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The novelist and social critic Norman Mailer once wrote, “You can be the best in the world and still lose.” Mailer uttered these profound words to lament his defeat in a race for the office of Mayor of New York City. His prodigious ego led him to believe he was the best candidate in the race. Perhaps history will give him the benefit of the doubt and adjudge Mailer the best novelist turned politician in that contest.
Let’s face it. There are no two ways about it. Republicanism is terrible for American Democracy. Suppose the response of Republicans since January 6, 2021, indicates how current Republicans in the main feel about democracy in America. There is nothing in the historical record that suggests otherwise. In that case, it is safe to bet the farm on the demise of the much-heralded American democracy, for, without a doubt, democracy in America is on its last leg.
Two weeks after an angry mob stormed the US Capitol in what can only be described as an outright act of war against the federal government, two civil rights groups in Georgia have demanded the ouster of six Georgia delegation members in the House of Representatives.
The civil rights groups alleged that six Republican members of the US House knowingly told lies, claiming that impeached President Donald J. Trump had won the 2020 Presidential Election. Their lies stirred up the hatred that led to a raid on congressional offices and legislative chambers, placing the entire Congress and the Vice President in jeopardy of serious bodily harm or death.
Henry “Hank” Aaron first came to my attention in the 1957 World Series. I was a few days shy of my sixth birthday. The ’57 World Series was the first baseball game my family ever watched on a television set. We were farmers, and radio had been the media beaming information and entertainment into our farmhouse for about forty years.
Amendment II of the US Constitution, generally referred to as the “Right to bear arms” amendment, is a concise one-sentence paragraph containing, one would presume under the circumstances, twenty-six carefully chosen words:
“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
Let’s face the truth. The Second Civil War (CW2) just got underway. It had been brewing underground, in chat rooms, and on social media sites for much of this century. The first skirmish of CW2 started when insurgents, commanded by their Commander-in-Chief, the disgruntled sitting President of the USA, ordered them to march down to the capitol and stop the certification of the November General Election results.
“They always get away!”
The day after the not guilty verdict came in from the George Zimmerman case back in 2012 for the murder of Trayvon Martin, a friend from college called me with a teary voice. She cried: “White people always getaway; they always getaway.”
While I attempted to console her by saying we are a nation of laws, and justice, in the end, will prevail, I knew in my heart from my own life experiences that she was right. “They always get away.”
The nation moaned and groaned, “Come on Georgia.” It became a rallying cry in the Senate runoff races because the outcome of the Georgia contest to seat two senators in the US Congress not only impacted the State of Georgia, but it also had national and international implications as well.
And boy, oh boy, did Georgia come through. She elected two senators on the same ballot for the first time in the history of the constitution. In 2018, Minnesota came close to achieving this feat when it held a special election to select a class two senator ( Tina Smith- Democratic-Farmer-Labor) on the same day that the General Election chose the level one senator (Amy Klobuchar-D).
One day before the US Senate run-off in Georgia and the Democrats have the “Big Mo.” Momentum is on their side. In what is expected to be two close races to determine who will represent Georgia in the Senate and which political party will control the upper chamber, turns on which party can generate enough excitement to turn their supporters out.
Quit it! Stop it right now. I can’t bare to read or hear this hashtag one more time. It is denigrating to the southern spirit within me.
I’ve had about all I can take from people who do not live in Georgia using the hashtag “Come on Georgia” about the January 5, 2021 run-off election to fill two open seats in the US Senate. It’s as if the people of Georgia are too dumb to know what’s at stake in next week’s election.