Mr. Trump: We Don’t Need Your Civil War
Trump believes the country would fall apart without him. It won't.
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by Rich Herschlag
Mr. Trump:
Your recent half-prediction-half-threat that removing you from office would instigate a U.S. civil war is—as almost everything you do, say, or tweet—repugnant, irresponsible, and grotesquely self-serving. The most important thing about it, however, is that it is wrong.
On the face of it, the statement falls under the general megalomaniac umbrella along with many others—that only you can fix it, that your departure would cause a stock market crash and massive unemployment, that amending the Constitution to allow a third and fourth term is remotely conceivable, that the thing you mistake for your wisdom is unmatched. But the civil war threat is in a category by itself. Its underpinning is the idea that you are loved. You are not.
I say this not because I know exactly what is in the hearts of over three hundred million Americans. With the possible exception of my family and close friends I can only guess. I say this, rather, because I have an idea of what is in your heart. It certainly isn’t love. When I squint at your talking head on television or my iPad I see a dark maroon swirl sitting beneath orange straw. Your chakras are a swamp of fear, loathing, and self-hatred that make Richard Nixon’s radiance look like the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Your cacophonous shouting over the sound of a helicopter blade—real or imagined—is a hybrid of a dictator from old newsreels and a football coach who isn’t really sure of his authority. About eight seconds into this nails-on-a-blackboard experience and I usually hit the mute button, leaving me to stare at a silent animated face that often seems computer generated.
That you are emitting no love whatsoever is not merely a surmise. It is as close to scientific fact as the observation that you withheld military aid to Ukraine in exchange for a political favor. It is also a basic law of the universe that if you give no love you can receive no love. Maybe from God or your mother, but your mother is gone and God is evidently sitting this one out.
As far as the fifty million or so people you call your base, they are full of love. They love their families. They love a few of their friends. They may claim that they love their RVs, AR-15s, dirt bikes and barbecue grills but they don’t. These things are instruments, in some cases filling practical needs but most of the time providing entertainment. In other words, they are just like you—a tool.
Like any tool, they can be replaced. Love is for the irreplaceable. Love is for the profound. Love is for the entity giving love. You are none of the above.
To go out en masse and risk life and limb there has to be either love or fear, and a lot of it. The soldiers who fought for the Allies in WWII primarily loved their country. Those who fought in the U.S. Civil War in some cases loved their country, but in countless other cases were conscripted and served against their will. Nothing anything like any of that is going on here.
When the Sergeant at Arms comes to escort you to a waiting Air Force One to ship you one-way to Mar-a-Lago or a federal prison, a few members of Oath Keepers and other radical right militias may be doing drills in the woods or even piling onto flatbeds to head to Capitol Hill. That effort will be on par with the one year anniversary of the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, which was over before it began. Some of the base will be watching Fox News and grumbling. The rest of TrumpLand, I’m reasonably confident, will be replacing mufflers, cleaning out the garage, or placing bets online for the NCAA men’s basketball finals.
These people still know what they knew when they voted for you—that D.C. is broken. It was then and it is now. The difference is then it was broken in a boring way. Today it is broken in a wildly entertaining way. Entertainment is not worth dying in the streets for. There will be no entertainment Gettysburg. What there will be is more rodeos, more YouTube cat fight videos, a flurry of new hardcore porn offerings on the internet, and a deer in the headlights named Mike Pence.
(image via AP)
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“The rest of TrumpLand, I’m reasonably confident, will be replacing mufflers, cleaning out the garage, or placing bets online for the NCAA men’s basketball finals.”
And, like a bully trying desperately to disappear into a corner and not draw attention to themselves, quietly hoping nobody will point out what they’ve done.
"It is also a basic law of the universe that if you give no love you can receive no love. Maybe from God or your mother, but your mother is gone and God is evidently sitting this one out."
I'm not so sure Drumpf's own mother was that fond of him.