“You can’t just talk and not listen - that’s what the other side does”.
So spoke former President Barack Obama last Thursday night in response to the chaos created by protestors who had attempted to shout down three American Presidents while they were speaking to a rapt audience.
The crowd erupted in cheers at Obama’s words.
I was in the house - the incident prompted some very serious and very sober discussions on the fraught nature of this moment both geopolitically and at home.
I was happy to hear the wisdom of men who had participated in attempting to solve some of our most intractable problems and were keenly aware of what was at stake if we do not continue to work towards democratic solutions for a lasting peace.
Mr Clinton’s remarks about Yitzhak Rabin were particularly illuminating but it was Obama’s words that felt like a balm for the moment - albeit coming out of behavior intended to disrupt rather than promote discourse.
The idea of listening is central to who President Biden is as a candidate and a human being - and a source of much of his empathy.
He is clearly of man of faith who believes in redemption and the shared burden of compromise. His fifty years in Washington bear that out as did his ‘let them go…’ comment when the protestors were being escorted out.
Biden still wanted to hear what they had to say even when it was apparent they were not there to listen.
In a way, it is fitting that President Biden is in a rematch with Donald Trump because it highlights the lessons needed for the soul of the nation.
It is indeed true that Donald Trump’s name should not appear on the ballot in 2024 but a combination of institutional lethargy and outright cowardice have put him there once again.
When you do not have the courage to stand up to a bully he will keep coming back to the playground to steal your lunch money.
In Trump’s case he wants to steal the essence of what it means to be an American; our basic rights, equality and freedom.
Trump is asking people to forgo the principals we all share has a nation and the rights millions have fought to preserve and protect.
The fundamental belief that this flawed land could still produce a system of government designed to protect and serve the individual, while putting no one man above the law.
Trump is asking his voters to make him the law.
He is betting on the ignorance and gullibility of his supporters to believe yet again that he has their best interests at heart.
He does not and never will - as it is not something he is even capable of.
He is a criminal on a crime spree.
He wants them to believe he will be a ‘strongman’, while in reality he may be the weakest man to ever exist.
A greasy orange embodiment of perfidy and malice, Trump will turn on them like buttermilk left to bake in the sun the second he no longer needs them.
Which will be the moment they elect him or participate in his theft of an election.
MAGA will have served their purpose and will soon find he wasn’t really ‘their retribution’ - there was no deep state - and now they live in a kleptocracy run by an addled lunatic selling USA to highest bidder, one who dismantled a working government in favor of one peopled with sycophants.
The lessons of the last Trump term should not be lost on anyone, most especially the American people.
They have been failed by the GOP; a party who folded immediately in the face of Trumpism.
Those who opposed him for the most part headed quietly for the exits early on.
A few did not.
I was in New Orleans a couple of weeks ago and watched as a very left-leaning audience gave Liz Cheney two standing ovations - showing there is life after Trump if you have the courage to oppose him when it counts.
Even Cheney admitted the Republican Party she knew no longer existed and listed Donald Trump as the gravest threat that the U.S. and democracy around the world face.
A sentiment that was shared over and over at the New Orleans Book Festival where I heard everyone from Heather Cox Richardson to Lawrence O’Donnell and David H. Petraeus raise alarm bells.
We must not allow ourselves any sort of fatigue in realizing the dangers we face in this moment.
While he was POTUS, Trump stood against labor unions, human rights and public health during the COVID pandemic and anything else that didn’t suit his immediate needs.
Now Trump seeks to attack our institutions and the rule of law.
Naming and threatening judges and their families.
Using his pulpit as weapon to intimidate and harass those involved in trying to bring him to justice across a myriad of criminal cases.
The former president is not above anything one might have seen from drug cartels looking to evade accountability for their crimes.
It is only a matter of time until more people get hurt.
We’ve already learned we cannot count on the courts to treat Trump the way they would any other defendant behaving in this manner (pretrial detention).
Instead they seem to bend in his favor - that is not an accident.
You should think about that in the sobering sense that if he does get back into office the judicial system will be fully under his control and he will use it to go after rival politicians.
Our last chance to stop him is at the polls in November.
As this holy week winds down, let us think not of the man who sells personalized Bibles - that he cannot read - to pay off his legal fees for cheating on his third wife with an adult film star and a playmate and then paying hush money to cover it up so he could win an election.
Then, in office, stealing classified documents and shaking world leaders for dirt on their political opponents while presiding over the most corrupt administration and deadliest pandemic in American history.
Think instead of the men who understand the adage ‘faith without works is dead’.
The leaders who know that listening, empathy and orienting oneself towards service and the greater good is a better route for a man - and a country - to sail than a course set only on self-centered seas.
As we pause to ponder faith, redemption and perhaps most important of all, forgiveness, let us not fall farther from our true natures.
While millions are led astray, we can keep on a steady course. The policies of the Biden/Harris administration are working.
They are rooted in equality and fairness - designed to benefit and bolster those who need it most while making corporations and the wealthy pay their fair share.
We have been in recovery mode as a nation for some time.
While there is hard work to be done and many lessons ahead, we have the means to achieve a victory on behalf of a better angels.
Vote for the better man.
Vote Blue.
Brilliant piece of writing, Noel! That event in NYC must have been epic to see in person. Bravo!
Thank you for another great article. Glad to see you got to go to Radio City, and I always enjoy your threads.