2024: Democracy Is On The Ballot
2024 is not an election of choice. It is an election of our duty to protect our Democracy.
Democracy is meant to be about choice.
Politicians line up and share their competing ideologies, policies, and plans. They take the stage a few times to respectfully debate their differences in order to help the voting public decide who is better to represent the people, who is more fit to serve.
Every election, both midterms and Presidential, I would review each candidate regardless of their party.
What were their positions?
Who seemed most likely to deliver on their promises?
Who could work with others in Congress to get things accomplished?
In 2010 I voted for Scott Brown(R) for the Senate. In 2012 I voted for Elizabeth Warren(D). I’ve voted for Independents and both parties at most levels of government over the years, although I’ve yet to ever vote for a Republican President.
Then, in 2016, America and our political system fell off the rails. There was no question that Trump was unfit to serve as President. I, like the majority, voted for Hillary Clinton. Sadly those votes weren’t enough.
After the results were final I posted to Facebook asking how we were supposed to explain the result to our daughters. I had one daughter at the time. I now have two and my wife is pregnant with a third.
What country were they going to inherit from us as they came into adult hood?
What mess were we going to leave for them as progress slid backwards?
Their rights were under attack.
The man elected President not only had no respect for women, he had contempt instead. He also held no respect for America, Democracy, or even the world.
Trump made friends with authoritarians such as Putin and Xi. He still speaks fondly of them today. He repeatedly stoked hatred, division, and violence.
Despite all of this, his following held strong. MAGA was proud of this man.
Being voted out of office wasn’t accepted by Trump. A country that had always had a peaceful transfer of power. Trump was determined to change that. He fired up his followers to the point of insurrection. Fortunately, the coup failed, but his movement continued on.
The 2022 midterms were overall an embarrassing defeat for Republicans. However, the GOP did gain a slim majority in The House and MAGA congress members seized on the moment to cement their own control.
McCarthy is little more than a puppet for their warped agenda.
Now, Trump is the frontrunner for the GOP nomination yet again. We saw how bad he was for America when he held the position before but that doesn’t matter to his followers.
MAGA doesn’t want a just country or a true Democracy. They want power and oppression. They want their idealized America where only a certain group gets to live the American dream, the rest must accept inferiority.
Trump is once again calling for violence heading into this election. He wants everyone to be afraid to confront him, afraid to hold him accountable.
But America is not afraid, it is standing strong.
There is no choice when Trump is on the ballot. The only answer is to prevent him from ever holding office again. To make him a sad footnote in American history that serves as a reminder to all future autocrats that they cannot win.
The election doesn’t stop there. The MAGA hold on The House must be broken.
Jim Jordan is leading a sham of a “Weaponization of Government” committee with an agenda instead of facts. Unsurprisingly he distorts the events of those committee hearings to serve his own narrative.
Jordan is also the person who wouldn’t comply with a congressional subpoena but now wants to issue a subpoena to a DA who is prosecuting Trump for state level crimes. This is not only hypocritical, it is a violation of states rights.
Matt Gaetz has said he wants to disband the ATF, defund the FBI, and shut down the Department of Education. He also routinely uses tyrannical rhetoric such as saying the FBI needs to “come to heel” to himself, and that other Republicans who don’t support him will “feel his power”. He praises Trump at every turn, not because he believes in Trump, but because he wants Trump’s MAGA supporters. Gaetz wants his own mob.
Marjorie Taylor Greene continues to be a disgrace to America. After the latest school shooting, the 130th mass shooting so far in 2023 in only 87 days, Greene spent her time attacking trans people. She dove head first into spreading hate and saying we needed even more guns in our country. Apparently 400 million firearms isn’t enough for a population of 330 million.
Greene doesn’t care if innocent people die. She has harassed school shooting victims in the past, all while believing in conspiracy theories that the school shootings were staged. She began with QAnon and continues to lie on a daily basis.
Lauren Boebert also supports more guns. She has even used her Christian beliefs as a basis for owning high powered assault rifles. It isn’t the second amendment to her, it is a right bestowed by God.
This extremist version of Christianity is a growing part of the Ultra MAGA movement. All hatred, all violence, any and all attacks on Democracy itself are ok because that is what God wants. It doesn’t matter that we are a non-religious government with separation of church and state.
Andy Biggs is like the rest of MAGA and denies that Jan 6 was an insurrection. He even attempted to claim that none who have been jailed were convicted of insurrection. They were. His denial might be driven from the fact that he was directly part of the attempt to discredit the election and to find ways to change the results. Biggs continues to be one of the most loyal supporters of Trump.
Josh Hawley is simply a fool. One who raised his fist to show support to the Jan 6th mob. The same one who ran away from them later.
He has no real agenda. Hawley flounders every day trying to find something to talk about, whatever he may be able to build some outrage around. He does not believe in working for the people.
There are more MAGA members of Congress and they are all similar. None of them care about Democracy, only the power of their own movement. They all want Donald Trump back as President.
They’ll all undermine our Democracy whenever it serves their own needs. They have no actual policy goals outside of their own culture war. They will do nothing about gun control, even as innocent children are murdered again and again.
Not all Republicans are MAGA, but they allow the movement to not only exist, but to hold power in their party.
There is no choice in 2024.
Until the Republican party removes MAGA from its ranks, disavows their movement, disavows hatred and white supremacy, and until they respect our country once again, then the GOP must remain in the minority.
Republicans simply can’t be allowed to have the majority of either the Senate or the House.
Even with MAGA gone, the Republican Party would need to show that it cares about America more than lobbyists and corporations.
They would need to:
Support reasonable gun control legislation
Restore women's right to abortion
Support government healthcare
Support higher wages for workers
The most ridiculous part of this list is that Republican voters already support these initiatives. The GOP wouldn’t be changing who they are, they’d be respecting the wishes of their own constituents. Which is exactly what politicians are meant to do.
It will be a humbling moment for Republicans to be shut out of yet another election. But maybe, just maybe, it will finally lead to some soul searching which in turn will lead to a better party after they sweep up the shattered pieces and rebuild anew.