High Noon, Low Expectations

How did this happen? We didn't stop it

Are you worse off than you were three days ago?

It’s a version of what Reagan asked in 1980. Then things got better in his first term because of a Federal Reserve chairman appointed by Jimmy Carter. Reagan got credit. If you knew that, you were paying attention. If you thought Reagan tamed inflation, you weren’t. If you could argue whether the simplification above was right or wrong, you were paying attention and had maybe read a book or taken a class.

So are you worse off?

You are if you have relatives in Ukraine. Get them out if you can. You are if you benefit from aspects of the Affordable Care Act. Google “ACA navigators” to find out what you can do. You are if you’re a non-citizen. Look for a church or non-profit that understands the complexities of your situation.

In a nation with a functioning government, one that isn’t constantly being libeled, ridiculed, and derided by its own citizens, you could call the State department or Health and Human Services to find out some of the answers. But State was gutted by the first Trump administration and HHS never knows if it will be funded next year. You can still try.

Call your congressman or senator for constituent services. Call to express your feelings about legislation if you must, but the vast majority of votes for the next two years are already decided or won’t be held. We’re polarized, deadlocked, at an impasse on policy issues. Constituent services personnel still show up every day and answer the phone. They don’t have time to be as political as their bosses.

Lay off the memes. They’re being liked by people who already agree with them, and they’ll be argued by those who don’t understand them or can’t be persuaded.

Find out when the next election is and who’s running. Two out of five supervisors and school board members, including Matt Cross, are up in 2025 in the county. Talk to your neighbors about the elections. But don’t try to convince them of anything, and change the subject if they try to convince you. Talk about it instead of arguing about it. Find out what your friends think. Find out how we got here. Don’t argue, ask. That doesn’t mean sympathize. It means find out what kind of lies, distortions, and misinformation could make someone decent enough to be your friend vote for someone like Donald Trump at the top or Matt Cross at the bottom. Don’t look for a compromise. They won’t.

If someone tells you it won’t be that bad, don’t trust them. That doesn’t mean don’t believe them. It means don’t accept their judgment. There was a Muslim travel ban last time, for those who don’t remember. The White House had a pandemic management office in case a new and unknown disease broke out; Trump eliminated it. He endorsed canned beans from the same Resolute desk JFK sat behind to manage the Cuban Missile Crisis. It will be that bad. It’s who he is.

If you want this to end, if you want it to get better, get involved in politics. It’s easy to say politics are ugly and gave us Trump. It’s hard to knock doors for a school board candidate in Elkton. It’s easy to hate politics, and it’s hard to make things better if you feel that way. Organizations that helped Trump win were founded in the 1970s. The rabid right began taking over their party in 1964. The Paranoid Style in American Life (google it and read it) begins the story in the 1840s. Campaigns don’t begin on Labor Day. They’re going on right now, and we’re losing.

Reagan gets credit for ending the Cold War. That end had more to do with the collapse of oil prices in the 1980s than with the U.S. military buildup, but the myth survives of Reagan the Cowboy meeting the Russians in the street at High Noon. Now we have the myth of Trump the tycoon managing the government like a business. Elections are too often decided by people who believe things that aren’t true.

Trump won this week. How could that happen? That’s a question we should have been asking eight years ago. Matt Cross is likely to win reelection in 362 days, unless we fear that enough right now. Harrisonburg seems rudderless to many of its citizens, but those voters won’t know who’s on council or when they’re up for election until they see a ballot with no options in two years.

Are you, or the people you care about, or the ideas that you believe in going to be worse off in four years? Count on it. Will it be even worse in eight years? We can’t wait until after Labor Day in 2028 to start thinking about it.