Ted Babbitt

It’s been a while since I last posted. I cannot help it. I’m not motivated. I feel adrift, alienated from the country I love and thought I knew. I go along, taking it day by day, and then it hits me again like a ton of bricks: President Donald Trump…

I tell myself to reserve criticism and give him a chance and then he does the totally predictable: He appoints someone to oversee the nation’s education system who hates public education, or someone to head the EPA who has spent a lifetime enabling pollution. We joke that his next appointee will be El Chappo to run the DEA, but this is no laughing matter. These appointments will affect not only us, but our children and grandchildren and theirs after them.

Presidential  judicial appointments leave an indelible mark on the country’s history, with potentially devastating effects if the power is wielded by the wrong hands. On the state level, the appointments of Govenor Scott have often been purely political, not designed for the protection of the rule of law but rather, to further his political agenda and the decisions of those unqualified or imprudent judges have far-reaching and far more personal and life-changing effects on litigants than the rare political or social issue SCOTUS ruling.

Our focus has been on the United States Supreme Court, but equally troubling are the appointments to Federal district and circuit courts which have direct impact on individual litigant rights that can be devastating.

What troubles me most is the vacuum that is caused by Trump’s empty set of values and his absent moral compass. Who- or What- will fill it? I am afraid the Far Right ideologues will rush to fill that vacuum and so long as they feed his insatiable ego, he will allow it.

So, what now? The stock market is going crazy, giddy with expectation of lack of regulation. When was the last time this happened? How long has it been since we had a spiraling market with a completely Republican Congress and presidency? The 1920s just before the Great Depression. The Republicans are a great opposition party but they are terrible at governing. Republican economics have never benefitted any but those who are fortunate enough to already be wealthy – that segment of the citizenry will always prosper while the vast majority of the populace pays for it.

Trump has always been, at best, a law-bender if not breaker, and he will not be able to stop now. If I had to guess, while in office he will commit an impeachable offense, but don’t expect the Republican Congress to call him to task. It’s the the legitimization of the “I could shoot someone on fifth avenue and they would still vote for me” swagger.

The good news is if the situation turns out to be as bad as I suspect, there will be another election in only two years!

Hold on. Have you ever been in a cab in NYC and listened to a driver who thinks he knows all the answers? No depth of issues and no understanding of the consequences to his prescriptions? That is exactly who I am reminded of when I hear Trump’s tweets.

Forty-six percent of college-educated women voted for Trump. What were they thinking? What happened to the reaction to the candid video depicting a disgusting man denigrating women? And to the twelve women who had been sexually assaulted by our soon-to-be president.

The Democratic Party has lost touch with Americans. Sadly, so have I. This is not America as I knew or thought I knew it. This is, however, America’s reality. Racism is not just present, it is pervasive. I fear for my country and the people who live in it not only for the next four years but long after Trump has departed the Oval Office.

For now, all we can do is hang on.