So that just happened…
All of you either watched Donald Trump’s speech last night or you’ve heard about the lowlights. It was a debacle by any measure, and a reminder that – just six weeks in – Trump has somehow incompetently backed himself into a corner already. But nothing Trump said last night was as important as what one of Trump’s people said hours earlier.
Trump and his regime have been indiscriminately eliminating federal government jobs in alarming fashion. They gutted the FAA and then airplanes started falling out of the sky. Elon Musk admits he “accidentally” fired the people in charge of protecting us from Ebola, which he seemed to think was hilarious. But it’s not just that all this idiotic firing is making the country less functional or safe. It’s a lot of these people needed these jobs – particularly veterans.
Military veterans are often particularly well suited for federal government jobs. Many of them already have the background and training required. In other cases it’s a matter of giving a job to physically or psychologically disabled war veterans so that they can remain productive members of society; it’s the very least we can do for their service.
Because the Trump regime is trying to fire as many federal government employees as possible, this is hitting our military veterans particularly hard. What are they supposed to do now? Some of them can’t get a private sector job. But when Trump adviser Alina Habba (yes, the same Alina Habba who incompetently represented Trump in his criminal trial) was asked about these veterans, she said that these veterans are maybe “not fit to have a job.” No really, she said that.
So the Trump regime’s official stated position is that if a military veteran gets laid off from a federal government job, they probably didn’t deserve a job anyway. What are they supposed to do, become homeless? Beg on the streets? This is beyond insulting. These are the people who signed up to fight for their country, and now the Trump regime is telling them that if combat messed them up too much to be easily employable, it’s their own fault. Wow. Keep in mind that many military veterans, perhaps a majority of them, are Republican voters. But maybe not anymore.
At this point the Trump regime is handing us material daily that we can use to win the midterms in decisive fashion. Then we can impeach Trump, block his appointments and legislation, and slow him down enough to tie his hands for his final two years. Alina Habba’s ignorant, self defeating remark yesterday is just one example of the free advertising that the Trump regime keeps handing our side for next year’s midterms.
It’s now clear what our marching orders are: hold down the fort until next year’s midterms. Keep Trump off balance with protests, public pressure, smart messaging, and online activism so that we’re still a democracy by the midterms and can therefore retake control of that democracy.
That’s a year and a half from now, which is a long time when things are evolving this rapidly. But for now we can safely focus on just Trump’s first hundred days. Believe it or not, we’re almost halfway there (56 days to go and counting). After any President’s first hundred days, people on the fence get tired of giving him the benefit of the doubt, the media decides to go intensely negative for ratings, and that’s when a President loses momentum and leverage. So let’s focus strongly on these next 56 days. If we’re still a democracy by April 30th, there’s a good chance we’ll make it to the midterms and win them.
