Personal Reflections of a Middle-Aged Man

As 2023 comes to a close, my mind has wandered to where we will be as a nation at the end of 2024. I wonder because 2024 is a presidential election year. The last one in 2020 just didn’t go so well, ending with an insurrection and the continuation of the slow crawl towards a fascist authoritarian government structure.

Looking back, it seems such the pipe dream to have thought the election of Biden in 2020 would be the political end of Trump and his ilk. Alas, as we’ve experienced, it has only gotten worse with more and more elected Republicans and Trump’s base, becoming full-fledged Trumpists, leaving the Republicans party behind. They are fully behind the idea of Trump being dictator-in-chief and their love of power, believing they will be fine under a Trump regime. My guess is they haven’t studied anything about history to remember how thin-skinned and paranoid a dictator can be, how his followers can become enemies-of-the-state at the drop for a hat.

Will we have a fully functioning democracy at the end of 2024? Will it be the last free election many of us will have in our lifetimes, maybe for many generations to come? Will women become full chattel to exist solely for the pleasure of the men of the world, fully living at the pleasure of their husbands, sons, brothers, or fathers? Will the queer community be driven back underground, imprisoned, tortured, and killed? Will people of color become even more stigmatized and treated even worse as second class citizens than they already are? Will police continue, and become even more so, judges, juries, and executioners of people they consider the “other?” Will the less fortunate among us be totally left, in an already stacked against them society, to fend for themselves while the well-to-do live in gated and guarded communities? Will we live in a military state because military leaders carry out a coup? Will we live in a full state of violence if Biden is elected due to the Trumpists? Will we live in a full state of violence and fear if Trump is elected due to the Trumpists? Will the media finally realize their mistakes, albeit too late to do anything, in their full embrace of Trumpism and their collusion in reporting misinformation and disinformation, seeing how their both-sidedness led to their own downfall? Will we live the fear those in France, Poland, Germany, and the other countries lived when the Nazis took over?

What a dismal world we may live in at the end of 2024.

Is there anything to be done?

Have we surpassed the tipping point in which democracy loses and fascist authoritarians win?

The answer really lies with us. Not just Wisconsin, Minnesota, Michigan, and Pennsylvania? Not just Nevada, Arizona, and Georgia. It lies with all of us whether we live in a media created label of red, blue, or purple state. It lies with the main stream media standing up and calling a spade a spade. It lies with good people speaking out against white- and christo-nationalism. It lies with old-fashioned journalists getting the truth out to the masses, not hidden behind paywalls. It lies with those who live in rural poor areas voting in their own best interests. It lies in the judicial system treating all equally and imprisoning all the people involved in the January 6th insurrection and subverting the rule of law.

To win and take back democracy, pulling us far away from the brink of fascist and authoritarian rule, a full gambit and coalition of people must be involved and vote.

We must, as a whole:

• Have full participation of registered Democrats vote.
• Have the largest voter registration drive of liberal and Democratic leaning eligible voters and help them get to the polls.
• Have people maintain the stamina and determination needed to wait hours in long lines (sorry as I know this is mainly people of color) to have their vote count.
• Have poll workers who will do the right thing to ensure there are more than enough ballots for those who want to vote and have working (paper verified) voting machines.
• Have people like Marc Elias suing states and counties to ensure there are as many working voting machines in all precincts equally to ensure all who want to vote can vote.
• Have full voter participation in the 18-35 year-old crowd as they now outnumber the conservative baby boomer voting block.
• Have all women who, whether they want an abortion themselves or not, vote for Democrats across the ballot to ensure all women, not just rich women, have the freedom to choose what happens to their bodies.
• Have all men, whether they want a loved one to have an abortion or not, vote for Democrats across the ballot to ensure all women, not just rich women, have the freedom to choose what happens to their bodies.
• Have queer people and their allies vote for Democrats to preserve the right to love and marry whom one wants, and to live full and happy lives as much as their straight counterparts.
• Have people of color, men and women, turn out in as high of numbers, or higher, as they did in the election of Obama and Biden, voting the full Democratic ticket. I know we ask a lot of you, and always have, without much being given in return, to save democracy. I can only continue my hope and faith if enough Democrats are elected from the local to the national level, things will get better.
• Have all of us pressure elected officials now, and forever, to grant full and equal rights and protections to our brothers and sisters of color, voting for Democrats to help move the American ideal needle in the right direction in a more urgent manner.
• Have all of us who care about democracy help Democratic candidates with financial donations, knocking on doors, making calls, writing postcards, texting, showing up at rallies, doing whatever you are most comfortable doing to help get Democrats elected, and as importantly, show up and vote.
• Have full participation of registered Democrats vote (I know I already said this, but it bears repeating).

The big question is, do you care enough to save democracy? Do you care enough to leave a full and free country to your children, your grandchildren, and future generations that you won’t have the pleasure to meet, but to whom you can leave a legacy for in perpetuity?

Yes, you have the power as Glinda said to Dorothy, “You’ve always had the power my dear.”

Now exercise it!