November 2020: The Battle for America's Soul

In the early 1930's Germany found it self beset by economic turmoil and still smarting from defeat in WWI.  Some of the population continued to support democracy and social norms, but others chose to support a boorish, anti-Semitic  who played to their prejudices and offered scapegoats to explain Germany's dire straits.  Ultimately, this shortsightedness and bigotry lead to the Nazi dictatorship and the horrors of the Holocaust and WWII and the deaths of tens of millions of people. While Donald Trump is likely no Hitler - despite his desires to be a dictator - those who support him are not much different than those who supported Hitler and chose to kill the soul of their nation.  In America on the eve of the November 2020 elections, we find ourselves in a similar battle for the soul of this nation and faced with the question of whether honor, decency, morality and a desire for a common good will survive.   One will not find honor and decency among the scamvangelists and pews filled with evangelicals who have thrown their lot in with selfishness, racism, bigotry and hatred of others.  But good people still exist in this country who seek to restore America's soul, something highlighted last night at the Democrats' virtual convention.  A column in the Washington Post looks at this battle and the need to cleanse the White House and nation of Donald Trump and his Republican enablers.  Here are column highlights: 

Democrats from Maine to Guam, assembled virtually for their convention Tuesday night, spoke of a nation that has lost lives, jobs, fairness and friends because of President Trump’s leadership.

But at core they were talking about a nation that has lost its soul.

“We are in a battle for the soul of our nation,” Florida Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried began in a “keynote” montage of elected officials from around the country.

“We need a president who will restore the soul of America,” said Sally Yates, fired as acting attorney general by Trump because she refused to implement what she called his “Muslim travel ban.”

A young Naval Academy graduate and former Marine Corps officer, DeMarcus Gilliard, told the convention that “there is nothing more important for me right now than making sure that we restore the soul of our nation.”

Colin Powell, the Republican former secretary of state and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, exclaimed from Washington: “What a difference it will make to have a president who unites us, who restores our strength and our soul.”

And Jill Biden closed the night by saying that kindness and courage are “the soul of America Joe Biden is fighting for now.”

Of course, Democrats didn’t have to convince anybody that the heart and soul of our republic are on the ballot in November. Trump had already done it for them, earlier Tuesday, when he once again reminded the country that he has little regard for democracy itself.

Trump supposes the election is like his golf game: If he shanks one into the woods, he simply takes a mulligan and hits a new ball.

Even as Trump was floating an election redo on Tuesday, the Senate Intelligence Committee issued a bipartisan report concluding that Trump’s 2016 campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, worked closely with a Russian intelligence officer suspected of involvement in hacking the Democratic National Committee’s emails — the very definition of the “collusion” Trump has denied.

This follows Trump’s talk of postponing the Nov. 3 election, his refusal to commit to accepting the results of the election, his attempts to defund and to sabotage the U.S. Postal Service to compromise its ability to process mail-in ballots, his campaign’s attempts to get Kanye West on the ballot in key states and his use of federal police to suppress protests by his opponents.

“We have just 4 percent of the world’s population and 25 percent of the world’s covid cases,” a raspy and wrinkled Bill Clinton proclaimed. “We are the only major industrial economy to have its unemployment rate triple. At a time like this, the Oval Office should be a command center. Instead, it’s a storm center. ... If you want a president who defines the job as spending hours a day watching TV and zapping people on social media, he’s your man."

Far better was the Democrats’ full-throated embrace of American values, something Republicans thought they owned before Trump’s reign of selfishness, vulgarity and disregard for democratic norms. Stacey Abrams spoke of Biden as a leader who would “restore our moral compass.” Powell, long America’s most celebrated soldier, said “Biden will be a president we will all be proud to salute,” one who “will trust our diplomats and our intelligence community, not the flattery of dictators and despots” and one who “will restore America’s leadership and our moral authority.”

If American democracy still has a pulse, the voters will join the old soldier’s battle for our national soul.