It's 2022 And I've Already Run Out Of Optimism

Maybe it fell inside the couch cushions?

Photo by Luke Stackpoole

It is no exaggeration to say that 2022 is the year that will make or break American democracy.

Nor is it an exaggeration to say we are already in a state of emergency.

It’s a mid-term election year, every bit as important as the presidential election, only with half the voter participation. A presidential election is an easy sell. It’s sexy. We want to see who gets to be top dog. But not enough Americans understand the way our government works to appreciate the gravity of the mid-terms. All 435 seats in the House of Representatives are up for grabs this year, in addition to 34 of the 100 seats in the Senate. And if the Democrats lose either the House or the Senate—which, unless the John Lewis Voting Rights Bill is miraculously passed, they most assuredly will—it’s game over.

Not for the Democrats. For the country.

For us.

We’re no longer dealing with “Democrats versus Republicans.” We’re dealing with troubling and inefficient democracy versus the clean, smiting blade of fascism. The Republicans have made it clear that they will do anything they can, legal or illegal, in order to win.

That, friends, is fascism.

Here are the facts, corroborated by articles from reputable, responsible, fact-checking sources:

1. Republicans are already laying the groundwork for another coup.

2. If they can’t win an election, they will steal it.

3. They will lie about state elections with the same impunity Trump showed when he claimed to have requested 10,000 National Guard troops on January 6 and then Nancy Pelosi vetoed it.

4. They will persistently fabricate “election audits” in order to add fuel to the fake narrative of stolen elections.

5. They will gerrymander every voting district they can to exclude Democratic-leaning Black voters, Democratic-leaning young voters, and people with college degrees who, not surprisingly, vote Democratic.

6. They will continue going on Fox News and disseminating yet more falsehoods (e.g., that the January 6 coup was a “false flag” operation).

7. They will gladly support a criminal racist gameshow host like Trump if he makes another bid for the White House.

8. They will continue refusing to censure their own members, such as Marjorie Taylor Greene, who just got ousted from Twitter for posting anti-vaccine propaganda, even though she owns stock in Pfizer, J&J, and AstraZeneca.

9. Republicans have made “owning the libs” more important than truth, democracy, or our nation’s health and safety. They’ve turned politics into the world’s most dangerous soccer match, winner takes all.

10. They will continue to gin up fake news about an alien horde of “Mexican rapists” in order to defraud donors, put public money in private coffers, and scare voters to the polls.

There’s a very good chance either Trump or Florida Governor Ron DeSantis will win the 2024 election, a probability that the Biden Administration doesn’t appear to be taking seriously. Our only hedge against disaster is the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, which will hobble some of the Republicans’ most draconian efforts to overthrow our elections, but obstructionist West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin’s Maserati and 65-foot yacht don’t come cheap. The Koch advocacy group, Americans for Prosperity, is throwing so much dark money at him to vote against his Party, we actually have no way of knowing the exact amount.

Photo by Kyle Mills

There’s an outside chance the Democrats are playing the long game. Maybe they will carve out an exception to the filibuster (as was recently done to extend the debt ceiling) to get the Voting Rights bill passed. Or maybe they’re waiting until the last possible minute before the 2022 election so the Republicans won’t have enough time to challenge the legislation in court. But that’s an awfully big gamble. The alternative—that they can’t or won’t do what’s necessary to save democracy—seems far more likely.

Now might be a good time to ask yourself what you plan to do when DeSantis or Trump is President of the United States and enjoying a healthy majority in both the House and Senate. Because I am not joking when I say all the signs are red and flashing. The “American voting public” isn’t going to save you.

Do you think the majority of pipe welders, truck drivers, factory workers, small business owners, and suburban soccer moms cares about Democratic talking points like Black Lives Matter, police brutality, trans rights, pay equality, Dreamers, gentrification, racial diversity, climate change, or selling arms to Israel?

They don’t.

They care about what things cost and how far their money goes. They care about safe schools (but are mostly unwilling or unable to see the direct correlation between lax gun laws and school shootings.) They care about crime, but only in the way it might affect them. Crime in your neighborhood? Meh.

Most American voters don’t know enough about politics to make an informed decision, even if they wanted to. More than ever before—in large part, because of fake news promulgated by Fox and social media—Americans are impervious to objective, verifiable facts, whether they’re about vaccines or climate change or Donald J. Trump’s fitness for office. They want to believe Trump is their racist white savior, and nothing you say or I say or anyone says is going to change that.

We’re getting our news from completely different sources now, sources that aren’t legally held to any journalistic standard whatsoever.

You can’t explain the truth to people who won’t listen.

Photo by Ernest Brillo

To sum up: We have a deeply gerrymandered nation, 1/3 to 1/2 of all voters who are “Trump or die,” 2.5 million Fox News viewers, hundreds of thousands of older white men wetting themselves at the thought of being supplanted by gays, women, or people of color, alarming amounts of inflation, a pandemic that’s still raging, the mess and disappointment of rule-bound democracy, Joe Manchin, runaway housing prices, medications no one can afford, the cost of food going ever higher … and now a fractured, non-consensual reality where half of all Americans believe the 2020 election was stolen, vaccines are dangerous, and climate change is a hoax.

What do you think is going to happen when Trump is back in office?

The first thing he’s going to do is appoint himself president for life. How? With that sweet sweet gerrymandered majority in the House and Senate—you know, those pesky mid-term elections that are happening this year.

Trump is smarter now. He’s more experienced. He won’t make the same mistakes as before. And once he’s finished gutting the rest of the judiciary like he did the Supreme Court, he can purge the Department of Justice of Never-Trumpers, enact deeper tax cuts for his rich golf buddies, throw migrants into indefinite detention, and pardon Ghislaine Maxwell. And we can scream as loud as we want, but it won’t matter. It never does under a fascist dictatorship.

There are no claims made in this article that have not been supported by research and facts. I am not “out to scare you,” or to depress you with dreary prognostications about the future. I’m here, like Cassandra, to warn you.

Act now, fight now, vote now, or kiss your democracy goodbye.

***RIGHT NOW is the time to confirm that you are registered to vote. Or has your vote been purged? Even if you’ve voted successfully in the past, it only takes 30 seconds to find out if you’re still registered: Vote.org.***

Better to do it now than when it’s too late.

As always, I love to hear your thoughts on the topics raised here on Cappuccino. Feel free to leave your comments below.