Don't give up the fight

Democrats need to understand the new environment that they are entering.

The difference between Trump’s first win in 2016 and the one this year is huge. Back then, a feeling of disbelief was quickly followed by a rush to resist. A protest movement sprung up that created slogans, bumper stickers, and headlines. Democrats organized and agitated to give Trump and the Republicans a hell of a fight. Just two years later, they captured the House in the midterms and by 2020, they controlled the Senate and White House.

This year, there seems to be just resignation. The fight is gone. Maybe it’s that Trump won both the electoral college and the popular vote, but, suddenly, nobody seems ready to man the ramparts to defend democracy. Most people have a wait-and-see mentality.

Now is not the time to give up. Democrats need to learn to push back in different ways. Trump has changed the rules or is disregarding them altogether. He’s brought on Musk and the oligarchs, giving him essentially bottomless pockets to sue the press and anybody else he wants to cower. In return, he’ll remove the guardrails that keep billionaires from amassing even more wealth and power.

One thing, though, hasn’t changed. Language still matters. Defining Trump and his actions is key to turning public opinion against him. Right now, we’re talking about shutting down the government. Democrats in North Carolina should be complaining the Republicans in Congress are playing games with hurricane relief money, leaving people without resources as an already tough holiday season rolls in.

As Donald Trump says the Ukrainians are going to have to make a deal with Russia, Democrats in Congress should be shouting that Trump is surrendering to Putin.

Start referring to Elon Musk as President Musk and calling Trump a figurehead. Get under Trump’s thin skin. Besides, it sure looks like that what’s happening. Musk is exerting more influence and making more news than Trump. That will eventually bruise Trump’s fragile ego.

Democrats need to realize that Trump has no grand plan. He’s a grifter and reactionary figure who is easily influenced and easily distracted. He has no real philosophy of governing even if some of the people around him do. He’s not a person Democrats, or Republicans, can trust to do business in good faith. He’s there to plunder and he’ll do whatever is in his best interest, not the country’s or anybody else’s.

They also need to understand that the legacy media is dying faster than expected. Newspapers and TV news have lost the credibility of the left, years after they lost the credibility of right though they still seem to be chasing it. New outlets and means of communication will replace the old school outlets, even if they stick around in a diminished form for the next few years or even decades.

We need the reporters who cover government far more than we need the opinion pages of Washington Post or New York Times. The rise of outlets like ProPublica nationally and The Assembly locally might be heralding a new age of watchdogs who eschew opinion for reporting. Somebody needs to be watching the store with less of an ideological bent and more of an interest in good-government and accountability.

I’m not much of a fan of mass protests because I haven’t really seen them deliver many results since the Civil Rights Era. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t protest. We need to be smarter about how we do it. Find ways to influence the public and reach beyond our comfortable bubbles. Headlines in newspapers or hits on the six-o’clock news don’t really matter anymore.

Trump and company are about to burn the government down. I don’t think there’s a whole lot anybody can do stop it—except the Republicans who won’t—but I do believe Democrats can make sure everybody knows who is responsible. A lot of people are going to get hurt and they should know who to blame.

Democrats need to be prepared to pick up the pieces like they’ve done all this century. They had to fix the mess George Bush left us in 2008. They had to fix the mess Trump left us in 2020. Now, they will have to fix the mess Trump makes this time with the added challenge of wresting control from the billionaires who believe they now own the country.

Don’t give up. Get ready for a different kind of fight. It will be long and hard, but worth the effort.