2017: Brace For Impact
At the beginning of the Second World War in Europe, there was a period of time, eight months and one week to be exact, that was dubbed The Phoney War. This period began with the German invasion of Poland on September 3, 1939 and ended on May 10, 1940 when the German armies rolled over the borders of France, Belgium, and Holland. During this period of time, after the Germans had secured Poland, it was said that nothing much happened. People knew it was going to happen. People were waiting for it to happen, yet the onslaught everyone was waiting for failed to occur.
Of course, there were a lot of people who would have been surprised to be told that nothing happened during these eight months. The Poles, for example, who lost their country, or the seamen whose ships were already going down. The Finns would have been astounded to find out nothing was going on, for it was in this period that they fought and lost their ill-fated war against the Soviet Union.
So, there was plenty of stuff happening, but the big battle, the German’s full frontal assault on France, the Blitz on London, the events that we in the West generally associate with the beginning of the Second World War, had yet to occur.
The German term for this Phoney War was Sitzkrieg: the sitting war. It meant basically, that though war had been declared, and people in the West knew what was coming, or didn’t know, which was worse, they just sat around and waited for it, stunned that it had come to this, wondering how their lives and the lives of people they knew or loved were going to change over the next months and years. I have to admit, that’s kind of how I’ve been feeling since November 8, 2016.
Even though I know what happened and how it happened and why it happened, I’m still stunned that it happened, and spend most of my days sitting in front of a computer screen reading political and economic analyses, or with other like-minded, equally-stunned people, going over what might possibly be in store.
I of course won’t have to wait eight months and a week for things to get going. The onslaught will begin already on January 20th, two-and-a-half months after Mr. Trump was elected. I assume it will begin on January 20th since Mr. Trump promised this, and though many a person I talked to during the campaign insisted Mr.Trump wasn’t serious about half the things he said, it would appear he was actually very serious. January 20, 2017 could be the beginning of the end for a lot of things.It could be the beginning of the end for the Dreamers, the children of illegal immigrants who’ve been allowed to stay in America to do things like study and work. It could be the beginning of the end for the people who pick our food in the fields of California and Florida and Texas and for the cheap prices we’ve been paying for this food. It could be the beginning of the end for a lot of people who’ve managed to get some health insurance in the last couple of years. It could be the beginning of the end for clear, relatively-breathable air over our cities. It could be the beginning of the end for affordable public housing. It could be the beginning of the end for a national commitment to public education. (Show me a country that doesn’t have a commitment to public education and I’ll show you a failed country.) It could be the beginning of the end for the control women had begun to wield over their own bodies. It could be the beginning of the end…I can’t go on and anyway you get the picture. I’m sure I’ve forgotten a lot of things and I’m sure there are plenty of other things I’m not even aware of, things that in the coming months and years, I’ll realize I was a fool to miss.
And, of course, that’s just the domestic list. Internationally, the next four years don’t bear much thinking about. Trade wars, real wars, the possibility of nuclear war? That’s when I move from being stunned to being just plain terrified.
Europe, of course, endured her nightmare and after six years of mind-boggling carnage came out the other end. She came out destroyed, her populations decimated. She came out cut in half. In the western part, she rebuilt herself with American help, and became for many decades and remains (I still insist) a darn fine place to live. People say that after the war the Western half of Europe became a better, fairer place. I agree with that, but oh what it took to get there. It’s also the kind of thing historians say years after the pain of events has eased. Whereas the people who lived through these events didn’t have the luxury of analyzing what was happening from a distance. They had to live it, bear it, and that’s what we’ll have to do as well.
Enter the dismantlers, the demolishers, the destroyers. Enter a group of people who say they despise government, but who’ve never lived in a country where the government did nothing for its people. Enter a group of people who can only think the way they do because they’ve grown up in a country where the government, compared to other countries, actually functions pretty well. Enter a group of people who entertain strange, fuzzy notions of how wonderful it was back in the day when people had to do everything for themselves, when they might die in childbirth because they had no doctor, or starve because it didn’t rain. Enter a group of people who, in love with the past, are propelling us into a chaotic, dangerous future. And the only thing I can think to say isn’t very philosophical. It’s more like a raw, desperate cry, a thing you shout to fellow passengers when the vehicle has gone hopelessly out of control.
This is it.
I can’t stop it.
Brace for impact.
I share your fears. I have been feeling the same stunned reaction and am still lingering in denial. My antidote to paralysis: becoming politically active.
Progressive ideas have to be fought for initially to be won, and then the fight continues to maintain them. I believe we can all do something to make a difference, and if there was ever a time to do so, it is now. We who are privileged with the wherewithal to survive the coming regime have a moral obligation to do what we can to stand up for those who are not so lucky.
And yes, I still believe in hope, and in never giving up.
To the barricades.
Agreed. But there’s a circumstance that both the NYT and WSJ, in different ways, have seized on: the often conflicting sets of beliefs of Trump’s Cabinet appointments. One possible scenario is an administration whose internal disagreements lead to inaction, and whose ineffective leader spends more time on the tee box than governing. Maybe Trump will channel Millard Fillmore … if you think about, his views on immigration certainly recall the Know Nothing Party, under whose banner Fillmore ran in 1856, unsuccessfully. One term and out.
But until/unless that happens, it would be prudent to … brace for impact!
Here’s hoping for inaction.
EEEEEEKKKKK!! I’m reading this on New Year’s Day and now I want to go back to bed! Say it ain’t so, Linda!! We are hoping with every breath in our body that SOMEHOW things won’t be as bad as we think they will be. Happy New Year!!!
Sorry to be such a downer on New Year’s Day!
I applaude you voicing your discontent. Don’t stop. You and Tony should consider joining us in DC for the protest on the 21st. There is no other way I want to spend Trump’s 1st full day in office than in public protest. I’m sure it will be the first of many for me and many, many others.
Stay strong!
May I add the threat to loss of free speech and of religious freedom of the first amendment. The press has already fallen for the old trick of giving a more respectable name for the white supremasist, radical religious groups – The Alt Right.
Linda,”
I agree with all the threats you list and would like to add an additional that I beieve equally scary and that is that our democracy is threatened by ther erlgious right who cries that treir rights are at stake. In actuality they want to legicislate their ideologyandprejudices into law for all of us, This will be a thocracy.
Linda, I share your fear. The threat is real and may I add a personal fear of a loss of the first amendment protections in regard to free speech, and a serious diminishing of democracy and rise of a dangerous theocracy from the far right.
The press has already fallen for the old trick of giving a more respectful sounding name to (Alt Right) to the white supremacist/ radical Christian groups coming from one of the leaders – Richard Spencer.
The cry of Religious freedom from the right means their legislating their beliefs into law for all of us.
Linda, Well written. I am with you. It is going to be a scary time for us. God help us.
Don’t forget the good old days when the Cuyahoga River burned brightly!
Well written and chilling Linda. In New Zealand we are watching all of this – Trump, Brexit – and wondering whether it will stay at a distance or if the same isolationist, xenophobic and reductionist sentiment will come to infect our domestic politics as well.
Linda, I share your concerns. Today I listed to the President-Elect press conference (or maybe what appeared to be a circus) and I’m truly troubled by what I witnessed.