By Roger Bowen

the White House will be adorned by a downright moron

H.L. Mencken

My partner of 50-plus years and I live at one of the most remote spots on Americas East Coast, also one of the most beautiful. Our small fishing village gives genuine meaning to the heavenly words peace and quiet. We do hear the occasional gunshot during the fall deer hunting season and fireworks on July Fourth, but these noxious interruptions to our psychic balance mercifully pass. When the noises end the bald eagles, sharp-shinned hawks, snowshoe hares, foxes, bobcats, chickadees and chipmunks come out of hiding and life as we love it returns in all its fullness.

COVID-19 thus far has been tolerable. Only 18 souls in our county have been infected; just one has died. Nevertheless, most residents and visitors wear masks whenever they travel to the nearby shire town, they practice social distancing, they wash their hands after every visit to the local post office or grocery store, and they avoid crowds. Our neighbors prudence and regard for community welfare reassures us that we live exactly where we should.

More worrying to us are the health and safety of our two children and two grandchildren. One child lives just north of Boston, the other, and mother of our grandies, lives on Long Island while her husband works in Manhattan. They all hope to visit us at the end of this month. It is an annual ritual that enriches the spirits of us all. Several years ago, when our grandson was just 5 years old and his baby sister only 2, he placed his kiddy rocker on the deck looking out onto the Atlantic, and quietly uttered, You know, Maine is the only place where I can really relax.

What frightens me more than the virus is our President and his most ardent supporters. Trump is a philosophical nihilist who has no firm convictions about anything other than his own glorification. His nihilism has been embraced by his diehard base. They are the ones who defiantly proclaim that they can defy government mandates to wear a mask because they are free, even as they fasten their seat belts, pay taxes, send their children to school and obey the laws of civil society.

To date, Trump has told them what they want to hear: wearing or not wearing a mask is a personal choice made by freedom-loving individuals; CDC guidelines are voluntary; malarial medication and Lysol kill the virus and somehow the virus will magically disappear on its own accord. Thats leadership.

They believe Trump when he describes the Black Lives Matter movement as manipulated by radical leftist fascists; they believed Trump when he said some of the racists in Charlottesville are good people. They believe Trump when he tells them that his tax reform benefits every American; Wall Street just smiled. They believe him when he denies he is Putins puppet, when he denies being briefed about Russia paying the Taliban a bounty for killing American soldiers, when he promises to make America great again, etc. Trump has told over 18,000 lies since assuming office and his base seems to have swallowed most of them. One of the great elitist cynics of the 20th century, H L Mencken, once wrote: No one in this world has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of plain people.

Americas Bill of Rights was written to protect Americans from government overreach and to enshrine the rights of the individual. Now as never before, at least in my lifetime, have the First Amendment guarantees of freedom of speech, freedom of the press, the right to peaceably assemble and to redress grievances meant more. Of course, rights are meaningless unless you exercise them.

Now is the time to prove Mencken was mistaken. Do not be taken in by Trumps lies, listen to the CDC experts and vote this November to remove Trump from office. Our democracy is at stake. And I want our grandchildren to grow up unencumbered by fears, of COVID and of the egotist occupying the White House.

Roger Bowen held nonpartisan elective offices in Gouldsboro for 10 years. He currently works (remotely) for a Washington, D.C., higher education nonprofit.

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