The Resistance

I don’t object to the opposition that Democrats have shown towards President Trump and his policies. The Democrats are the opposition party and their job as the opposition is to, well, oppose. I am not one who complains much about gridlock or that the government isn’t moving fast enough. As far as I am concerned, gridlock is precisely what the Founding Fathers intended when they wrote the Constitution. They were most concerned about protecting the rights and liberties of the people and did not want a situation in which the majority could vote away the rights of the minority, thus they intentionally made it difficult for the federal government to do much without a broad consensus among the people. If I wanted a government in which everyone marches together in lockstep, I would consider moving to China or North Korea. What I do object to is the way that the people most opposed to Donald Trump have taken to calling themselves “The Resistance”. Not the loyal opposition, not simply the other party who happens to have disagreements on policy, but the Resistance, as if they are fighting against an enemy occupation.

The Resistance is deliberately named to harken back to the resistance movements in France and other countries occupied by Nazi Germany during World War II. This is a ridiculous conceit on their part. The resistance fighters of World War II faced considerable danger and hardships. The Nazis were not known for their kindness towards those who fought against them and their countrymen who chose to collaborate with the Germans could be far crueller. The only danger that a resistance fighter against Donald Trump could possibly face would be being interrupted by a standing ovation in the middle of a public rant against the president or developing carpal tunnel syndrome from being at their keyboard too long. In other words, there is no danger at all in “resisting” Donald Trump. If anything, judging from recent headlines, it takes more courage to publicly support Trump, at least in such progressive strongholds as Hollywood and college campuses.

It requires no courage to be against Donald Trump. He is not a Fascist dictator who has suspended the constitution. The police will not arrest anyone who speaks out against Trump. He does not have a paramilitary army of thugs to silence dissenters. It is the “antifa” protesters who are behaving like thugs. The Resistance is just a cheap way to feel courageous and virtuous. It is a way for people to feel as though they are fighting the good fight against oppression without having to do anything about the real oppression in the world.

Who is the Resistance and what are they resisting anyway? I notice that there don’t seem to be many marginalized, and oppressed people leading the marches against Trump. The Resistance seems to be comprised of Democratic politicians, journalists and media figures, Hollywood celebrities, academia, federal workers of the so-called Deep State, and the like. In other words, the Resistance seems to be those people with the most power to influence public opinion in the country, in many cases the people who seem to despise the “Deplorables” who live in flyover country the most. I get the impression that the are actually less concerned with losing their freedom than with losing their power to hector and bully the rest of us who do not care to follow the policies they see as enlightened. Trump’s populist tone and his “political incorrectness” must be really frightening to these people.

What are they resisting if Donald Trump is not a dictator who seized power in a coup or a puppet of an occupying power? They are resisting the duly and constitutionally elected President of the United States as well as the elected representatives, of at least the majority party, in Congress. The Resistance likes to accuse President Trump of shredding the constitution, but they are the ones who have been proposing one unconstitutional means after another to remove Trump from power. After the election they were urging the electors who were pledged to support the Republican candidate to be faithless electors and vote for someone else. They have proposed that Trump’s cabinet invoke the twenty-fifth amendment to declare him unfit for office. They are now promising to impeach Trump if the Democrats regain a majority in Congress, even though there is no evidence that Trump has committed any crimes. The Resistance is resisting the results of a democratic election. They are resisting the concept of democracy in this country. They are resisting the idea that we the deplorables should have any say in the direction this country takes. They are resisting the idea that the United States should have a government of the people, by the people, for the people, wishing instead to have a government of the elites, by the elites, for the elites.

For some time now, I have had the strangest feeling that I was living in a country occupied by an enemy determined to destroy, or at least fundamentally change, every aspect that makes this country unique. It seems to me that the people who have been running this country and shaping public opinion have been doing nothing but attacking America and the ordinary people who have made it great. Our history has been disparaged as nothing more than a history of systemic oppression and racism. Our founding fathers, the greatest men who have ever lived, have been dismissed as dead, White, slaveholders. Our great heroes are defamed as racists who committed genocide. Our religion has been mocked as intolerant. Our values and our way of life are derided as old fashioned and obsolete. If we dare to take a stand and ask that our concerns be addressed, we are called racists and bigots.

Both political parties have been taking part in this. The Democrats are openly against us. The Republicans listen to us before the elections, but as soon as they get to Washington, they decide that they don’t need to keep their promises. We had the Tea Party to try to get them to listen and it has had some success, despite the unanimous opposition from the media. It wasn’t until Donald Trump ran for president that they started to notice us, and even then we were all racist deplorables. I still do not altogether trust or like Trump, but he does seem to be one of the few people in Washington who really gets it. He won the presidency by understanding why so many of us in flyover country are so upset, and he seems to really be trying to fight for us.

It is really we who are the Resistance. We are the ones fighting to restore democracy in this country. We, the bitter clingers, the Deplorables, the people who love this country and want to see it become great again are the revolutionaries against the people who think there that this country was never really great and who want to see it transformed into something quite different. Donald Trump is the leader of this resistance movement, for the moment, but if we want to see America great and free again, we cannot rely on any leader. We have to rely on ourselves. It is up to us all to make America a great nation. Let’s get out there and fight.

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