Do you see that our growing disgust with the the way the GOP has embraced and catered to racists, white nationalists and neo-nazis was not some manufactured slur against republicans? That we were pointing out the serious danger that we have seen explode the last 12 years, and culminating in this sad moment?
We kept pointing out that since the 90's the GOP has been radicalizing their base with wilder and wilder end times propaganda, and that would lead to disaster.
The republican party has been inflaming the gun nuts to believe the time where they would need to rise up with their arms to defend themselves against the socialists was drawing near... what did you expect that would lead to?
We kept ringing the alarm bells, and we were called whining 'liberals', accused of unfairly slandering conservatives, we were called silly partisan alarmists.
The alarms were justified, but unheeded by those that needed most to listen... and so the fire grew, and grew... and then came Trumpism-
We pointed out that he was bringing rocket fuel to the fire that had been slowly growing... that he was going to turn it into an incandescent conflagration that would consume us all.
The conservatives here scoffed, and insulted us for pointing out all the flammable madness he was bringing with him- but it was OBVIOUS that he would burn our nation badly, and quite likely leave us in only ashes.
This destructive fire didn't just burst forth out of nowhere, it wasn't some mysterious spontaneous combustion, it was a fire that has been intentionally fed and tended by the Republican party since the 90's... perhaps even earlier, but it was in the 90's, listening to Rush Limbaugh in shock as an undergrad, that I started to see the flames he and the GOP were breathing into life.
The dread of those approaching flames has shaped my political views my entire life.
As we pointed out the obvious threat we were insulted, dismissed, and when we pointed to the actual flames in front of us, the conservatives said we were seeing things. We were simply 'liberal alarmists'...
They say, ‘It’s not so bad’ or ‘You’re seeing things’ or ‘You’re an alarmist.’
"And you are an alarmist. You are saying that this must lead to this, and you can’t prove it. These are the beginnings, yes; but how do you know for sure when you don’t know the end, and how do you know, or even surmise, the end? On the one hand, your enemies, the law, the regime, the Party, intimidate you. On the other, your colleagues pooh-pooh you as pessimistic or even neurotic. You are left with your close friends, who are, naturally, people who have always thought as you have.
An excerpt from
They Thought They Were Free
The Germans, 1933-45
Milton Mayer
In the next decade or (if we are lucky) two, we are are going to be living in a world filled with countless white hot sparks- unless we fireproof the world, I see no way humanity will survive the inferno. I have no idea if it will be possible to prevent it, but I know there will be no avoiding it unless we study the fires of the past and present to understand how they started and how they can be extinguished.