Americans made a bad choice last week. Next year, they have to really feel the consequences.
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Note: This wasn’t a fun column to write, and it won’t be an easy one to read. However, there are some hard truths for people to accept… and the sooner the better.
A lot of Americans are worried that things are going to get really bad really soon when Donald Trump takes office. That concern is understandable in light of his obvious mental illness and fascist tendencies, the vast propaganda network he can rely on, his twisted vision for America, and the people he surrounds himself with.
Sadly, that is the wrong way to look at this.
People who care about the country, democracy, and the rule of law should be worried that things don’t get bad enough.
Here is why.
As we have pointed out, Trump won this election largely because he was able to convince Americans that they live in an alternate reality in which things are really, really bad, and that he alone can fix things and make everything awesome (again). (Not that everything has been peachy, especially the high rate of inflation early on in the Biden presidency.)
On some level, it’s tough to blame them because the right-wing disinformation network is sophisticated and ever-growing. On the other hand, one should expect voters to do a minimum of fact-checking and truth-seeking on their own.
Actually, in order to get (some) Trump voters to recognize that they have been duped, or to realize that his policies are bad for them, it will have to be really, really bad.
In any case, the result of this dynamic is that tens of millions of Trump supporters are firmly entrenched in a partisan propaganda bubble — a bubble that has proven to be impervious to rational thought, truth, or facts.
In order to pierce it, something extraordinary will have to happen.
And, since the GOP now controls all of Washington, DC, that “something” will have to be really bad.
Actually, in order to get (some) Trump voters to recognize that they have been duped, or to realize that his policies are bad for them, it will have to be really, really bad.
This isn’t just scaremongering or mere rhetoric; we have been here before.
In 2020, Trump lost the election because of the chaos he created, a botched pandemic response that resulted in countless excess deaths, and his apparent incompetence.
But even all of those things and a failed coup were not enough to keep him out of the White House four years later. And neither were his racist, xenophobic, fascist, and misogynistic rhetoric on the campaign trail or his idiotic and unworkable policy proposals.
To banish Trump and his MAGA cult for good, things will have to be much worse this time around, and millions of Americans will have to feel the pain (we told you this wasn’t going to be an easy read).
And we are not talking about weak gross-domestic-product growth, or even a minor recession, modest job losses, a stagnating Dow Jones, or inflation that is higher than it is now.
Experienced demagogues like Trump, Elon Musk, or the fine people at Fox News, will always be able to explain that stuff away; that’s what they do (and why we are here).
It’ll have to be worse than that.
In terms of the economy, a deep recession might do the job, or massive layoffs, 401(k) accounts that plunge in value, and higher prices. It would be nice if only Trump voters get to experience these things. Sadly, that’s not how it works, and many other Americans would also be impacted.
But the alternative is worse.
In light of the damage Trump has already done, it seems unlikely that the country will be able to escape a lengthy MAGA rule unscathed.
There needs to be a massive awakening and reckoning at the ballot box — preferably in two years to wrest control away from House Republicans (and, if things get really out of hand, Senate Republicans as well).
Obviously, it’s not just about the economy, although that’s an area in which the effects are especially noticeable, as Democrats found out this year.
Americans have to be confronted with the cruelty and idiocy of a second Trump administration.
Let’s conduct mass deportations that tear apart families (and jack up the cost of living of everybody).
Let’s dismantle the federal government so that tens of millions of Americans will have trouble accessing important services.
Let’s do away with childhood vaccinations and bring back all kinds of deadly diseases.
Let’s eliminate regulations that help keep corporate greed in check. Who needs food safety, environmental, workplace health, or financial rules? Certainly not major companies, but let’s see how Americans feel about deregulation once these often life-saving mandates are no longer in place.
Let’s allow Trump and Musk to blatantly enrich themselves.
Let’s give Ukraine to Russia and/or withdraw from NATO and see who is next.
Let’s unquestioningly back Israel as it bombs the Gaza Strip to smithereens (to be fair, that’s already happening, but it’s very possible even that will get worse).
Let’s have a Fox News host run the Pentagon and impose his Christian nationalist views on the military.
Let’s allow Matt Gaetz to show the country what the weaponization of the Department of Justice really looks like.
Let’s hand over the nation’s intelligence services to a Russian stooge.
Let’s embrace the denial of climate change to be able to drill, baby, drill.
Let’s harm unions to benefit wealthy GOP donors.
Let’s pardon all of the January 6 insurrectionists (and anybody who pays Trump).
Obviously, in an ideal world, we would not want any of this to happen. However, as we learned last week, this is far from an ideal world.
In this one, we know that awful things will happen to innumerable Americans, so the real question is whether they will be bad enough for (at least some) MAGA voters to wake up.
So, all of this hand-wringing over some truly awful nominees for Cabinet-level positions is misplaced. Anybody serving in this administration will be bad for the country, so let’s hope that these ab(n)ominations will make Americans realize sooner rather than later that Trump is the wrong person for the job.
We honestly don’t know if even that would do the trick.
But we do know that a few really hard years are America’s best bet to rid itself of this existential menace.
