Have our elected officials abandoned and then forgotten us?  I don’t know about you but I sure feel like they have.  Further, have all those people who said all the things that they were well-coached to say to get their potential constituents’ votes when they were trying to get elected been stricken with amnesia?!  Come on!  Remember how they named all these things that we – their constituents, “the American People” overall, and our country need and how much they would value the privilege to work with their friends across the aisle to assure that those needs are met?

Didn’t they project the idea that they wanted to be public servants because they wanted to serve a cause greater than themselves?  Doesn’t it now seem that all those patriotic images that their smooth rhetoric aroused in you when they alluded to a life of public service and a cause greater than themselves have long ago faded?  Doesn’t it now seem like all those words that engendered thoughts of patriotism in you were just a mask to hide their desire for a life of self-service so they could line their pockets and acquire as much power as possible?

Can you recall occasions in these current highly partisan and completely polarized times how when a candidate or elected politician referred to “friends across the aisle,” and they used the adjective “Republican” preceding “friends” if they were a Democrat and “Democrat” preceding “friends” if they were a Republican, that many times when coming from the Republican side of the aisle these words were ladened with vitriol?  That is because now that this is the Trump Republican Party, many Republicans, especially elected Republicans, refuse to use the adjective “Democratic” when referring to Democrats or things that are in any way associated with Democrats out of fear that it might somehow give Democrats a political advantage.

As a result, most Republican candidates running for office have adopted this same approach when referring to Democrats or things associated with Democrats i.e. Democratic Party, Democratic policy, Democratic Dogma, etc.  Instead, they use the words Democrat Party, Democrat policy, Democrat Dogma, etc.  As regards Independents, since you can choose which Party you will caucus with, I assume that as Independents you are not under any pressure to choose one or the other of these adjectives so the decision as to which to use is entirely yours.

As for me and my feelings of being abandoned and then forgotten by elected officials, I feel that way because of: 1) the rude awakening that I have been shocked into.  The rude awakening of witnessing elected politicians that I viewed as principled, strong, and powerful individual men and women who form the collective strong body of our government and way of life, be cowered to the point where they kowtow to a superficial charlatan who is a proven serial liar who has been convicted of 34 felony counts and who is still awaiting trials, which he has cunningly managed to delay, until after the 2024 presidential election in which he is the presumptive Republican nominee.

2) The rude awakening that I have been shocked into.  The rude awakening of witnessing one man, a superficial charlatan who is a proven serial liar who has been convicted of 34 felony counts and who is still awaiting trials, which he has cunningly managed to delay, until after the 2024 presidential election in which he is the presumptive Republican nominee, twist the American judicial system into a Trump-conjured pretzel starting with the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS).

Is the SCOTUS, under the leadership of Chief Justice John Roberts, aiding and abetting Trump in his attempt to avoid being held to account for the crimes he has been convicted of and other crimes that he is accused of committing before the 2024 presidential election?  If it is not, it certainly appears that it is.  The SCOTUS, to which Trump appointed three justices in his one term as The Donald J. Trump of the United States of America and to whose conservative justices he on many occasions has referred to as “my judges,” has slow-walked a decision on whether he has complete presidential immunity; immunity against any crimes that he might have committed as The Donald J. Trump of the United States of America.

3) The rude awakening that I have been shocked into.  The rude awakening of witnessing one man, a superficial charlatan who is a proven serial liar who has been convicted of 34 felony counts and who is still awaiting trials, which he has cunningly managed to delay, until after the 2024 presidential election in which he is the presumptive Republican nominee, twist the American judicial system into a Trump-conjured pretzel by working his will upon, in addition to the SCOTUS, four courts where he is to be held to account for crimes that he is accused of committing.  Even in the court that managed to try and convict Trump, he thumbed his nose at the gag order placed on him the entire time during that trial.  Despite the intimidating atmosphere in which they had to work, the jurors in this court did their job and, although not everyone agrees with it, returned a fair verdict.  Trump will be sentenced on July 11, 2024.  It remains to be seen as to what his sentence will be.  Will the judge do his job?  Without doubt, not everyone will agree with the sentence; but it will be fair.  Hopefully the punishment will fit the crimes and Trump’s defiance of the gag order will also be incorporated into the sentence.

