As a child, did you ever play the game commonly known as “Which One Is Not Like the Others?” If so, it’s time for a bit of nostalgia. Please read the following six news headlines and try to determine which one is not like the others.
1. “Trump Loses Support of Half of GOP Voters, Poll Finds” – New York Times, 7/12/2022
2. “President Trump Losing Support From Republicans” – US News, 4/27/2021
3. “Trump Losing GOP Support for 2024 Run as Jan. 6 Hearings Unfold” - Newsweek, 7/22/2022
4. “Polls Show Trump Losing 2024 Support to DeSantis” – BusinessInsider, 9/21/2022
5. “Trump’s Support Among Republicans Is Slipping, Poll Finds” – Rolling Stone, 07/12/2022
6. “Is Trump Losing His Base? New Poll Suggests Otherwise” – Intelligencer, 01/25/2022
If you guessed number six, give yourself a medium-five—with your face between your hands and an Edvard Munch raised-brow, open-mouth scream of despondent terror conveying your rational comprehension of our nation’s dystopian future.
Trumpism is here to stay. For every MAGA supporter Donald Trump loses—and I’m convinced that number is statistically insignificant—he gains at least one to replace that deserter. Donald Trump retains his iron grip on the GOP, and the GOP is growing. Anyone who says otherwise is basing his or her assessment on wishful thinking or mistaken polling rather than on reality.
How Trump Trumped Traditional Republicans
How, despite the many and varied scandals, has “the Orange Jesus” managed to gain and retain his iron grip on the political party he joined so late in life? The answer is that he was the Republican candidate most willing to lead the charge in viscerally attacking the opposition party as not just being wrong on policy issues but rather as being fundamentally evil. According to the MAGA wing, which now controls the GOP, Democrats are so sold out to "godless communism"—and even to bloodthirsty satanism—that they must be defeated at any cost, including lying, cheating, violence, and even full-on civil war.
Two Terrible Scenarios
Excluding the possibility of a miracle, I can envision just two possible scenarios for the USA. Scenario One: Trump is convicted on one or more of the many charges he’s facing. If this happens, the violence we witnessed at the Capitol Building on January 6, 2021, will appear trivial compared to the carnage that will result in this scenario. MAGA minions' rage will be unleashed. The federal government will have to respond in force, which will intensify the MAGA rebels’ resolve. A literal, national civil war will commence. The civil war will end with a weakened USA being ripe for subjugation by a stronger nation.
Scenario Two: Trump manages to elude conviction for any of the charges brought against him. Here we have two sub-scenarios, both of which assume Trump will be the Republican candidate for president in the 2024 election.
In the first sub-scenario, Trump loses the election. If this happens, he and most Republicans will again claim the election was rigged. Trump will then whip his followers into a frenzy that will look much like the results portrayed in Scenario One.
In the second sub-scenario, Trump wins the election. In response, some progressives will take to the streets in protest. Trump will quickly call out the National Guard to quell the protests. More progressive protests will be followed by more crackdowns. Trump will then declare martial law, and Congress—with Republicans holding a slim majority—will do nothing to resist. Within a year of that time, the USA will become a fully fascist nation. Anyone who openly opposes Trump and his MAGA goons will be imprisoned—or worse.
I Know White Evangelicals
Why do I feel confident in my predictions? I feel confident because I know America’s white evangelicals. I know their intransigence. I know their certainty of being God’s righteous instruments on earth. I know that they have unreservedly crowned Donald J. Trump as God’s vice-regent, ruler of earth in God’s stead. I know that once a doctrine is established for them, evangelicals shall not be moved. Anything that appears to contradict that doctrine is a lie from the enemy, the devil.
One could show them irrefutable evidence that their messiah incited the January 6th violence, or that he stole top-secret documents that should never be removed from their designated storage or viewing areas, or that he brazenly revealed some of that top-secret information to a famous Washington Post reporter, and they’d blame “the deep state” for slandering their hero.
White evangelicals make up approximately one-fourth of the nation’s registered voters, and Trump can count on the unwavering support of at least 80 percent of them. That's probably enough to sway an election. If not, it's enough to rip our nation apart.
Don’t rejoice when you see the many incorrect assertions that Trump’s support is waning.
America is destined for a disastrous, dystopian, Trumpian future, and my people—white evangelicals—will be the cause.