1.
"Thank you!," I said to my son over the phone.
"Well, you're welcome," he replied. But why are you thanking me?"
"Thank you for electing Biden! You belong to a community which came out in force; its members overwhelmingly voted Democratic. Without its support, Trump would have won!
It's true. The African-American community voted in large numbers. Well over 80% chose Biden. Blacks are the only group who really got Trump's number. One in three Blacks live in swing state and were thus crucial in achieving a majority for Biden in these states. If non-college educated white males somehow replaced the Black population in Georgia, the largest of any state in the country, you know what would have happened. The king of the birther movement has been unveiled, revealing a babbling old Ego, a Fool with his bauble, a shameless, fey orangey head.
Comunidad latina, che pasò? Too many of you voted for him.
I recall seeing an elderly Black lady on TV, who said, "If Trump were running against a flowerpot, I'd vote for the flowerpot." That's what she said. And that's the way my son, wife, and I feel as well.
How could one support a man who wanted to bring back the death penalty in order to execute five mostly Black teens, who were railroaded into confessing a crime they didn't commit? (Even worse: when their innocence was proven after years in jail, Trump didn't want to let them out.) How can one forgive a man who promised to 'drain the swamp' of human beings, only to replace them with alligators? How can one still believe this inveterate liar? (I recall what Mary McCarthy said about Lilian Hellman: 'Even when she says a or the, it's a lie.') What else has this orangutan done? He withdrew our nation from W.H.O. and the Paris Accord; he's done nothing, with little time left, to combat climate change; he's has embarrassed America before allies; he has cozied up to dictators, etc. I could go on, but will end this list of his malfeasances with Covid! Covid! Covid! If he hadn't bungled the Covid crisis, thousands of Americans would be alive today.
2.
Many people thought there would be violence after the election. So far, there has been little.
I did my best not to pity Trump while he was in office, since he was doing such damage to our country. I imagine being a narcissist, and a particularly needy one at that, isn't easy. He certainly didn't look like he was enjoying those last press conferences.
Trained by his father to win at all costs, he sacrificed everything in the service of ego, his shameless little god with a gargantuan mouth. As president, until the epidemic hit, he had been extraordinarily lucky. The economy was good and the unemployment rate was low for most of his term. For this reason much of his nonsense and lies were glossed over. A good example of this was his insistence that he received the popular vote and that the size of the crowd at his inauguration was larger than Obama's. In the first case, he insisted that millions of illegal aliens voted for Clinton; in the second case, well, anyone who looked at the photographs could see that Obama's inaugural crowd was much larger. Liberal pundits, for a while at least, enjoyed pointing out Trump's spoiled-childlike denial of reality. Then life went on. Now that he lost the election, his inane claim that there was widespread voter fraud, is something he can't get away with; no one can alter the reality that he is eventually going to have to vacate the White House.
This is the biggest defeat Trump has had in his life; it is now part of history. Pathological narcissists can't accept defeat. I doubt if he will concede the election any time soon. I also doubt that he will ever give a concession speech. Is is not in his nature to do so.
He will go on claiming that the election was stolen from him; maybe he'll go back to "reality" TV. His claims will continue to be preposterous, but one look at him will convince a perceptive person that he knows that a rousing defeat has come to the Donald. (Another real possibility: he's going to jail.)
A narcissist's life tends to end badly, if he lives long enough. Now he's just a fat, old, angry man with a gold club. There are many such in Florida; his retirement, however, will not be a happy one.
I've written many blogs over the last four years, chronicling America's decline under Trump. I look forward to writing more on other topics. After the debacle of Vietnam and Iraq, America has little buffer room left to prevent a sad decline. We can't afford another childish, ignorant, boorish, liar like him in the White House ever again.
3.
Mozart's Don Giovanni, Act 1. Scene 1
The masked Don Giovanni has attempted to seduce Donna Anna. The scene opens as she is chasing him down the stairs. (She had screamed; the rape didn't happen). The noise awakes her father who duels with Giovanni, who kills him. Donna Anna, just before her father was killed, escapes. She returns and encounters her lover, Don Ottavio, who just happened to be walking by. (Things like this happen in opera frequently.) She explains what happens in a dramatic recitative. When she gets to high point, Ottavio believes that Don Giovanni has been successful and sings, "Ohime! Narrate--" which could be translated as, "O My God! Continue--" When he discovers that Donna Anna gave out a loud scream which sent Giovanni packing, he sings, "Respiro!" I translate this one Italian word into idiomatic English as, "I can breathe again!"
Trump has done his best to rape Lady Liberty, but, thank God, he wasn't successful.
RESPIRO!!
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