America now has an openly racist, sexist, fascist President-elect. He says that global warming is a hoax and intends to pull out of the Paris climate accords. He’s pledged to tear up the nuclear weapons agreement with Iran. He’s promised to nominate only Supreme Court Justices who will overturn Roe v. Wade, denying women the fundamental right of control over their own bodies. Trump plans to deport even more people than Obama has — 11 million mostly honest, hardworking people of Hispanic ancestry, including children. And he’s threatened, “We’re looking at” Muslims too, all Muslims, because he’s afraid of all Muslims.
If the rest of us sheep remain silent, our law enforcement agencies could morph into the American version of the Gestapo and SS, rounding up whomever they decide to demonize next. Before accusing me of overreacting, consider the massive military-style police crackdowns on peaceful demonstrations over the past year and the extraordinary rise in hate crimes since the election. My ancestors died in Nazi concentration camps. All except for my grandparents who “overreacted” and got out before it was too late.
How is it that we now have a president-elect who is adored by the Ku Klux Klan and American Nazis, a.k.a. the Alt Right? Why would white working men and women unwittingly vote against their own Social Security and Medicare, which the Republicans are already laying out their agenda to dismantle? Forget the “Audacity of Hope.” Obama has the audacity of being black.
A black man becoming president drove a knife into white, right-wing America’s racist heart and it twisted every time they saw him. Getting re-elected was like a hot poker in their eye. A lot of people I know don’t even realize they’re racists, but it didn’t matter how much Obama expanded the military, they said he was weakening it. Didn’t matter how many murders by drone he ordered, they said he was caving in. Didn’t matter that in most respects Obama has been more Bush than Bush and a huge disappointment to the liberals and minorities who got him elected.
Didn’t and doesn’t matter because what really drives so many white people bat crap crazy is that Obama is black. Racism, rather than receding, has been seething, festering and being manipulated by the GOP ever since the “southern strategy” of Richard Nixon. With Obama’s election it exploded like whacking a hornets’ nest with a stick. The Democratic Party may not have flailed that stick but they sent the pest control guy away when they rigged the primaries for Clinton, denying the nomination to Bernie Sanders, who would have trounced Trump and his fascist agenda in the general election. Who better to inflame fundamentalist racist white misogynist wingnuts than Hillary Clinton, while simultaneously disenchanting young voters?
But it’s not nearly all Obama’s, the DNC’s and Clinton’s own fault. Investigative reporter Greg Palast (http://www.gregpalast.com/) exposed years ago the secret lists of 7 million mostly African American and Latino voters created by a system called “Interstate Crosscheck” that Republican Secretaries of State use to illegally purge registered voters. See Rolling Stone Magazine from last Aug. 24th: “The GOP’s Stealth War on Voters (http://www.gregpalast.com/rolling-stone-expose-gops-secret-plan-steal-vote/).” At least 1 million likely Democratic voters were denied their Constitutional right to cast a ballot in this election.
Here’s the breakdown of Crosscheck in action on Nov. 8:
* Trump victory margin in Michigan: 13,107 / Michigan Crosscheck purge list: 449,922
* Trump victory margin in Arizona: 85,257 / Arizona Crosscheck purge list: 270,824
* Trump victory margin in North Carolina: 177,008 / North Carolina Crosscheck purge list: 589,393
As Palast details in his book and film, nine other methods of attacking the right to vote of black, Latino and Asian-American voters were employed including “Caging,” “purging,” blocking legitimate registrations, and wrongly shunting millions to provisional ballots that will never be counted. Republicans closed down nearly 900 polling places since 2008, eliminated or greatly reduced early voting and instituted discriminatory voter ID laws all over the country.
And one last tidbit about real election fraud: Because of electronic voting “discrepancies” in Ohio in 2004 that flipped the election to George W. Bush, Ohio spent a great deal of money buying electronic voting machines that would produce a paper trail by taking a picture of the electronic vote for future auditing and verification. Unfortunately, the Ohio Secretary of State, who happens to be a Republican, ordered that feature disabled, saying the two mouse clicks required to enable it was too much trouble. Election law attorney Robert Fitrakis, who represents both Republicans and Democrats, found out that the photo image and audit protection functions had been shut off. He took Ohio to court to get it turned back on before the election but a Republican judge ruled in favor of the Republican Secretary of State. No paper trail in Ohio. Why would Republicans who are always ranting about voter fraud want to prevent auditing the vote?
Well, as Joseph Stalin reportedly said:
“Those who cast the votes decide nothing. Those who count the votes decide everything.”
Anyone else getting more interested in Hawaiian Sovereignty?
Jake Jacobs is a pilot for a worldwide cargo company who lives in Kailua-Kona and writes a monthly opinion column for West Hawaii Today.