The Dark Times Journal - 495 days



The day I admitted total defeat. Sorry Germany for all the accusations I have made about you giving Hitler free reign. I now believe that in any country, in any culture there is a percentage of people that will support a dictator no matter how horrid. The one barrier to a Mussolini, Hitler, or Trump is an awake and conscious population which prevents their election. But once seated at the head of a government it is virtually impossible to unseat them in any way other than an assassin. 

 Our only defense is that we did not actually elect him. We just didn't prevent Russia from getting him elected. More importantly we allowed two parties to so corrupt the whole process that there were no longer any effective checks and balances. A percentage of our population is still hypnotized by this snake oil salesman, and there appears no way to snap them out of it.

 That said, short of hiring James Bond to handle this problem, what are we to do? I personally am sheltering in place. The New Mexico mountains are a good place to ride out the fall of the empire. The great US Civil War barely touched us. I will tend my garden, paint my pictures, record the changes in the color of sunrises, and, like Anne Frank, write in my journal.

 What is very interesting to me, on a personal level, is this is the same decision I made in the final days of the Nixon presidency. It was a decision many of us made. We just picked different mountain tops and different wildernesses. It was an unplanned strategic retreat. It became so clear we had no power to change things after the May Day protests in 1971. We were putting our lives in danger. We gave up and left the battle ground.

 When I got involved with the Resistance against Donald Trump I dreamed it would be different. But that false hope was there in the early days of 1970 too. This time, at least, I am already on the distant mountain top. I do not have to pack all my worldly goods, resign my job, and head out as I did in 1972. Two years before he at last resigned, and Ford pardoned him for crimes named and unnamed. They are a fraction of Trump's crimes.

 It is not cowardice to leave. To wage even a peaceful war against an entrenched dictator and his minions is to validate his position and give him power. In early 1970's we were giving Nixon reasons to call out the National Guard and put DC under martial law. Now we are proving Trump's claims of a witch hunt. 

 Hopefully there will be people to pick up the pieces after it all falls apart.

 Exit stage left.

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