You Can't Handle the Truth

You’ll hear it said that the Republican Party has an identity problem and that, after this election, the party leaders will have some real soul-searching to do.

There is a large swath of the electorate who feel they've been left behind and that nobody cares about them, their lives, or their children.  These are the people that Trump attracts.  Unfortunately for them, his promises to them are lies.  He could never deliver on those promises.  There will be no wall.  There will be no deportation force.  He doesn't seem to understand how legislation gets passed in a democracy.  Congress will never approve any of his plans that cost too much.  

But the problem is that those people aren’t going away once the election is over.  They are convinced, now, that the jobs that have been lost in the Rust Belt can be magically brought back by a wizard with orange hair, and that if he loses the election it will be because our democracy has failed.  He should tell them the truth: that those jobs are gone forever and illegal immigrants didn’t take them.  A new economy and technology did.  

I live in Arizona and I have an Etsy shop selling hand dyed silk.  I received an order yesterday from a woman in a village in the United Kingdom.  I will ship her silk that I buy from China.  That's the kind of interconnected world we live in now.  There are between 6.7 and 9.7 million people who are making a living selling on eBay.  Another 1.6 million are active sellers on Etsy.  They may not even show up in the employment statistics, but they are independent entrepreneurs who are not depending on the government to make everything OK.   

It is a global economy and candidates who don't recognize that truth are dangerous.  

My heart goes out to those Trump supporters who haven't learned to think critically; who don't read a variety of opinions in order to decide what makes sense to them; who resemble the German populace in the Hitler days, following a pied piper who is as ill-informed as they are.  

I'm Ignoring Trump

When it all began, we thought it was humorous.  The idea of the larger-than-life reality showman running for any political office, let alone the Presidency.  The only thing anyone knew about him was that he was rich and like to fire people.  As time went on, the joke became less funny.  And, finally, when it looked as though he would definitely be the Republican candidate, it got scary.

The major news folks - from CNN to the Twitterverse - have given Trump millions of dollars of free coverage.  Every word he utters seems to be news.  Why?  I'm damned if I know.  We have a sitting President, and his activities and speeches are not covered as much as the lies and exaggerations of Mr. Trump.  

Everyone seems to be concerned about the image he's giving our country.  It's not just on Facebook that people are saying they will move to Canada.  I said it last night.  Mitch McConnell tries to reassure us that the structure of our government will protect us from Trump's unconstitutional and racist ideas.  But we have had presidents in the past who were willing to break the law to have their way.  Certainly, I can imagine Trump ignoring our laws because he thinks he knows better.

The one sure thing that would straighten things out a bit is if the media just ignored him.  Let him make his speeches, criticize whomever he wants, threaten each and every minority, and make promises he cannot keep - just don't cover the story.  That's what Megan Kelly did.  We've heard enough to form an opinion.  Months more of it won't change our minds much.  Let's see the news reports of heroism in the face of floods in Texas, document the newest breakthroughs in the treatment of cancer, show us the refugees who are settling in to their new lives.  Just, please, no more Trump.