We’re living in a world where the rules of decorum from the office of the president have gone out the window. Decorum won’t return until Trump is pushing up daisies.
Donald Trump said he was glad that Robert Mueller, a decorated soldier and respected public servant, was dead. In true Trump fashion, he went to his Truth Social platform and posted:
Robert Mueller just died. Good, I’m glad he’s dead. He can no longer hurt innocent people! President DONALD J. TRUMP
Of course, there was an immediate backlash to the president’s comment from decent people and public servants, which was in stark contrast to the all-too-familiar silence from the testicle-free, scared-shitless Republican representatives in Congress.
After Trump’s post, I got to thinking, if I’m lucky enough to be around when Donald Trump dies, will I celebrate? Will I dance in the streets with the millions of like-minded Americans? If I do, does that make me a hypocrite for chastising the President for celebrating the death of Robert Mueller?
No, it does not.
In the same way, I would have celebrated Hitler’s death and been saddened by President Roosevelt’s death. In the same way, I would be heartened by the death of Vladimir Putin and crestfallen at the death of Volodymyr Zelenskyy. In the same way, I would have celebrated with my Munchkin brothers-in-arms at the death of the Wicked Witch of the East.
It’s natural to celebrate the death of vicious people.
Vladimir Putin attacked a sovereign nation without provocation, murdered civilians, kidnapped children, and committed war crimes. I’ll be glad when he’s dead.
In America, we celebrated the life and actions of Claus von Stauffenberg cinematically in the movie Valkyrie. Claus von Stauffenberg attempted to kill Adolf Hitler. If he had succeeded, would we have mourned Hitler’s death, or would there have been a global three cheers to Claus?
I did not feel glad or elated when Mueller, a decorated soldier and public servant, died. Robert Mueller was a decent man who served his country with honor.
Under Donald Trump, America has become the kind of nation we used to despise and oppose on the world stage — a loud-mouthed aggressor nation that denies the sovereignty of other countries and the rights of citizens and immigrants in its own, a nation that shows a blatant disregard international law, attacks the free press, bastardizes and uses religion as a tool of the state and cozy’s-up to other leaders of other authoritarian states. That is the America we’ve become, and it’s not even debatable.
To put it in a simpler context that Trump supporters might understand, Trump’s America is the Biff to Marty McFly, the Darth Vader to Luke Skywalker, the slimy Nazi general in Raiders of the Lost Ark to Indian Jones. We are officially the bad guys, and no amount of “USA! USA! USA!” chanting can cover up that fact.
And the main reason we have become the bad guy is pretty fucking simple to understand – it’s because we’re being led by a morally decrepit criminal, a convicted felon, a credibly accused pedophile and rapist, a seditionist who gave a blanket pardon to violent convicted felons who attacked our democracy. So yeah, when that guy dies, I might raise a glass.
Unfortunately for us, after Trump passes, there’s a fresh bumper-crop of the morally crazy waiting in the wings and they’ve got a blueprint in hand.
If you haven’t had a chance yet, please check out my book, My Paper, My Words: Rantings from a Progressive Boomer and Peeved Parent, from Amazon. And if you feel moved to write a review of the book, on Amazon, or anywhere else, I’d be honored.
My Paper, My Words is a collection of essays, stories, and poems that reflect the challenges of a middle-class husband and father trying to navigate a rapidly changing political, religious, and technological landscape of post-911 America.
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