4) The rude awakening that I have been shocked into.  The rude awakening of witnessing one man, a superficial charlatan who is a proven serial liar who has been convicted of 34 felony counts and who is still awaiting trials, which he has cunningly managed to delay, until after the 2024 presidential election in which he is the presumptive Republican nominee, twist the American judicial system into a Trump-conjured pretzel by making a mockery of the flowery words “no one is above the law” and “without fear or favor” that are so frequently used by America’s high-level judicial government officials.  These words have been made meaningless by Trump.  Arguably, he has been treated favorably from the beginning and it remains to be seen whether he is above the law.  So, as regards whether the law is being applied to Trump “without fear or favor,” … well, you have witnessed what is going on in Trump’s case; you decide.

And finally, 5).  The rude awakening that I have been shocked into.  The rude awakening of witnessing one man, a superficial charlatan who is a proven serial liar who has been convicted of 34 felony counts and who is still awaiting trials, which he has cunningly managed to delay, until after the 2024 presidential election in which he is the presumptive Republican nominee, twist the American judicial system – and as a result – the American election system into a Trump-conjured pretzel that enabled him to arrange to participate in a debate with the President of the United States of America!  Yes, on June 27, 2024 the President of the United States of America will be debating a convict in an effort to help Americans to decide as to whether he or a convicted felon should be the next president of the United States of America.  Wow, that will be a first!

Whether or not you feel that you have been abandoned and then forgotten by our elected officials, the current situation that America is in demands that you do your civic duty and vote.  No matter how many roadblocks are placed in our path when it is time to vote in the 2024 presidential election, we must overcome them.  Instead of getting angry or booing at the ridiculous things that Trump says and does; in the words of former president Barack Obama, don’t get mad, vote!  Don’t boo, vote!

So always remember, whether you are a Democrat, Republican, or Independent, your vote is the most important one of all…unless you don’t use it!

Eulus Dennis – author, M2: Street Cop To Top Cop, Operation Rubik’s Cube, and Living Between The Line

The Republican Party has gone completely crazy; they are unhinged.  In addition to all the scandals that the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is already involved in, SCOTUS Samuel Alito (a member of the SCOTUS conservative supermajority) is now embroiled in a scandal that involves flying an upside-down American flag at one of his homes and an “Appeal to heaven” flag at another.  Both these flags were carried by those involved in the January 6, 2021 insurrection/riot and are considered by many Americans to indicate support of the January 6^th insurrection/riot and those that participated in it.  Yet, Justice Samuel Alito refuses to recuse from cases that will come before the SCOTUS related to the January 6^th event, Trump’s request for complete presidential immunity, or any other cases involving Trump and his legal woes.

In addition to the SCOTUS, Republicans in the Senate and House have gone all-in in support of Trump.  Some of them, including Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, went to New York and appeared in court during Trump’s Hush Money Trial and stood behind him in support as he spoke to the press during pauses in the trial for breaks.  Since then, many of them – again, including Speaker Johnson, have referred to the trial as rigged, a sham, a disgrace, and used other denigrating terms to describe it.  Speaker Mike Johnson even went so far as to say that the SCOTUS should get involved and overturn Trump’s conviction, in which he was unanimously convicted of all 34 counts against him by a jury of his peers.  Imagine that; Speaker Mike Johnson, the self-proclaimed Constitutionalist who is second in line to the presidency and who is supposed to represent all Americans, is trashing the American justice system, and conducting himself like a Trump defense attorney!

