When I was 10 and first read the diary of Anne Frank, I wondered if I would have had the courage to hide her. I felt such a kinship with Anne, both of us being writers. Both of us pouring our hearts into the pages of our diary. I remember when a neighbor criticized my friendship with a new neighbor who was Jewish. Don’t you know the Jews killed Jesus? she asked. When I answered that Marcia was my friend and anyway Jesus was Jewish, my neighbor, a year younger than me slapped me across the face and walked away. I don’t recall us ever playing together again and a few months after this incident, my new friend Marcia moved away. I never forgot her.
When I was a bit older a storefront in Greenwich Village was decorated with flowers, peace signs, and a Nixon mask with blood pouring out from the knife in his forehead. At that time, my father was labeled a hawk but said a rosary for peace every morning. I was confused, but said nothing.
Cultural and political animus unnerves me. Sometimes I do the right thing. Other times I silently turn away from the labels, the angry faces, the bloodied mask. I turn into my self, my own life, my own dreams for the future.
It’s one of those times again. Angry voices. Hateful rhetoric. Truth is twisted, old guardrails are melting away. It’s time to take a stand. People, people with clear eyes and hearts now need to be the guardrails. We need to speak the truth loud enough to drown out the present torrent of misinformation.
We are a nation of laws. Donald Trump has been found guilty by a jury of his peers. He is at this moment a convicted felon. Those in government who defend Trump by denigrating the legal process, the judge, and the jury which determined Trump‘s guilt, should not be drawing a salary from the very government they besmirch. Let the legal process clear Trump if he has been wrongly convicted. For that matter, let his other indictments proceed to trial instead of slowing the process and burying the truth. If I were accused of wrongdoing, I’d willing go to court. I’d willingly testify on my own behalf. I wouldn’t make excuses. I’d take an oath and use my voice.
Without evidence that would prove Trump’s innocence, Mike, Marjorie and the rest of the GOP are simply spewing tales full of sound and fury that signify nothing but their desire for power. They are nothing but resounding gongs and clanging cymbals. If any of them loved their country more than their desire for power, they’d at least be as brave as a 10 year old and tell the truth.
