“These are the times that try men’s souls; the summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of his country; but he that stands it now deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph.” – Thomas Paine.

This week, for all my struggles to rationalize, understand, and explain Trumpism this year, the reality of it hit me on the head last Wednesday as our capitol was assaulted so violently.

We are not the country we thought we were. We have never been. It’s time to own up to it.

We are a country of great promise and often good intention, a noble experiment, but the real healing journey comes with looking in the mirror and telling the truth. We have lied almost from the beginning to ourselves and to one another.

I love America, but loving America has been most often the embracing of a myth, a creation story that was only partially true and very much a lie. I heard this myth on the traitorous lips of the mob that stormed the capitol.

They must never be permitted to own those flags and corrupt their meaning.

When millions of people of color watched the truly horrifying attack last Wednesday, they saw, live on TV and in color,  a clear glimpse of the other country, the country of white privilege,  not the one they know and have known and experienced.

They’ve always been there, the “keep America white people,” but they never had a President in their pocket before. And they never had millions of Christians in their pocket either.

And they never seem to land in jail as quickly and for as long as people do when they protest voting suppression or police brutality.

On Wednesday, I saw a President leading a white nationalist movement that had embraced fascism over democracy as their goal. They have given up on our country and seek to make their own, a white Christian nation.

That is the face of Trumpism now, exposed to the world.

This movement has infected the Republican Party, Christianity, and a number of state government officials and Congress. We have another pandemic to deal with, this one deadly as well.

Bigots and racists and thugs and people who call themselves Christians have joined forces to form a coalition that has torn our country apart and damaged it grievously.

The Republicans can whip up all the hysteria they want about a socialist takeover. A socialist takeover would look a lot better than the one we saw in Washington last week.

America is so screwed up that working-class white workers all over the country think that people who wish to pay them more and treat them better and offer them health care are their worst enemies.

That’s what big business and many politicians have been telling them for years.

At the moment, the country is almost all about lying to its people, white and black.

Even the voters of Georgia, never a bastion of liberal democracy,  saw through that lie.

There had to be a reckoning. It’s here. And this struggle won’t be over for a long time.

It’s common when workplace massacres and church and school killings occur in America, as they do routinely,  for our leaders to say “this is not who we are,” and then rake in the cash from the gun lobby.

But if it happens, and we do nothing about it, it is precisely who we are.

It is essential, at long last,  that we own up to the truth.

Then we might just become the country we always claimed we were. We might actually be great again, rather than just claim we are.

I understand now why Donald Trump fought so hard to keep confederate statues up and confederate flags flying.

They are the official flag of his movement, the flag he has taken an oath to uphold and defend.

Why should we be so staggered when Trump and his supporters lie?

Our national creation story is somewhat of a lie. There’s plenty of hypocrisy to go around.

We’ve been lying to ourselves for centuries.

When we face up to that as a people, perhaps the healing and talking will begin.

Blacks are not the only people for whom this is true – ask mine workers and industrial and factory workers and union members in the industrial heartland and Appalachia and small farmers if the long history of government and politician’s lies and violence against them and their well being is or isn’t who we are.

But Wednesday, Charlottesville 2.0, as some people call the capitol assault, hit me and many others right on the head with the truth.

Trumpism is first and foremost about white nationalism, about our remaining a white, Christian nation. Everyone else is the enemy, the other.

No wonder there is no reasoning with them. How could there be?

His many decent followers have been betrayed. They have nowhere to go.

The “good” people who marched with their Nazi flags in Virginia were back for a reprise – and perhaps more empathy from the President than he has ever shown a coronavirus victim – emboldened by their first “demonstration” in Virginia.

They are coming out. And being “loved.”

Someone seems to die wherever they go.

I don’t know for sure, I don’t accept that all Trump supporters are white nationalists or bigots, but it was obvious on Wednesday that both constitute the heart of his movement.

