I’ve spent the past few weeks working to formulate my response, practical as well as philosophical, to the election of Donald Trump. During this time, I have been appalled to hear well-meaning Democrats, from President Obama to Chuck Shumer and even Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, express a willingness to work with Mr. Trump on issues of common interest (infrastructure being the only one that readily comes to mind). I am appalled because the notion of compromise, while normally appealing, only works when both parties are acting in good faith. For instance, if I want to go to the movies and my friend wants to go bowling, both of us desire to have an enjoyable evening–we just disagree how to go about achieving that end. And to give an example of greater import, most Democrats and most Republicans are genuinely interested in addressing poverty; so while the left may want to raise taxes and the right may want to cut them, both are working toward a mutual goal.
In these cases, compromise can result in a palatable and workable solution that, while not ideal, can result in positive change. And yet, I have decided to come down hard on the view that one must not work or compromise with Donald Trump, regardless of the issue at hand. Why? Because to compromise with a man who cares about nothing but himself, who traffics in bigotry and populism and racism and division, is to legitimatize and acquiesce to all that he stands for. What’s more, it is to assume that he is acting in good faith and not, as is the sad reality, only in the interest of himself and his cronies.
One could respond to this approach by saying, “Well now, aren’t you just trying to copy the Republicans, who even before Obama became president had already decided to obstruct him at every turn so as to ensure his failure?” The answer to that is, yes and no. It’s clear that part of the reason why Republicans now control the House, Senate, President, and a majority of state legislatures and governorships, is that they have a simple message that is all about “winning.” Democrats, in contrast (and as a broad generalization), tend try to sell a nuanced message rather than do what it takes to win. Don’t believe me? Consider that, for fear of appearing to meddle in the election, Obama refused to bring up Russia’s hacking until after election day. Put another way, the right adheres more to an “ends justify the means” approach than does the left. I’m not impugning this tactic so much as noting it: I’ll leave it to others to decide which is “better.”
But beyond the notion of winning and losing, which might be applicable under normal circumstances, these are scary, dangerous, and unprecedented times. The things Trump proposes to do can easily lead us down a dark road to tyranny, autocracy, and war. Unfortunately, whereas to take but one example, the Republicans’ refusal to consider Obama’s Supreme Court nominee–who was really a middle-of-the road, consensus pick–was bad for the country (an eight-person Supreme Court simply can’t effectively function) but good for their political prospects, a refusal to vote on the likely far right nominee from Trump would be good for the country but bad for the Democrats’ political future. Somehow intransigence has rewarded the right, so that forcing a government shutdown or holding up judicial and other appointees has, instead of making them unpopular, instead further increased the support of their constituents.
I say unfortunately because I fear that the left will now try to avoid the appearance of intransigence in the interest of gaining seats in the House and Senate in 2018. This strategy, however, assumes two things: first, that we can afford to work with a demagogue, and second that “the people” will penalize opposition. The former will lead to disaster and the latter, I believe, is wildly incorrect: Americans are generally centrist, and I don’t think they will fault Democrats for denying Republicans the opportunity to gut social security, appoint radical judges, cut taxes for the wealthy, privatize schools, and allow the oil and gas industry to run roughshod over the land.
Let’s not forget that Republicans voted to repeal the Affordable Care Act over sixty times despite the impossibility of success, and even though the law is a good-faith attempt to solve the critical failures in our health insurance system. In contrast, Trump will, on day one of his presidency, almost certainly be in violation of the spirit and the letter of laws designed to prevent the person holding the highest office in the land from personally benefiting from that immense power. With that in mind, I propose that not only should Democrats filibuster and oppose anything he tries to do, but that they also attempt to impeach him over 60 times, no matter how remote their chances of success.
In short, the proper response to hatred is to be unyielding in opposition to it; evil must never be legitimized. One of the lessons of history is that in the 1930s, when Hitler was still relatively weak and easy to stop, far too many people, still wounded from the first World War and eager to avoid another, chose the path of appeasement. At the same time, the United States was caught up in an America-first mindset that prevented us from intervening, even after Hitler had invaded Poland and Britain was begging us for assistance.
The question now is, will we appease Mr. Trump, or will we stop him before he strips minorities of their rights, deports millions of people, devastates public institutions, brings never-before-seen levels of corruption to government, and so on? For even if we fail to stop him from everything he hopes to do–the president’s power is, in practice, very difficult to check–we can at least tell our children that when all seemed hopeless, we did everything in our power to maintain a flickering light of hope for the future.
Some of my other posts and poems about Trump:
The Election and the Aftermath
Complacency
The First Step to Tyranny
If They Come
We Cannot Afford to Make This the New Normal
As the Nation Went Insane
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