Let’s face it, the indictments against former President Donald J. Trump and his conspirators in Georgia seem like they’re getting harder to dismiss as political payback or a manuever to keep Trump from being elected President again in 2024. I was surprised to hear that Georgia’s former lieutenant governor Geoff Duncancalled Trump the “worst candidate ever” for the Republican Party even worse that Herschel Walker, who ran for the U.S. Senate of Georgia. Duncan, who is 48, and a former college athlete has the GQ business looks and guts to say what Republicans used to say clearly about each other. He’s been one of the few Republicans who publicly questioned Trump’s allegations of voter fraud since the beginning.
But could he be the future for the Republican Party? Who knows? He chose not to seek re-election for a very good reason. Now, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, who looks like he’s from Central Casting of every racist bigoted sheriff/police chief in every white savior Civil Rights movie, is also criticizing the Trump campaign’s allegations. “The 2020 election in Georgia was not stolen,” Kemp posted on X, formerly Twitter.
“For nearly three years now, anyone with evidence of fraud has failed to come forward — under oath — and prove anything in a court of law. Our elections in Georgia are secure, accessible, and fair and will continue to be as long as I am governor,” he added. Both he and Duncan said the GOP need to get a clear focus on a better candidate for 2024. The speculation has already started that Duncan, who was a witness for the grand jury, should run. Yet even with primaries months away, it might already been too loate for him. And he may not play well among the Trump fan base.
Since Trump has been indicted by grand juries in Florida and Georgia, it’s harder to call it a liberal conspiracy. The 98-page indictment in Fulton County, Ga. named Trump and others, Rudi Giuliana, Sidney Powell, John Eastman and Kenneth Cheesebro including Georgia’s own David Shafer, the former GOP Chair for Georgia. Trump is charged under Georgia’s RICO (Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organization) Act for election tampering and interference.
Trump and 18 others are accused of trying to make officials violate their oath of officer, devising a plan to submit fake electors, intimidation of election workers and even unlawfully breaching voting equipment. And since a sitting president can’t pardon anyone under Georgia’s statutes, it’s likely Trump will have to serve prison time if he is convicted. The question is do people really still believe the election was rigged or do they want to keep putting money into the jukebox to play their favorite song.
It’s been my experience that when the victims of criminal cases start questioning “wrongfully convicted” people, law enforcement and the courts begin to look closer into the evidence. And since Kemp and Duncan, who were the top dogs for Georgia during the 2020 election, are saying the election wasn’t rigged, it should be an eye-opener that enough is enough is enough.
It’s hard for people to defend a phone call where Trump is contacting Georgia’s Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger saying, “I just want 11,780 votes.” That would have given him Georgia’s 16 electoral votes. Other people still hold on to the falsehoods that the election was rigged. In Colorado, former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters is under indictment and charges for a breach in Mesa County’s election system. President Joe Biden won Colorado with 55 percent of the votes.
How many people are willing to go down with the ship on this? Kari Lake, who ran for governor of Arizona and lost, keeps acting like that election in 2022 was rigged. With the RICO charges, it’s likely someone else beside Trump will play Let’s Make a Deal. Trump keeps denying it saying he’s got evidence but it’s evidence that hasn’t been presented in almost three years. He’s obviously just doing it to keep getting campaign money and have people pay his legal bills.
But the Republicans have to wonder how much longer they can listen to this song? Lately Oliver Anthony, who grew up in the appropriately named Farmville, Va., became the latest conservative MAGA goldenboy after the Montgomery Riverfront incident knocked Jason Aldean’s “Try That in a Small Town” down. Anthony, who claims to be a political centrists, wrote and sings “Rich Men North of Richmond.” But it has a lot of the same far-right talking points.
Anthony, who reportedly was born in 1993, seems to sing the same talking points other Millennials who lived in isolated areas heard. Lyrics include “I wish politicians would look out for miners.” Of course, someone who was born in Virginia should know there was a lot of history of how politicians mistreated miners. On May 19, 1920, agents with the Baldwin-Felts Detecive Agency working for the mining industry and supported by politicians as pre-Gestapo goons got into a shoot-out with the miners and officials of Matewan, W.V. Filmmaker John Sayles’ made a movie about this in 1987 starring James Earl Jones, Chris Cooper, Mary McDonnel and David Strathairn, among others.
Then, a year later, there was the Battle of Blair Moutain, the largest labor union uprising in history from Aug. 25, 1921 to Sept. 2, 2021 with the Warren G. Harding Administration intervening by sending the U.S. Military to break it up as 10,000 armed coal miners confronted 3,000 law officers and strikebreakers backed by the coal mining industry to prevent them from organizing unions. You don’t hear much about this because no one wants you to know the people of Appalachia were progressive. It’s the same as they don’t want people knowing the Old West was progressive.
There are only about 55,000 reported coal mining jobs in America. I understand Anthony’s frustration over the “bullshit pay” but does he know that coal miners weren’t paid shit. They got the equivalent of Monopoly money that could only be spent at stores and places owned by the coal mining industry. He sings of the Reaganite myth of the “Welfare Queen” of an obese person using food stamps to buy junk food, but doesn’t he realize that it’s gotten harder (a lot harder) for people to get government assistance unless they are damn near death.
The song has become another anthem for conservatives who say it speaks to blue collar people, but I seriously doubt conservatives really know much about blue collar workers. Blue collar workers had their best era when they were mostly unions and rich wealthy men Anthony (who looks like a MAGA version of Opie Cunningham) sings of paid more taxes. Reagan and especially Trump made sure these rich men weren’t taxed while the blue collar workers were. Let’s be honest, blue collar workers supporting Donald Trump is like Jewish Holocaust survivors saying Adolf Hitler was a job creator.
It’s obvious MAGA Opie wrote a song to appeal to the right. And while he can act like he’s an Appalachian version of Ron Swanson, as someone who grew up in Appalachia, this is becoming a tired song too. I grew up in a town where Daddy’s Money talked and bullshit walked. Not everyone wore flannel and dreamed of working in the mines. A lot of people drive Mustang 5.0s and lived in nice homes. People are surprised when I tell them that the Homecoming Dance was a tuxedo and evening gown event. And they usually had the dance in the fucking cafeteria. I never went because I didn’t have the money.
My ancestors hid in the upper mountains of Appalachia rather than be kidnapped by the U.S. military and taken 1,000 miles to Oklahoma Territory on the Trail of Tears. Appalachia people are very diverse and they are very cultured. Athens, Ga. and Asheville, N.C. are known for their diversity as well as their appreciation for the arts and entertainment. You have the Research Triangle of Duke University, North Carolina State University and the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill in close proximity.
Instead, people associate Appalachia with the Hatfield and McCoys and Ned Beatty being raped in Deliverance. There’s three times the number of jobs for people who are road workers at 146,000 than there are for coal miners. There’s 1.4 million delivery drivers and an additional 3.5 million truck drivers in America. That’s why the UPS strike didn’t happen. Movies and TV tell the same stories of Appalachia that only white people live in Appalachia but there are black peope and Indigenous Native Americans.
The truth needs to be told because the lies are more damaging. And it seems that while the GOP thinks their chances of winning in 2024 grow slimmer as they continue to back Trump, maybe they’re finally coming around even if it’s for their own good. But if it’s enough to stop the lies, it’s a necessary evil. People will rather believe the lies because the truth is a harder pill to swallow.
What do you think? Please comment.
Zane Says 