How to Grapple with Having a Child Rapist as President

Funny thing: I hated Dick Cheney, like hated him with a visceral, almost incomprehensible level of hate. And I'll accuse him of all kinds of horrific things, but you know what I'd never say about him? That he himself is a rapist. I'm not saying he didn't cover for those who rape and torture. I'm not saying he isn't sexual assault-adjacent because we saw what happened in Abu Ghraib and elsewhere. I'm simply saying that, despite my loathing of the man, I simply have no basis to say he's a rapist or that he committed any kind of sex crimes. No one was ever reported to have accused him of that. And there are plenty of people I fucking despise who I could say that about. Indeed, if false rape allegations were genuinely, widely used to attack shitty people, you'd think that a whole lot more shitty people would be falsely accused of rape.

I bring this up not to backhandedly compliment Cheney ("nice job not raping, dick"), but to point out how absolutely fucking perverse it is that anyone would defend Donald Trump by saying that any accusations against him regarding rape and assault are fake (or "fake news," as the dunderheaded like to moan, like they've made some awesome point). First off, Trump is one of the most litigious little bitches ever, and he'd sue anyone who falsely accused him. And then there's the fact that a goddamned jury found him liable for sexual assault of E. Jean Carroll. And then there are sworn depositions stating that he raped or assaulted multiple girls connected with pedophile and sex trafficker and Trump bestie Jeffrey Epstein, let alone all the free-floating allegations and stories of his lechery and violence. And that's all before you get to the tranche of 20,000 documents where Epstein and others talk about what a fucking scumbag Trump is. That doc dump is merely an amuse bouche. Think what that means is in the entree, the actual Epstein files, the documents from the investigation into Epstein that led to his arrest and "suicide," as well as the conviction of his co-pimp, Ghislaine Maxwell, now serving time relaxing on a pillow while being fed grapes by guards in exchange.

As our torrential news cycle moves on to the next thing (the clusterfuck of stupidity over Russia's peace plan for Ukraine or Marjorie Taylor Greene punking out on Congress or the upcoming war with Venezuela for "reasons" or whatever disaster/conflagrations/fresh fuckery occurs while I'm writing this), we're still waiting for the next shoe drop, or, really, the next truckload of shoes to drop now that some version of the Epstein files are going to be released. Whether or not Trump has had his name redacted out of them or if those documents are held back for "national security" or because Trump ordered the Department of Justice to "investigate" Democrats associated with the scandal, one thing is certain: we will likely have to grapple with the idea that the president of the United States is, at best, someone who looked the other way while a close friend and associate ran a sex trafficking ring. Or, as seems likely, is himself a child rapist (and, yes, 15 year-old girls are children - let's not even entertain that weird discussion). The worst case scenario is that Trump himself was involved in trafficking, something that is, sadly, awfully, not outside the realm of possibility.

So what the fuck do we do with that? It's not meant to be a glib question. Think about the implications for, well, everything. We can assume that Republicans in Congress will live in denial or be ordered to do so or be intimidated into doing so, and thus removal from office isn't a possibility. So that means everyone from world leaders to everyday citizens will have to deal with a child rapist. How much shit can we stomach? And what does that say about us if we as a country don't have the will or the energy or, goddamn us, the interest in demanding that we not have a child rapist as president? We've sunk pretty fucking low pretty fucking fast in these last 10 months (sorry, that's how long he's been back in office, even though it feels like forever). Trump and his Republican lackeys have caused massive suffering and massive amounts of deaths. How fucking strong is the camel's back? How much can Trump corrupt everyone around him?

I wish I had the answer. Or maybe I do and I fucking hate it. We've already seen some pretty goddamn intense compartmentalization and denial in the fact that so many people seem to have no issue making nice with a court-adjudicated rapist of an adult, let alone a convicted felon (no, really, that all happened). Every single time someone is smiling next to him for a photo, they are giving the thumbs-up to Trump's crimes. So maybe that's who we are. Maybe we are so used to how shitty we've become that nothing penetrates our protective shell made of historical callouses.  

Or maybe, just maybe, the attention given to the Epstein files as some kind of Rosetta Stone of the corruption of the elites will have shifted the brain chemistry of enough people, especially those in some kind of position of power, that something will give, that maybe, finally, something is appalling enough.

But I'm not gonna hold my breath.