At least now Democrats can stop fucking pretending that there is any reasoning with Republicans or anyone on the right at this point. By refusing to condemn President Donald Trump's blatantly racist statements as "racist," by continuing and expanding on Trump's attacks on four non-white Democratic congresswomen in saying that they should leave the United States, by getting outraged that racism is being called racism, the GOP has ripped its mask off in the clearest way possible and gone all in on attacks on non-whites. At this point, Donald Trump could yell, "Nigger!" on Fifth Avenue and wouldn't lose any voters. And Republicans would blame whichever black person it was directed at.
Conservatives like to decry what they say is "identity politics;" that is, making policies and running candidates to appeal to a certain racial, ethnic, religious, or other background. But the GOP's appeal to white nationalists and to the idiot hordes that comprise its base is more clearly identity politics than anything Democrats have done. 'Cause, see, Trump and those who suckle at Trump's orange manteats get their votes almost exclusively from white people. By contrast, Ilhan Omar was elected with 78% of the vote in a district that is two-thirds white. I fucking guarantee you that Republican Representative Steve Scalise didn't get shit for non-white votes. But we're supposed to pretend that Omar is dividing Americans. Fuck that.
The right has been aching for a political race war. With their explicit support of Trump's "Go back to your country," now supposedly not racist "If you're not happy here, you can leave," as well as rallying around demonizing Omar, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ayanna Pressley, and Rashid Tlaib, Republicans have tied their 2020 strategy to this racist fuckery. The four progressives are the new welfare queen, the new Willie Horton, the new Mexican rapists. And they are folding that into the oldest fucking act in the conservative book: calling Democrats socialist or "commies," as a sweaty Lindsey Graham did. There's the campaign: commies and coloreds. They really did make it 1960 again.
Hell, yesterday, Trump went back to his political origin of saying that other countries send their criminals here to seek asylum. In a cabinet meeting, while doing the supposedly official business of the supposed United States, Trump said, "Why would Honduras or Guatemala or El Salvador, why would they keep their criminals when you can put them into the caravan, lose them in a caravan, and send them up to the United States. We take everybody because the Democrats don’t allow immigration laws that mean anything. It’s horrible. It’s horrible."
As a counterpoint, here's how a mother from Honduras described the circumstances that forced them to leave their home: "The family fled Honduras after Tania witnessed her mother get killed. Her sister-in-law also was a witness and was later kidnapped, tortured and slain to keep her from testifying. The gang MS-13 then posted a note on the family's door telling them they had 45 minutes to leave, Tania said. That's when the family left to seek asylum in the U.S." Yeah, it is horrible. Just not in the way our simpering racist prick of a president says it is. And his very approach, his very words are more anti-American than a million socialist candidates demanding that this nation take care of its people like nearly every other nation on earth.
Let me personalize this: I fucking love my neighborhood. I love the black women artists who live downstairs from me. I love the Latino kids who ride their bikes up and down the street with rap music on old school boomboxes playing. I love the Indian family across the street who have a disabled son whose Chinese bus driver is always overjoyed to see. I love the Dominican family behind me who have parties that always end up with musicians playing amazing tunes. I love the young Puerto Rican parents who have a car with a license frame that says, "My other car is the Tardis." I love the white people who showed up to offer comfort to the Pakistani owner of the corner bodega when his father died. It ain't perfect. We've had crime and fights and everything (although that's changed since the neighborhood has become even more diverse). But I fucking love this America. I don't know who is here legally or illegally. And I don't give a shit. I just care that we all treat each other with respect. If you don't love this, too, then you don't love this country.
That's worth fighting for. That's worth pissing off the mythical "White Working Class" (which doesn't seem to contain all those working class voters who think Trump's full of shit). That's worth having the political race war the GOP has been aching to have and has been having since 1980. Let's have this throwdown the nation has needed since the civil rights era. Let's define who we are and try to finally be absolutely fucking clear about it.
Call it like many of us have been saying for years now: If you support Donald Trump, you're racist. And fuck you. Double fuck you if you think calling you "racist" is racist, you dumb motherfuckers. And triple fuck you if you think anyone who doesn't want to get face-fucked by Donald Trump hates this country and should leave. You assholes aren't leaving over the Affordable Care Act, which is the law of the land. You assholes didn't leave over same-sex marriage. You put on your asshole hats and tried to change it. Which is the exact same thing that Ocasio-Cortez, Omar, Pressley, and Tlaib are trying to do (minus the asshole hats and with smarter tweets).
Make this election explicitly about the meaning of America, Democrats. This is our chance to take the plot of this story back from Republicans, who have controlled the narrative for most of the last three generations. Do we stand with diversity as our strength or do we stand with white nationalism? Do we stand with the right to dissent or obeisance to a leader? Jesus, we already have to get over the bar of our current racism. If it turns out that most of the country wants to be more racist and more in the thrall of a fucking moron and his moronic policies and the moronic, racist party that props up his saggy orange ass, then we'll at least be able to be fucking honest about it.
And then we can decide if fighting on is worth it or if we want to leave.
(Note: This was supposed to be part 2 of something I started last week, but, well, then this shit started. It's coming.)
