Trump and the Firing Squad

I watched a little of President Trump's last gasp on TV this morning. Although he had assembled, as usual, a huge crowd of several thousand followers chanting their love for him, the fact remains that he lost the election and refuses to accept it, and that's sad. Plus it pisses me off -- rather than hold on, he should just get the heck out of town, fly off to some beautiful Caribbean island, order a few Mai Tais, lay in the sun, play golf and forget his four-year political nightmare. That's what I would do. In fact, that's what I did in similar circumstances, about 36 years ago.

I was working as a graphic designer at The Washington Times, a right-wing newspaper run by the Reverend Sun Myung Moon. Despite disagreeing with the paper's politics, I needed the money and the job paid well. Single at the time, I embarked on a romance with a colleague, back when that was actually commonplace. What was not commonplace was that this particular guy was a "Moonie," or follower of the Reverend's weird religion, for whom fraternizing with non-Moonies was strictly prohibited.

When the office gossip reached my boss that I was seeing this guy, she, being a no-talent patsy who did what she was told, went straight to the top. Next thing you know I was fired without cause, the only time I was ever fired I might add, while my partner in crime was never seen or heard from again. Outraged, I decided to fight it and lodged a formal complaint. Soon I received a note stating the date and time I had to appear in a court of law in the city of Baltimore to plead my case.

I went alone, of course, because why wouldn't I? When I got there I found my boss, her boss, and about six lawyers all ready to pounce on me and make their case. I surveyed the scene, realized I had no chance, and besides if they didn't want me to work there that much, who wanted to work there? I left immediately, got in my car, went out for some coffee and the paper and started looking for a new job. I may have been unemployed, but at least I still had my dignity. 

Trump faces a much bigger firing squad: Everyone who works at CNN, MSNBC, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, NPR, PBS, all of Hollywood, at least half of Congress and half the citizens of America, to name but a few. He would be wise to get out with what few shreds of dignity he can scrape together since there's no way he can win against that bunch.