Once again Republicans have circled the wagons around one of their own.  It does not matter that he has publicly stated that he will be a dictator if he is elected to be president again.  It does not matter that he is a convicted felon.  Trump is their man; he is their presumptive presidential nominee.  Virtually every Republican in the United States congress is supporting Trump whether overtly, covertly, or by their deafening silence!  Not only are these Republicans supporting Trump but most Republicans throughout America are supporting him.  Big business has lined up behind Trump and is holding fundraising activities to help him get elected.  Most everyday Americans, and without doubt, these elected officials and business executives know that Trump is not fit for office.  Notwithstanding, their lust for dominance, money, and power compels them to disregard Trump’s true nature and his existential threat to democracy.  As a result, they view the concerns by many Americans that Trump is unfit for office as an overreaction and discount the real damage that he is currently doing to the country and the greater damage that he can do if he is elected president.  This is shortsighted, frightening, shameful, and disappointing.

Many of Trump’s sycophants and other supporters are encouraging rich Republicans to “come off the sidelines and get involved,” encouraging Republican congressmen to withhold funding from prosecutors conducting the Trump trials, encouraging Republican Attorneys General throughout America to investigate Democrats and do anything else that they can to “defeat these [Democratic] communist.”  Some congressmen are even threating to impede Biden appointments as a protest to Trump’s conviction.  In the meantime while all of this is going on – despite his gag orders, Trump is busy calling Special Counsel Jack Smith a “deranged dumb son-of-a-bitch” calling DOJ employees bastards, and spouting lies and denigrating nearly everyone else who is not pro-Trump in his upcoming trials and the one trial in which he was recently found guilty on all counts, Rudy Giuliani is calling District Attorney Fani Willis a “Ho”, and Representative Byron Donald is telling Black Americans how much better off we were under Jim Crow than we are now.  The amazing part about all of this is that no one in the Republican Party is pushing back on any of this.  They are completely silent!

The 2024 election is a little less than five months from now and the Republican Party is going full speed ahead in their effort to get Trump elected president.  Trump visited capitol hill Thursday and his congressional toadies were there to welcome and support him.  Many of us are asking ourselves, what have we come to as Americans and how could things have ever come down to this?!  My thoughts?  Complacency: we have taken our freedom for granted for so long that we have forgotten that freedom is not free!  It comes at a price and we must fight for it every day by regularly and faithfully performing our civic duty.  That does not only mean that we must vote, but we have a responsibility to stay informed and keep abreast of what is going on in politics whether we like it or not.  To invoke a currently popular slogan, when we see something, we must say something!  We must say it to our elected officials and keep pressure on them to do something about it.  If we do not do this or wait too long before doing it, we will end up in a situation like the one that America is in now.  Hopefully, our current situation is only temporary, one that can be reversed, and one that we will learn from.

We have a two-party system of government in America.  Because we live in a democracy, we have a right to expect reasonable discourse to occur between the two political parties in order to solve America’s problems and foster effective governance based on the will of the majority.  We are a country that believes in the rule of law.  That is key in a democracy and what makes it function effectively.  If we discard the rule of law, work in any way to rig the system in favor of minority rule, trash our justice system and refuse to accept the decisions made that are based upon the rule of law and our overall democratic system, then we are no longer a democracy; we just have not formerly established and declared that we are something other than that!  Right now, only one Party is conducting itself like a Party that believes in democracy and the rule of law.  Only one Party is fighting to preserve those precious, irreplaceable things that are the foundation of a democratic system of government.  That Party is the Democratic Party.  Do you want a democracy or something else?  The choice is a binary one.

Again, the 2024 presidential election is a little less than five months away; you must choose.  If you want a Democracy, the Democratic Party is your only logical choice.  Yes, the Republican Party says that it is the Party of the rule of law and it is their Party that wants to save America and the American democracy.  But, in the words of Rachael Maddow, “watch what they do, not what they say.”  Keep a close eye on what Republicans have been doing since Trump’s one term as president and what they are doing now; not what they have been saying since then and are now saying!  To save our democracy, you must do your civic duty and vote.  So always remember, whether you are a Democrat, Republican, or Independent, your vote is the most important one of all…unless you don’t use it!

Eulus Dennis – author, M2: Street Cop To Top Cop, Operation Rubik’s Cube, and Living Between The Line