Do you hear that?
It’s the collective sigh of relief from most progressives and sane-minded people alike that we’ve reached the beginning of the end of Republican nominee Donald Trump’s campaign for the presidency.
With polls projecting either a victory or landslide victory for Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, and mainstream Republicans all but conceding that Trump won’t win, it appears we can all finally calm our minds knowing the next president will not be, among other horrible things, an under-qualified, self-admitting, then post ex-facto self-denied sexual assaulter.
Whether you like Hillary or not, it has to feel good knowing that.
With this relief, though, comes a tinge of anger and sadness. While progressives were busy choosing between the practical choice and ideal choice, Republicans allowed Trump to happen.
One has to wonder why members of the GOP had to wait this long to finally take be back their endorsement.
Let’s actually go over some highlights since he announced his candidacy back in the summer of 2015, when Republicans could’ve and should’ve said, “Wait, hold up. What are your plans for the country?”
June 2015: Trump calls illegal immigrants rapists and murderers, plans to have Mexico pay for a wall to keep them out and would kick all undocumented immigrants out of country.
July 10, 2015: Trump still insists Barack Obama was not born in U.S.
July 18, 2015: Trump insists Sen. John McCain is not a war hero because he was captured and tortured in Vietnam.
August 8, 2015: Trump stigmatizes and calls to attention the fact that Megyn Kelly is in fact a female-bodied person, and yes, has periods.
Sept 10, 2015: Trump doubles down on stigmatizing women, demands people look at Carly Fiorina’s face before supporting her.
Sept. 20, 2015: Trump is a vaccine conspiracist.
This is just the first few months, people.
Oct 2, 2015: Casually dismisses mass shootings as, shit happens.
Oct. 19, 2015: Trump doesn’t believe in climate change. Roughly 47% of Republicans do.
It's really cold outside, they are calling it a major freeze, weeks ahead of normal. Man, we could use a big fat dose of global warming!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 19, 2015
Oct 25, 2015: Trump backs ruthless, deceased dictators.
Only a whole year to go.
Dec. 8, 2015: Trump wants to ban all Muslim travel to U.S., is totally okay with profiling roughly 1.6 billion people.
Some other highlights of Trump include mocking a reporter with a disability, using a mass shooting to promote himself, getting cosigned by white supremacists at every step of the way and refusing to disavow their support and saying Obama created ISIS when clips of him have been used as an ISIS recruiting tool.
He has bromanced with Putin, indirectly told Second Amendment supporters to shoot Hillary Clinton, said Ted Cruz’s dad shot JFK and insulted his wife. He was almost banned by Great Britain, encouraged his supporters to violently deal with his protestors and switched on many of his stances multiple times.
He insulted the family of a deceased U.S. soldier continuously, used the death of Dwayne Wade’s cousin to try to secure black voters, likely has not paid federal income taxes for the past two decades and, oh yeah, bragged about sexually assaulting women.
The last of these was the straw that broke the backs of many Republicans, including Paul Ryan, but what the hell took so long?
You had so many outs to put a stop to this, but you didn’t. Why did it take Trump doing something as reprehensible as sexual assault to finally withdraw your support? Was it because you could only truly see the man’s evil and bigotry when you could conceptualize it affecting your wives and/or daughters and granddaughters?
Or is it because you saw that Trump excited your voting masses like never before, ignoring the problematic truth that so much of your constituency is excited by a racist, xenophobic bigot?
Neither reason is good, and both signify that the GOP is a political party that will happily throw their own morals away if it means they will get elected.
It’s something myself and other progressives have always thought, but now know for sure. Thanks for sucking GOP, enjoy your busted party.
The only thing I worry about is what will rise in the ashes of Trump’s demise.
