Trump might call on not only for appointments to the Trump administration, but to fill the seats of the 2.25-million federal civil servants Trump plans to oust. sole criteria used for vetting is, of course, loyalty to Donald Trump.

No, everything says Trump is gearing up to actually fulfill his promise to Make America Great Again, and at long last we are able to deduce what MAGA has never been able to tell us … the period of time when America was great … the time in our history to which Trump wishes to return us.

It would have been about 1607. White Europeans were the immigrants, America was governed by a Monarch, the Church of England was the official religion and the first blacks wouldn’t arrive for another 12 years. Government was decidedly conservative and witches and other woke liberals were not tolerated and everyone in the Jamestown colony pretty much knew their place in white society, which consisted of about 104 men and boys in 1607. They only had to wait a dozen years until December 4, 1619, to celebrate the first American Thanksgiving.

Coincidentally, 1619 marked the arrival of the first slave ship in Jamestown, bringing 20 chained in her hold. Working industriously, they immediately built for the privileged whites the first grocery on American soil, a Piggly Wiggly, from whence came the stuffing mix, pumpkin pie with Cool Whip, cranberry sauce, and fixings for the green bean and tater tot casseroles.

Because their religion forbade it and they dwelt in a dry county, alcohol was prohibited and the five dusty bottles of port, three jeroboams of Bordeaux, one barrel of brandy and one of Barbados rum had to be snuck in and imbibed quietly and in utmost secrecy.

The thing those with TDS of the delusional variety seem to consistently get wrong is to think the words “liberal” and “conservative” define political positions and that either can be ascribed to a political party. If you went back to 1860 before the election and explained to Lincoln, Douglas and Breckenridge that Democrats were liberal and Republicans were conservative they’d have looked you over more closely to see if they could spot your stash of laudanum, because the roles then were opposite.

Conservative and liberal don’t define political slants, they define people. When Trump announced that henceforth, Democrats were to be considered enemies of the state, it wasn’t long before the Grand Ol’ Party had to add a new division with which to identify the now liberal faction of their conservative party, the RINOs. No matter h0w you organize and group people,  they will always settle out  according to their perspective.

Perhaps I do suffer Trump Derangement Syndrome, driven strongly by an unwavering commitment to live up to my obligation to protect and defend the United States Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic.

Not only because I proudly swore that oath, but because I believe without question that all men are equal, and equally endowed with inalienable rights. And I believe without equivocation that though it is by far the hardest form of government to administer, there are no more noble aspirations toward which to strive than to ever sustain and ever perfect this great and good gift bequeathed us, this government of the people, by the people and for the people.

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