ELECTION WOES

My Dear Trill,
Author’s note: Trill is a fictional female acquaintance who makes it possible to write in a style that is comfortable for me.

      You feel like screaming? I Understand. An 1893 painting by Norwegian painter Edvard Munch, titled “The Scream” comes to mind. Why has the country, in your words, in this election year, taken on the appearance of an upside down wastebasket? I suggest it is because events conspired to allow a populist, ego  driven candidate hypnotize enough of the population, though not a majority, into selecting him to become their leader.

      Thinking about how he came to power, a single tactical error by Hillary Clinton may have cost her the presidency when she told the coal industry that it has come to the end of the road, without telling it why, or expessing sympathy or telling how she will go about achieving allternative and better ways of earning a living income. So they flocked to the candidate who promised, without telling them how, the industry will thrive again.

      Hillary Clinton failed to explain, as she could have, that the industry is the victim of changing times, and that every effort will be made to introduce new industries to the coal mining territories.              Much as coal burning locomotives evolved into diesel electrics becasuse they were more efficient and cheaper to operate, coal burning power plants, the major users of coal, are, upon being retired, replaced with plants that burn natural gas, which are both cheaper to build and operate more efficiently. Natural gas is also favored over coal because carbon emissions are reduced, and so are toxic emissions. In Addition, coal exports are in rapid decline. Canada, for example will no longer use coal after 2030.

     She could have explained that in the long run this is good for the physical welfare of the community, especially for the men who work all day in the mines.

     Now, it seems, we have bought the farm.

     Samuel Adams wrote to a fellow revolutionary in 1780: “If ever the time should come, when vain & aspiring Men shall posssess the highest Seats in Government, our country will stand in need of its experienced Patriots to prevent its Ruin, There may be more Danger of this, than some, even of our well disposed Citizens may imagine. If the People should grant their Suffrages to Men, only because they conceive them to have been Friends to the Country, without regard to the necessary qualifications for the Places they are to fill, the administration of government will become a mere Farce, and our pub-lick Affairs will never be put on the Footing of solid Security.”

     Early warning of what is to come is manifested in the coterie of individuals selected for important posts in the administration, and the dossiers they bring with them:

A business executive with world wide petroleum interests, whose company funded studies to debunk scientific data on global warming, who has no prior governing experience, who has made serious end runs around US policy, for Secretary of State

A Neocon war hawk who championed the Iraq war for Assistant Secretary of State

A fast food CEO for Labor Secretary with a record of not being able to keep his employees happy and who opposes increasing the minimum wage.

A neurosurgeon with no governing experience to head HUD. 
A mortgage predator as Secretary of the Treasury
A fierce climate change denier to head the EPA.
An anti-women’s rights governor for Vice President

A man who has ridiculed paid sick leave policies and opposes $15 minimum wage to head the Department of Labor

A woman who is a vocal proponent of school vouchers and private schools, and who has contributed heavily to the Trump Foundation, to head the Department of Education.

A hardliner on immigration and other matters for Attorney General.

A controversial retired general as Defense Secretary. (Defense Secretaries by law must be civilians),

A governor and formerly candidate for the presidency who vowed to abolish the Department of Energy, to head the Department.
(Frightening, since the Department manages nuclear power.)

     I don’t know, Trill, this is all so surreal, so bizarre. Maybe it will turn out to be handy to have a neurosurgeon around.