Flew the Coup

Never in my wildest flights of the imagination did I dream I boarded a flight like this.   One month of Trump, though it has really been much longer, and friends and family are seriously considering leaving the country.  Leaving the country?  Yes, bailing out, seeking freedom, enlightenment, truth, and equal justice for all.  That place is not here anymore.  And my heart breaks.

Liberals and conservatives will always disagree on the programmatic implementation of their respective belief systems.  Public schools will be supported by liberals and opposed by conservatives.  Defense will always be supported, but conservatives will want to spend more.  Income tax will always be resented by conservatives and a fair and equitable taxation system will always be supported by liberals.  Viewing our population as a caste system with good guys being white males will likely always be a conservative perspective and everyone else, women, people of color, people from different areas of the world, people with different sexual orientations, and people with different points of view will always be protected by liberals.    Clear separation between religion and government will find conservative views wishing to push our nation toward a theocracy ruled by Christians while liberals stand to defend all beliefs and no beliefs at all.  Conservatives will believe that making the rich richer somehow creates more wealth and more jobs though that has never happened.  Liberals will argue that putting more money in the hands of the working class and the poor will create more wealth and more jobs.  And that belief has been sustained every time.  Every time. Liberals will support labor unions as a way for workers to negotiate with producers, but conservatives will bust them every chance they get.  There are many more, but those are the biggest sources of difference between liberals and conservatives.  We can live with that.  However, If the majority in power is free but no one else is then that is not freedom.  The fact that the nation has always prospered under enlightened leadership and always fell under conservative leadership is ignored in this debate where the conservatives see billionaires as the good guys and liberals see them as crooks seeking even more money from the rest of us. 

This debate has been waged for years.  It became the source of war in 1861.  Freedom won.   It became the source of disaster from 1929 through 1941.  The working class and the poor lost.  2008 again the working class and poor lost and the wealthy won, but the government rescued them with government spending.  FDR, Truman, JFK, Clinton, Obama, and Biden all improved the economy based on liberal ideals.  Not so much the others.  Trump, Bush, Bush II, and Reagan all left the economy in worse shape.  Eisenhower did not because he supported massive government spending to build the interstate highways system, and NASA.

Liberals see diversity as a national strength arguing one would rather live in a country people are trying to get into than one people are trying to get out of.  Hence, conservatives have ended DEI, affirmative action, etc.    

Most amusing of all is the fact that liberals will fight to the death to ensure that conservatives can believe and articulate their beliefs and it appears conservatives may fight to the death to ensure everyone thinks as they do.  Liberals believe in the tenets of democracy.  We now know conservatives do not.

Conservatives believe lies from the chief lie officers, Trump, Vance, Musk, McConnell, Fox News, Newsmax, etc.  It is important to note some of the absolute falsehoods conservatives claim to believe:

Biden stole the 2020 election from Trump.

Immigrants are felons, criminals, drug dealers.

Teaching diversity and civil liberties is not brainwashing.  Eliminating alternative views is.

The inflation rate under Biden was 9.9%.

Trump's felony convictions were witch hunts and the deep state was behind his convictions.

Trump will end inflation.

Trump will increase employment.

Tariffs benefit Americans.

A wall will keep immigrants out.

Anyone who criticizes Trump is an enemy.

Trump will leave NATO because we should not fund international peace and defense.

Trump will pull us out of the Paris Climate Accords because climate change is a hoax.

Trump will support anti-vaccination to fight pandemics.

Injecting bleach will cure COVID.

Dropping a nuclear weapon in a hurricane will end a hurricane.

Trump’s opinion is superior to the facts of math, science, and logic.

Federal employees who disagree with Trump should be fired.

Trump will make America great again by returning to a rigid white male rule, no tolerance for diverse thinking, no tolerance for criticism of Trump or his programs, ending liberal brainwashing, stopping promoting diversity, ending monitoring of big business and the stock market and consumer products, leaving kids with disabilities out of public education, ending public education funding and programs, promoting charter and private schools, and intolerance of any other point of view.

The America described above is not the America so many have fought and died for.  It does not believe that felons and sexual abusers should be able to be President.  It believes all men, (sic) are equal and should have the same rights, we are a nation of laws and no one is above the law, we are a nation free of government support religion, we believe when the votes are counted the people have spoken, we believe there should be a clear path to American citizenship, we believe we have to keep the world safe for democracy, we support the rights of sovereign nations, we will not bully friend or enemies, Russia and China and North Korea are not friends.  NATO, EU, and Pacific Accords are all friends, any nation that fights aggression and authoritarianism are friend, and any notion that promotes ending global warming is a friend. 

The ideals of America are well worth defending.  20,000 Americans left our country when Trump was first elected.  In the 2024 election, 30% of Democrats did not vote.   If one leaves now the army for truth, justice, and the American way will be greatly diminished.

We have witnessed a coup.  The beliefs and philosophy of America have been overturned by Trump.  Nixon told one lie and resigned.  Trump told over 30,000 lies in his first term and is well on his way to breaking that record.

Stand for truth.  Stand for democracy.  Stay put.  Flew the Coup will not help restore America to the nation she has always been.   That is how to make America great again.