Belfast is Burning. Because of COURSE IT IS.

[PatSeg]

14. You know, I have seen it from that perspective

I often felt like things had to get really bad before they could get better. This has been true throughout history. We rarely see a lot of positive or progressive change when a large percentage of the populace is comfortable and complacent, and that leaves so much injustice unaddressed. The Trump years brought largely ignored social maladies to the surface where they can be acknowledged and treated. Poverty, racism, and sexism still exist, but so many put their blinders on because it did not affect them and their families.

Trump spoke of the "forgotten man" (straight out of It Can't Happen Here) and in a bizarre sense he WAS right, but he had no intention of actually helping such people, he was just using them. Sadly, they went from "forgotten" to "used and abused", though few of them will acknowledge that.

I agree that it was better to have an incompetent oaf in the White House than a truly intelligent, charismatic leader, who could have been reelected. Someone who could skillfully dismantle democracy one brick at a time and taken us down a path we probably would not return from. How fragile a thing democracy is and how easily we take it for granted, as it is all we've ever known.