I couldn’t see any danger when I voted for Dick Nixon, twice, sure he was a bit dodgy and could use a shave, but he’d never betray the country.  A few years later I listened to the Great Communicator and felt that he was a decent enough guy who would never wittingly do real harm, even though I knew he was lying about the Contra Business.

Then along came GHWB, a war veteran, an experienced leader and a family man. At least he could run a short war and get out of the sand dunes.

Bill Clinton arrived, with the baggage from the Arkansas State House.  I did not like him or vote for him,  but after a while, I could see that he was being harassed unfairly, but Bob Dole, another real veteran, would surely repair the damage.

Well, that did not work out, and listening to GHWB’s son was a turning point.  George “W.” did not seem evil, just moderately bumbling, even funny at times, obsessed about WMDs and Cousin Saddam, but I was not yet unduly alarmed.

So I voted for Obama, a quiet, thoughtful man who would definitely put things right again, even if he had been born in Nairobi.  But it appears he was blocked at every turn as long honored rules and traditional customs were cast into history’s dustbin.

Hillary dragged along that same Arkansas baggage, but who would have believed that the stalwart defenders of Freedom,  the Sacred Constitution, and national fiscal responsibility, the “Grand Old Party” would nominate  A Buffoon from Queens, New York, a known serial adulterer, sexual abuser, racist and self-promoting liar, and then swallow all that America, the “City on the Hill”, “Home of the Brave”, Refuge of the poor, the downtrodden, the wretched exiles, the Bearer of the Torch of Liberty, Hope and Mother of Dreams, was known for, to elect a two-bit crooked scam artist who would plunge this great nation closer to the fundamentalist “Gilead-by-the-Sea” that our forefathers tried to avoid.

And now, as Martin Niemöller finally understood, it may be too late, and I am alarmed. Benjamin Franklin, when asked by citizens, what type of government the delegates had created,  is supposed to have said, “A Republic, if you can keep it.”

The alarm is sounding for all of us.  It is time for true patriots to stand up and be counted.

© 2018, Charlie Jensen, All Rights Reserved