An Hour and a Half Firing Squad

The millions of people around the US and world didn’t watch a standard State of the Union address. We all witnessed a protracted execution of the Democratic party by one man. In 84 minutes, Donald Trump systematically eviscerated every single DNC talking point and laid out a comprehensive plan for his next year in office. It was a masterstroke of rhetorical work, covering pathos and ethos in equal measure with a little bit of logos in just for the hell of it. His posture and hand movements were like daggers directed at the democrats, most of whom sat for 95% of the ceremony, often looking at the sitting Dems and slightly moving his hand upwards as he talked of his numerous economic accomplishments for the minority groups that they claim to care about so much. They didn’t stand or clap when Trump mentioned the 3 million bonuses given out since the tax break, the record low unemployment across the board, his plan for paid family leave, and the numerous companies bringing factories back to the states. Trump started his 5 pronged pathos attacks against the dems, with a small businessman from Ohio having his, along  with one of his employees, story told, and how the tax plan allowed them to hire 14 more employees and expand into the next building. Trump then shifted to immigration where he set out his plan to give citizenship to 1.8 million Dreamers who can pass a checklist, get the wall built, end chain migration, and offer a merit based system over what we have now. Trump said his line of the night during this section, “Americans are dreamers too.” Again, absolute silence from the Democrats. The families of two girls who were raped and murdered by MS-13 members were brought in to nail home the effect of the broken immigration system, along with an immigration agent, who’s life was threatened by the brutal gang. Trump also announced a 1.5 trillion infrastructure plan to help rebuilt parts of the country that are falling apart (to anyone living in Virginia, you know how horrible our roads our), and planned to have it complete within 2 years. There was also a section devoted to the opioid epidemic going on in the country with Trump planning to wage a war to end the country’s reliance on them, and having his FDA approve hundreds of new generic drugs for use.The President then shifted to foreign policy as his capstone, bringing up the annihilation of ISIS, his withdrawing of aid from countries that aren’t US-friendly, and his plan for the military for the future. This brought some Dems to get to their feet to chant “USA”, but not all of them. Here he brought up a solider who worked tirelessly to save his comrade who had been caught in an explosion, and a defector from North Korea who traveled thousands of miles to be free of the tyrannical regime. I was almost brought to tears when he triumphantly held up the crutches which had supported him on his journey to freedom. As soon as Trump finished, you could see Dems rushing to the exit, eager to leave a place where they were thoroughly blown out of the water. Things were looking bad for them, but Joe Kennedy’s response was absolute trash. Where Trump stood on a pillar of solid gold, Kennedy wobbled on the filmiest pile of kindling. He laid out zero actual policies that the Democrats would go through with, and instead focused solely on whining about Trump, and saying that America is filled with “fake choices.” The most disgusting moment of his speech was when he spoke in Spanish to the Dreamers, clearly showing that he cares more about their vote than the average English speaking American. Pelosi’s face in the featured image says it all. The Democrats stand zero chance of getting a majority in Congress come the midterms. Insulting Trump will only get you so far, but when people have more money in their pocket, are unfettered by the government, and the Rust Belt is getting jobs they lost over a decade ago, you’re setting yourself up for disaster. Now is the time where we can’t rest on our laurels. We must continue to campaign and organize to bring the full press onto the Democrats. They are this close to snapping, and with the release of the FISA memo soon, we’ll see how fast they disintegrate. Trump has proven his salt in the past year, and the sky is the limit now. It feels good to have a president I can be proud of again.