By Mike Weland
Publisher
It is heartening to see the positive energy generated by the ascension of Kamala Harris to presidential candidate among those who recognize the very real threat of Donald Trump, MAGA and Project 2025, but optimism has a tendency to give rise to complacency. If ever there was one, the race that is this year’s U.S. presidential election is without room for complacency, no time to slow down, no time to rest.
There is no time for debating the true believers, the effort is resented by those in a cult. No time to concern ourselves with the near-certain outcomes: a second and a far more organized insurrection if Trump loses, a dystopian world of retribution, retaliation, deportation and dysfunction as Trump revamps our government to his image should he win … each citizen in good standing reverentially bowing before him as the sun rises and sets daily in his derriere.
No, there is only time to see that Trump is beaten decisively at the polls 85 days from today, to see that Harris is not left on her own to maintain the momentum and excitement. You don’t have to like Kamala, you don’t have to be a Democrat. You needn’t support nor concern yourself with any third party candidate unless your support is genuine.
There are but two candidates who matter; Trump and Harris. That’s because your vote is not merely for the name on the ballot, but for what each represents.
This is but the second time in our nation’s history that a U.S. national election will determine not just a president but the very fate of our nation and our constitution, and much like the first, this year’s election is motivated on the demonstrably false assertions of the over privileged and powered by the hoodwinked underprivileged who believe the lies of those they think they depend on.
On November 6, 1860, Abraham Lincoln became the first Republican to be elected President of the United States. A staunch Whig before, Lincoln joined the nascent Republican party for their opposition to the expansion of slavery and their adherence to principles of the Declaration of Independence, particularly those immortal five words, “all men are created equal.”
But some men insisted that while most men might be equal there were some men, affluent white Christian men such as themselves, of course, who were clearly superior to those others, and therefore not just entitled to rights and privileges not attainable by those lesser, but owed them by virtue of that obvious and indisputable fact of nature as ordained by God. Theirs, of course.
That a man as evil as Abraham Lincoln, this upstart Republican, would soon ascend to the throne with the clear intention of depriving them of their rights to privilege and wealth as granted by power most high was more than their dignity and hypocrisy could bear.
Fortunately, few wealthy white Christian men of the south whose wealth and status was acquired by the subjugation and denial of unalienable rights of men clearly inferior had been idle.
They’d spent years indoctrinating their fellow but far less affluent white Christian brethren, many of them even worse off than those in bondage, with half-truths, misinformation and lies … propaganda, convincing them that they were oppressed by evil and vindictive men masquerading as public servants who wanted only to deprive them of their privileges, which for many meant little more than the ability to assert they weren’t black, and so had someone to look down on.
When the states began seceding, each had large contingent of predominantly poor white Christian men ready to march in defense of an institution that benefitted but a small percentage of the upper tier privileged few who had convinced them that them damned Yankees aren’t coming after me, they’re coming to take away from you everything you hold dear, everything that makes you a proud southern man, I’m just standing in their way.
And when at 4:30 a.m. April 13, 1861, mortar shells began falling on Ft. Sumpter, they were manning the tubes. Though many were barefoot, ill clothed, ill fitted and ill fed, the majority were in high spirits, glad at last to be moving forward, instead of standing back and standing by.
Four years and an estimated 750,000 dead soldiers later, the Union held, slavery had been abolished and the south had been reduced to ash and rubble. Lincoln prevailed, saving our nation and its constitution and becoming a paragon of principle, of sacrifice and service above self and of perseverance … all virtues held to symbolize the party he brought to prominence.
That in less than a decade the once Grand Old Party eschewed the virtues of Lincoln in favor of the vices of Trump is unfathomable, but proof positive of how grave is the threat we as a nation now face.
Though many still believed, even down to this day, the mistruths, misinformation and outright lies that precipitated the Civil War, the first grave domestic threat to the greatest document ever devised by the mind of man so as to “form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity” and bequeathed to the citizens of the greatest nation ever conceived, remained and yet remain just what they were at the outset … lies.
We are faced with the same existential crisis today, contrived by the over privileged, spearheaded by a charismatic narcissist and powered by a great mass of hoodwinked and under-privileged humanity, all who deem themselves inherently superior, grievously oppressed and who each need someone to look down upon as “proof” of their fallacy.
On November 5, 2024, the voters of this young and great nation, by virtue of the trust in its citizenry implicit in the words so carefully chosen and unambiguously set down by our founders, will once again be called upon to decide by their vote far deeper questions than whom we will entrust to “faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States,” and “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”
By our vote, we will decide whether our nation will continue ever to strive to form a more perfect union, one in which we may one day see realized a dream … “that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,'” or whether such a noble goal is beyond our limited capacity. We will decide whether our nation will continue to strive for fair and equal justice under the law for all or whether one citizen shall be above the law. Whether election to our nation’s highest office is a privilege which holds the recipient to a higher standard or an office in which no standards apply.
As obvious and logical as the correct answer seems, the race between Harris and Trump is close … it could go either way. There is no room for complacency.