They are the driving force behind the stormtroopers that struck at the heart of our democracy and behind the effort to sabotage our election.

And yes, they have enablers in power. Isn’t that always true of demagogues, there are always people willing to stand up and lie.

When they say they want to take the country back, does any rational citizen doubt from whom?

If any country needs a great big shake-up, it’s America.  Trump has given us that and shown us the need.

The Republican Party as we know it no longer exists except mostly as an extension of a racist, vote suppressing, lying, and a callous coalition of nationalists, greedy corporations, and a scattering of bigots and fascists.

One of the most outrageous truths about the capitol attack is that most members of Congress enabled and support it by lying and supporting lies.

We are a mess; that’s who we are.

In America, it is heresy to call for better treatment of workers, of a higher minimum wage, of accessible health care, or food programs and housing for the poor and the vulnerable.

The people who need these programs the most have been manipulated into fighting against them the most. We were at our greatest when we supported the notions of a liberal democracy committed to helping the poor and the vulnerable.

Does anyone really think we are great now?

We separate child refugees from their parents, hunt down undocumented immigrants who have been doing our national dirty work for decades, and abandon suffering refugees in nightmarish camps where they wither and often starve year after year.

I’m afraid this is who we are, it’s a bitter pill to swallow.

The Founders made a deal with the devil to get the country started, and the deal still sticks. Imagine if those were black faces charging up those marble steps.

The steps would soon have been running red with blood. I can’t doubt it for a second, and it is no joy in acknowledging it.

We are a country that elected Donald Trump, a hateful and mentally imbalanced bigot, totally unfit for the presidency, and nearly half the country cheers him and excuses him and enables and protects him even today. This is how broken we are.

The politicians who protected and supported him for years are scrambling around like rats to look for somebody else to blame for January 6 and still working to shield their leader from responsibility. In a few months, they will probably have succeeded.

They are traitors, and this is treason.

Trump should have been booted out of office last week, but it’s doubtful that he will be held accountable at all. There is little time and too little will.

That’s also who we are right now.

In many ways, this week has been a necessary reckoning of Donald Trump and much of the movement behind him. We needed to see it. We need to see what comes of lying to people and elected a President with no moral compass.

I thought Biden was correct when he said that good and bad leaders inspire people. Perhaps he can do better.

Donald Trump-inspired tens of millions of people, so much so that many of them are now determined to take the country apart.

For me, justice begins with Donald Trump getting run out of office, hopefully by resignation.

He is surrounded now and trapped; he really can’t get away with much in the remaining time left for him.

In a just world, he would be dragged out of the oval office and tossed out into the street. Thomas Paine would have done it.

We don’t live in a just world; we can only do the best we can.

There is a deadly virus to conquer, and an economy to repair, and wounds to heal. It is long past time for our government to get around to it.

I believe in truth and justice, and I believe that Donald Trump will pay the price for what he has done.

Speaking only for myself, I don’t see it as a time for new wounds. We have enough.

If you watch any of his videos, you know he already has suffered. He is a loser and a failure and is losing his mind in his insane attempts to destroy our democracy on behalf of his ego and to his advantage.

He faces trials and lawsuits that will occupy him for perhaps the rest of his life. And he has exiled himself to Mar-a-Largo, I shiver at the idea.

There is nothing in the world that would make me wish to trade places with him.

Donald Trump is a man for whom being seen to lose the worst fate and punishment. Let him have it, and whatever else is coming his way If he’s broken the law, let the professionals go and make their case and charge him with the crimes he committed.

And let the people he betrayed judge him.

Another trial in Congress seems exhausting to me, and the rest of the country as well. Isn’t it time to put the sick and dying people in the country ahead of politics?

I don’t see impeachment as the right tone to set as a new administration takes office.

I hope it’s either a symbolic gesture or put aside.

Joe Biden might have as little as two years to right some of the wrongs of the past four and help the country to move forward.

I voted for getting on with it.

I can’t think of a bigger priority than that.