The Toxicity Of The Trump Era Needs To Be Put Behind Us

1-16-21
   25,000 National Guard troops are in (or on the way to) Washington DC in order to protect the transfer of power from the Trump Administration to the Biden Administration.
   Think about that.
   Thousands of soldiers needed to protect the Inauguration of President Elect Joe Biden.
   It’s disturbing and sad that our country has sunk to this level. And it’s clear that Donald Trump along with those enabling him and blindly following him brought our nation to this twisted, deeply troubling state of affairs.
   Divisions, lack of understanding, intolerance, hate, prejudice, and so on were already problems in the United States when Trump started his campaign for the Presidency. The thing is: Trump took advantage of these problems and exacerbated them with his outrageous, hurtful, vicious, and often totally false rhetoric, actions, and lies. Instead of trying to unite people, he worsened divisions  and hate creating such a toxic atmosphere that prejudiced hate groups felt emboldened to become more brazen and vocal.
   And then we come to the 2020 election.
   He began attacking the election before it even had a chance to get started as he viciously went after mail in voting for months prior to a single ballot being sent out to anyone.  Once he lost the election, he quickly began spreading ridiculous, totally false claims and conspiracy theories in his quest to try to stay in office, even though Joe Biden clearly and legitimately won.
   And throughout all of this, numerous Republicans in important positions as well as millions of every day Americans have enabled Trump’s horrendous behavior by always going along with him, not standing up to him, and flat out blindly following him. And now we are having to endure the results of this sickening situation. We watched in disgust and horror as an angry mob of Trump supporters (incited by Trump and others) literally assaulted the US Capitol Building with the purpose of trying to stop Congress from certifying the free and fair 2020 election. This was clearly a form of undemocratic insurrection seeing how they used violence to attempt to stop Biden from becoming President.
   It’s disgusting, horrifying, sickening, and disturbing seeing how low things have sunk to. It’s also scary how many people are still blindly following Trump despite the fact he incited insurrection.
   We have to be strong and stand up for decency, honesty, compassion, science, caring, and democracy. It’s time to put the hate, narrow-mindedness, intolerance, and viciousness of the Trump era behind us and strive to make this a better place for all.
   It won’t be easy. We as a society and a country are battered and bruised. Healing will take time as will bridging the deep divides that have been tearing this nation apart.
   But we will get through it. Our democracy will endure and if we work at it, the United States will get closer to being the shining beacon we want it to be.