A man who is uniquely and totally unfit to serve as president of the United States.
Of course, as has been so often the case during Trump's 18 months in the White House, his Helsinki performance managed to be both shocking and -- in the spirit of a man who prefers golf to presidenting -- completely par for the course. There have been many other times when Trump has proved his unfitness. His "both-sides-ing" of lethal neo-Nazis marching in Charlottesville. Calling African nations "shithole countries." Calling journalists "enemies of the American people" -- even after five were massacred in an Annapolis newsroom. Conducting a "family separation" campaign on the southern border that has all but permanently tarnished the idea of America as a human-rights beacon.
Reminder: many of those who are now outraged were just fine with him when he referred to Africa and Haiti as "shitholes," emulated a reporter with a disability, bragged about grabbing women's genitals and was accused of sexual assault 19 times. -- jelani cobb (@jelani9) July 17, 2018
So what are we going to do about this?
The unfortunate events of July 16, 2018, had the feeling of both a major turning point but also no turning point at all. The handful of Republicans who'd been mildly critical of Trump in the past offered much harsher words -- Sen. John McCain, suffering from terminal brain cancer at home in Arizona, accused the president of "naivete', egotism, false equivalence, and sympathy for autocrats" -- while those who've been loathe to utter a bad word about their fellow Republican now at least expressed their vague disappointment.
But missing from this new conversation so far is any serious talk of action. None of the Republicans who control Congress seems willing to go beyond mere words -- to even introduce a morally powerful if non-binding resolution of censure, let alone begin the process of impeachment and removing Trump from office as a clear and present danger to American democracy.
This is nothing new. Remember Newtown ... and then Las Vegas ... and finally Parkland?
Doing nothing of any substance is the default position for a democracy that barely functions. But after Newtown, there was some progress toward making assault weapons harder to get, and in making it harder for those under 21 to purchase weapons. That pressure came not from voters, but from consumers. Companies like Dick's Sporting Goods, Walmart and Kroger supermarkets stopped selling high-powered weapons not because the government told them to, but because their customers demanded it, and would vote with their wallets if the corporations didn't listen. That's where we're at in America in 2018; Corporations are only afraid of consumers -- and politicians are only afraid of corporations.
There is a way to take back the real America from the impostor presidency of Donald Trump, but the road doesn't go through our failed democratic institutions -- not directly, anyway. Americans are going to have to hit the oligarchy in the only place it really hurts them: Its bankbooks. What's more, everyday people can't expect the reward of a Trump-free America without taking some risk.
I'm on my way ya'll, I have an early flight out of LAX, see you soon Lafayette Park! #OccupyLafayettePark https://t.co/MDITtnDk7m -- Marcus Wilson (@Marcus_Resist) July 17, 2018
Since congressional Republicans won't take serious moves to restrain Trump, it's time to boycott the large corporations that the GOP needs need to finance its fall campaigns, not to mention the handful of big companies that actively support the short-fingered vulgarian living at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
Do you buy a lot of stuff at Home Depot, the nation's largest home-repair store chain? Well ... don't. That's because the Home Depot's co-founder, Bernard Marcus, not only gave $7 million to aid Trump in 2016, but is spending nearly $5 million more, so far, to keep the House and Senate in GOP hands and even gave $300,000 to the Super-PAC of Trump's national security adviser, John Bolton. Until Marcus tells his clients in Congress to remove Trump, there's a Lowe's just down the street that sells the same stuff -- or you can patronize your friendly local hardware store.
Do you have Dixie Cups or Brawny paper towels at home? Replace them with a different brand, because those products are manufactured by Georgia-Pacific, which is owned by the most powerful GOP donors of all, David and Charles Koch, who plan to spend up to $400 million (!!) on the midterms and who could thus get rid of Trump with one phone call.
You can stop buying your gasoline from Chevron or Valero, which are also spending millions to keep in power those Republicans who are keeping Trump in the White House, and for God's sake don't answer the door when Amway -- founded by the Republican-financing family of Education Secretary Betsy DeVos -- comes ringing. Unless they successfully convince their wholly owned members of Congress to move on Trump. That is when the boycott ends.
But that's not all. Helsinki showed the rising danger posed by Trump means that the American people are going to have to kick things up a notch, in a hurry. It's time to begin the planning for a general strike-- perhaps right after Labor Day, when school is back in session and vacation season is over -- that would show our ability to shut down the American economy while this unfit and arguably treasonous president insists on clinging to power.
That means that millions of workers -- on the docks, in the classrooms, on factory floors, in sweltering warehouses and manning the checkout line and, yes, in newsrooms -- walk off their jobs . Maybe for a day, maybe for longer, and maybe more than once depending on the political fallout -- but until the comatose American system wakes up. The general strike is a recognition that while massive weekend protest marches since Trump's inauguration have been a thing of beauty, they don't strike fear into a corrupt system, either. A general strike is much more potent.
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