Saturday. We’re three days out from an Election Day that may seal our fate as a country that has abandoned democracy. Around the country, there are razor-thin margins in Senate and gubernatorial races between competent, rational and caring politicians on the one hand and hair-on-fire extremists who indulge in Confederate cosplay, proudly proclaim that they’ll support a nationwide abortion ban, and basically shut down democracy. These races shouldn’t even be close. The fact that they are tells us some sobering facts about our fellow Americans.
Last week’s vicious attack on Paul Pelosi is a grim harbinger of things to come. Last Friday at 2:00 a.m, a violent, right wing zealot broke into Nancy Pelosi’s San Francisco home armed with a hammer, zip ties and duct tape, looking for the Speaker. When the assailant realized that she was not home, he attempted to take her husband, Paul Pelosi, hostage. Pelosi’s quick thinking summoned the police to arrive within minutes, but they could not prevent David DePape from fracturing the 82 year old’s skull with a hammer. DePape later told authorities that he had planned to question Nancy Pelosi and if she “lied,” to break her kneecaps, (Source: ““Details emerge in Paul Pelosi attack: a break-in, conversation, 911 call, then violence,” by Bart Jansen, USA Today, 11/4/22).
The uniform Republican response to this shocking act of political violence was to mythologize, minimize or mock. In the first few days after the attack, the far right floated disgusting rumors of a personal relationship between Pelosi and his attacker, that were amplified by Apartheid Lex Luthor on the giant social media platform he purchased as a plaything. Kari Lake, Arizona gubernatorial candidate, used the attack on Pelosi as a punchline at a campaign event, drawing laughs from the crowd.
Not one Republican expressed dismay or sympathy for the Speaker in the face of a blatant assasination attempt that nearly killed her husband, because this has been the goal of their stochastic terrorism all along. They have demonized Nancy Pelosi for years because she has the temerity to be a woman with enormous power who wields it effectively.
The far-right that has subsumed the Republican Party uses the same playbook everywhere — demonize and dehumanize their opposition to justify violence and terror against us. They seek electoral power so that they can do so with the patina of legitimacy. Just look at the videos of DeSantis’ “election police” arrests of Black voters or armed Oathkeepers patrolling ballot drop boxes in Arizona. Republicans’ message to those who oppose their Christofascist aims is loud and clear— “we will threaten your life and liberty if you vote.”
Let’s face it. This side of America is very ugly, but it isn’t new. These people are the children and grandchildren of the people who spit on and threw rocks at Ruby Bridges and the Little Rock 9 when they integrated public schools. They are the children and grandchildren of the antisemitic “America Firsters” who found common cause with Hitler, that Rachel Maddow profiles in her new podcast, Ultra. The only thing that stopped them then were brave Americans who chose to dig in and fight, rather than look away. Wednesday morning, we may all have to decide what kind of Americans we’re going to be.
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