The Fork in the Road

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In a constantly overwhelming tsunami of discouraging events and negative changes in our culture, it is curious to suddenly see a brief pause in all the craziness.  This whole Kavanaugh/Judicidary episode opened a fissure in the apparently impenetrable Trumpian pall that envelops the nation.

The appearance of Dr. Christine Blasey Ford onto the scene has surgically poked a hole in the constant monotony of endless Republican misdeeds, obfuscation, misdirection and lies.  She made all of us stop and just listen…listen to the clear voice of pain caused by sexual assault.  She opened a window that is usually obscured by our cultural acceptance of white privilege and misogyny.  In fact without accusing anyone other than her assailant, her story ignited a firestorm among the more than 25% of our female population that has suffered sexual assault and the over 80% of women who had suffered some sort of sexual harassment in their lives.  And as simple as it might seem, just two passionate victims in an elevator forced a connection with only one man—Jeff Flake—who was perhaps the only man in America who could and did….finally…..pull us all up short so that we as a nation could take reasonable steps to ascertain the truth. 

This is such an interesting moment in our history.

For the past several years we, the people, have been victims of political maneuvering and shenanigans affecting all our lives, but affording us very little control over those who exert political power.  The power elite in America (the billionaires, the lobbyists, the corporate conglomerates) have been using their vast wealth to influence policy and practice in the form of tax policy, tax rebates, mismanagement of our tax payments, impeding voter registration, making war for profit and on and on.  We have felt powerless to stop it or even to put a small dent in it.

The problem is too big to solve.  It is too hard to get in front of train going a hundred miles an hour and hope to change its course or bring it to a halt, or even slow it down.  And then, suddenly, something like the Kavanaugh moment wakes everyone up to the speeding juggernaut heading for an impenetrable wall.

Maybe that just happened this past week.

The veil has suddenly lifted.  People who self-righteously scream their anger and vitriol are seen for what they really are—shills for anti-democratic propaganda.  Sinister strategies are made visible, and accusations of imagined conspiracies are revealed as the canards they really are.

I would urge you who read this and generally agree with my point of view to watch Fox News for an hour or two.  You will see commentator after commentator twisting the truth and fomenting unrest.  Shawn Hannity and Tucker Carlson are perhaps the worst of the lot.  Then turn the channel to MSNBC and listen to the considered opinions being expressed.  You will hear people talking and not interrupting. 

I know there are those of you who will consider MSNBC the ones who are lying and fomenting conspiratorial behavior, but if you listen closely and don’t interrupt you might begin to understand a viewpoint other than the strangulated one you possess.

All of us watched Brett Kavanaugh the other day.  We all saw the bitterness and disrespect toward Democrats and heard his accusations, presented without any evidence and witnessed his rancorous partisan vitriol.  We had a window into the character of the man that perhaps we wouldn’t have seen if it weren’t for the ‘fly in the ointment’ that Dr. Ford provided.

He certainly can be mean spirited.  He showed traits that are not pretty, and have no place on the highest court in the land.  I submit that the view we got of Brett Kavanaugh was harsh reality, and for once we have a glimpse of the true character of the man.  There can be no doubt that the majority of citizenry of the United States oppose this man being a Supreme Court Justice.  That doesn’t mean we can stop his confirmation.  We have seen that in the minds of the majority party in power there is no “We the People”, there is only “We, the majority party”, and therein is the larger problem.  But it is clear that a biased Justice who threatens, “What goes around, comes around” to any litigant who has ties to the Democratic party will result in a disaster for the Supreme Court.  The integrity of the Court and our system of justice is at stake.

But in watching this moment and seeing the slow realization on the part of the general citizenry that the push for Kavanaugh’s comfirmation has nothing really to do with ‘advise and consent’, but rather with ‘don’t ask questions, just know he will do our bidding’, gives everyone pause.

Is it too much to hope that this is the beginning of a renaissance of thought by our countrymen?  Maybe now is the time when people will stop and think about where all this is heading, and how we might pull back from the worsening state of affairs as we rush toward the precipice.  Our chance for change is coming on November 6th.

On NBC News the other night, there was a report about the discussions that families were having while  the Kavanaugh Hearing turbulence was going on.  The reporter visited a typical upper middle class family in suburban Virginia where there were two children—a boy 12 years old and girl 14 or 15 years old.  The Kavanaugh Hearings were provoking discussions between the parents and their kids and it is turning out to be a teachable moment in families.  The kids, after hearing and seeing Dr. Ford’s testimony, articulated a fulsome understanding of the presence and horror of sexual assault.  They were able to discuss how to avoid it and how to prevent it with their parents.  Frankly it was one of the only times in the past two years where I felt like something happening in the news was a positive experience for our youngsters coming of age to see.  Consider all the bad role modeling we have seen from public officials in the Trump administration and from the President himself.  This is a much better message to impart to maturing teens.

So I warily hope that this moment in time will perhaps be the fulcrum of a turn toward reasonable dialog, toward a growing awareness of the selfish and self-aggrandizing behavior of our elected Republican officials.  The Republicans on the Judiciary Committee this week were unveiled for what they are—mean spirited obstructionists and hypocrites when it comes to the rule of law and ‘fair process’ that Kavanaugh kept whining about.  They want to jam this confirmation through before the elections because they fear the rising tide of Democratic revulsion with their actions.  They want this man on the court because he will fulfill Mitch McConnell’s stated dream to change the balance to a conservative majority.  Trump wants him on the court because of Kavanaugh's position on Executive Power.

I believe that the true majority of this great country will make its presence felt in the November elections.  This is a pivotal election in the evolution of our nation, and the direction we take at this fork in the road will spell our redemption or our destruction.