Be Afraid for Your Family - and Yourself

This is one of the most important elections in US History. Don't pretend it's not.

Two weeks from now, the third most consequential election in this country’s 246-year history will be held, and it seems like even at this late date, too many Americans are not yet taking it seriously. We are on the precipice, potentially experiencing a dramatic transformation of everything the United States has been and what its future was meant to be. We have demonstrated the growth and gradual improvement in the lives of citizens that can come from a democracy. We are flawed, no doubt, but to use that as an excuse to ignore voting in this year’s midterm elections is surrendering the lives and well-being of millions of Americans to a collapse engendered by ignorance, self-righteousness and apathy.

While this is the third most important election, the other two are quite close in time. In 2016, many political commentators, including me, wrote endless streams of words and spoke almost nightly on television news programs about the unique dangers that would be posed by the election of Donald Trump. Too many people ignored the threat - shrugging their shoulders with a “why not try” attitude, voting for Trump out of a misplaced anger believing in conspiracy theories pushed by Russian disinformation specialists about Senator Bernie Sanders being somehow cheated when in fact more than 4 million people voted for Hillary Clinton in the primaries, or just sitting out the vote because “I don’t like her” or “she hasn't appealed to me, as if elections were a like a high school popularity contest.

Many of us - particularly business reporters like me who had covered Trump for decades - knew he was dangerous. We learned long ago that he is a pathologic liar, a malignant narcissist, who will destroy anyone who didn't praise him enough or do anything for someone who complimented him. We warned that this country would lose abortion rights, that voting rights would be more fully compromised, and that it would be pushed rapidly toward a future that threatened women, African Americans, Jews, the LGBTQ community, and anyone else who wasn’t a white male protestant conservative. Because too many didn’t listen, Roe v Wade is gone, the Voting Rights Act has been rendered toothless and obstructions to the ballot box not seen since the 1960 erected, antisemitism is at record highs for the modern world, LGBTQ people are called “groomers” and teens struggling with their sexuality or gender identity have been pushed further back into the closet.

Why was it worth it? What damn point were people trying to prove in 2016 by ignoring the danger this man posed, failing to take the election seriously? I will never know. (Unfortunately, too many protest voters read those kinds of sentiments and say variations of “Well, why should I vote if you say things like that?” Because this country is about more people than you. Because we need to protect those most in danger. And if you don’t see that, if that is not important to you, then stop reading now.)

The second most important election in our history was in 2020. Had Trump reached the White House again, no doubt NATO and every alliance we have with democracies would have been shattered by this megalomaniac. More civil rights would be sacrificed. The COVID nightmare would have continued far longer because, put simply, the Trump Administration was incompetent, and not only would have been unable to distribute vaccines but - as Trump made clear - states that didn’t praise him enough, like Washington and New York, would be blocked from getting them.

Which brings us to the election in two weeks. As everyone knows, the Republican Party, which once might have been considered likely to restrain Trump’s insanity, has abandoned any pretense of caring for the survival of democracy, the strength of our alliances, the opinions of the majority of Americans, and the well-being of our citizenry. All that matters to them is knowing that they must kowtow to Trump in order to keep an office than makes them rich and ensures they will get the best seats at Georgetown restaurants. It is fundamentally amazing how little it took for the GOP to abandon America, but that is the danger we face. This is a party that does not care the most violent assault on our democracy took place because of their God King; if they regain the House and the Senate in two weeks, the assaults will continue, this time from the houses of Congress.

Throughout his entire life - traceable all the way back to when he was in military school - Trump has always claimed that, if he didn’t win, someone else cheated him. A high school chemistry test, a verdict in a court case, a bad Wall Street analyst review, an Emmy Award, the Iowa Caucuses, even when a Trump enemy won Scotsman of the Year in 2012, this narcissist blamed voter fraud. Now, just because this “I never lose” maniac made the fully predictable - and often predicted - claim that he did not lose the 2020 election, at least 300 Republicans are running for office saying the same thing. When these once-fringe people get into office, does anyone think that our democracy will survive their hunt for imagined “voter fraud? To these people, voter fraud means a Republican lost. That’s it.

We are suffering under minority rule in this country, because the Founders did not anticipate how America would grow. But when the minority in power is anti-democracy, they will kill democracy. When they are pro-autocrat, they will install autocracy. When they spew endless hate and Christian nationalism, they will try to take us ultimately to a theocracy.

Sounds absurd? How about this: Trump is appearing with major national candidates, including some running for Senate, and playing music that is recognized by members of QAnon, the bizarre cult that believes - among other frighteningly irrational things - that Democrats operate a series of underground tunnels around the country where they take kidnapped children (or breed children), sexually abuse them, murder them, drink their blood and worship Satan. I follow a number of QAnon conversation sites, primarily because the FBI has identified these people are terrorist threats. They dream of mass-executions of Democrats on television. They want Democrats tortured. They are antisemites who say they don’t believe Hitler went far enough. How many believe this? One-quarter of the Republican Party. That is tens of millions of people. And the man worshipped by the cult, Donald Trump, sends out memes with QAnon phrases on them and uses their language and plays their music because, in his words he stated while president, “I hear they like me.”

So many of us warned in 2016. So many of us are warning now. If the Republican Party sweeps into office in 2022, held back only by the presidency, they will be fully prepared to steal the White House in 2024, and reinstall a man with a deep mental illness and a personality disorder.

A few months back, my wife and I left Texas, in large part because we saw the hate, ignorance, extremism, and Christian nationalism take over the state. We fled to a blue state, but if Republicans, in the minority, get too much control, even blue states, dictated to by an extremist Congress and a radical Supreme Court, might begin to look like Texas does now.

Just before we left Texas, we had a dinner with a number of our friends. At some point, someone mentioned seeking citizenship in another country out of fear for America’s future. One after another, couples at that dinner table admitted that they were preparing to have a way out, if necessary: Italian, Scottish, Portuguese, and Mexican citizenship were being sought by the different families. I told them, my family had just been awarded German citizenship, while retaining our American one. I particularly wanted our children to be able to flee, if things get too horrible here.

Even though we have a way out, I fear for my family. You should, too. All you have to do to preserve your, your children’s and your grandchildren’s future is to vote. For God’s sake, don’t sacrifice your life on the altar of apathy or ignorance. America and those who will struggle the most don’t deserve it.