Are we Neanderthals or Homo Sapiens? This election will decide.
The main lesson of these four years is that I may be an alien in this country in which I have lived most of my life.
I don’t mean “illegal alien,” as Trump calls them. I entered this country legally, became a lawful permanent resident, and was a citizen by the 1970s. I mean otherworldly, an alien from another planet.
I feel like that every time I watch the news, read the papers, follow the polls, and see that the election is still a contest. How is that possible? Donald Trump’s presidency has been an unmitigated disaster, on every level, especially on the moral plane. He possesses every detestable quality a human being can have. He deserves zero percent of the vote. Who are the millions of extraterrestrials who will vote for Donald Trump?
They are Americans. I am the alien. Or perhaps there are two life forms on this planet. Like Homo Sapiens and Neanderthals.
Last week The New York Times described the reasons why Donald Trump is unfit for the office he holds. I agree with everything on the list but have developed my own alternative with a different rank order.
His unspeakable cruelty
Donald Trump has put children in cages. As a policy. By design. To deter their parents from coming, the brown hordes from shithole countries who would pollute the beautiful white Anglo-Saxon gene pool. He has separated families, uncaring about the lifelong psychic trauma for the children and the suffering of the parents. To do this he has had federal agents tear children from the arms of their parents. His administration purposely made no provisions for tracking parents and children. So, at this late date there are more than 500 children whose parents can’t be found. Many have been deported. The government is doing nothing to belatedly rectify. Pro bono ACLU lawyers are trying to find them.
Donald Trump has been obsessed with building a wall on the border with Mexico. Not just any wall. A wall with concertina wire and other devices meant to seriously injure anyone trying to cross it. Cruelty to send a message. Wounding human flesh as deterrence. Shades of East Germany. But that Wall fell. The people tore it down with their own hands. One day we will do the same.
His inhuman lack of empathy
At this moment of incalculable loss and grief, Trump has shown no compassion or empathy. To do that, he would have to drop the lie that nothing is really happening, and he would have to call upon human emotions he does not possess. Contrast this with the actions of real leaders like New Zealand’s Jacinda Ahearn and Barack Obama. Ahearn donned the veil and comforted the victims. Obama sang Amazing Grace at a South Carolina Church visited by multiple racists murders. Trump blamed the members of a Pittsburgh synagogue devastated by anti-Semitic killings for being unarmed. Other examples abound.
His conscienceless lying
Were there a Guinness World Record for lying Donald Trump would own it forever. For years, although his lies were evident, they had to be established by eagle eyed fact-checkers and alert news junkies. But in Bob Woodward’s recent book “Rage,” Trump was caught telling the truth about COVID-19 before and after lying to the American people about the same subject. Until then, many people blamed Trump’s sheer ignorance, stupidity, and lack of intellectual curiosity. Now we know that the lies were conscious, calculated, and criminal in their consequences.
His wanton selfishness
To satisfy his huge but fragile ego, whose well being we have learned lately hinges on holding on to the presidency (What am I going to do if I lose?), he has been willing to put everyone at risk of dying, from Secret Service agents to Maga Hatters to the entire nation.
His selfishness led him to the calculation that he could afford to sacrifice the lives of a few tens of thousands of, for him, disposable Americans to ride a boast about a roaring recovery to the White House. The scheme failed on three counts. The death toll, quickly approaching 250,000 is many times what he expected. Those who died were not just the older, sicker, and darker elements of the population. Many others died too, including kids, athletes, cops, firefighters, and even suburban women. Finally, as the case of Iowa shows, recklessly opening the economy is no guarantee of recovery. With COVID-19 raging in the state, sensible people will wear a mask to the supermarket, buy the beer and the hot dogs, and watch the game at home. That does nothing for bars and restaurants, which have been hurting the most.
His unrivaled vindictiveness
He is constantly being victimized by others and always seeking revenge. Psychologists call this projection and paranoia. He constantly attacks and insults people and then portrays himself as the victim when they defend themselves. No one who doesn’t unfailingly lick his shoes—not an attorney general, not a decorated military hero, no one—is spared his wrath.
His racism, xenophobia, sexism, and homophobia
We thought we had begun to put all this to rest beginning in the 1960s and culminating with the Obama election. We were wrong. The Neanderthals were not extinct, just hibernating in their caves. The insult to their Neanderthal sense of pride and status resulting from a Black man in the White House rudely jolted them awake. They came out of their caves to tear down everything Obama built.
The 2020 election is a test of the worth and nature of the American people. Are Americans Homo Sapiens or Neanderthal?
If we are Neanderthal, I want to go wherever ET went.
