After ten long years of fighting against Trump and everything he stands for, we have lost. Trump will become President of the United States. Again.

Did we somehow fail to make our case sufficiently? Or was too much of the country too walled off in their own dark fantasy to hear it? Either way, it no longer matters. Trump still won.

To have more than half the country elect a man who, as The New York Times said, is manifestly unfit for the office of President — it is nearly impossible for me to absorb and accept its implications. A convicted felon and fraud will now be running the country. David Frum, writing in The Atlantic, has made an excellent effort put it in perspective. Many others will surely follow.

“We must {now} learn to live in an America where an overwhelming number of our fellow citizens have chosen a president who holds the most fundamental values and traditions of our democracy, our Constitution, even our military in contempt.”

This is not an America that I recognize anymore.

This election was not a choice between two reasonable candidates who had differing policies and different visions for the future. It was a choice between a candidate who sought to protect our freedoms and our democracy and one that seeks to end them. Between one that values truth and compassion and one that revels in lies and grievance and revenge. Between a defender of our laws and one who has broken our laws — multiple times. Between a future where I could feel safe and secure that the Presidency is in competent hands and one where I fear the recklessness and chaos that lies ahead. And the voters looked at all of this —and chose Trump.

I am shattered.

The next four years will be exponentially worse than Trump’s first term…if only because he will be emboldened by the fact that the horribly vile and divisive campaign he ran actually got him back to the White House. And because he has learned that no matter what he does, no matter what laws or norms he breaks, he remains held unaccountable.

We can look forward to Trump carrying out many of the punitive and autocratic and destructive policies he promised. Things such as (to cite one recently quoted example) Robert F. Kennedy Jr. being in charge of the government’s health agencies. OMG! And, as a special bonus, Trump can now ensure that the Supreme Court remains with a conservative super-majority for at least a generation.

If we couldn’t prevent a Trump victory — despite all of our exhaustive efforts and despite all of the evidence of Trump’s “unfitness,” I don’t have much hope for anything changing any time soon. What can we do now that we haven’t already done — to no avail? If you’re waiting for the country to have a collective change of heart at some point — because they begin to see how bad a Trump second term will be — don’t count on it. Trump’s America is not an aberration; for now at least, it is who we are.

What is the proper response when you believe someone is a fascist and that person wins anyway? How do you continue to go about your normal business? How do you fight back? If you were living in Germany in the 1930’s, what would you have done to combat the rise of Hitler? Could you have done anything that would have altered the outcome? Almost certainly not. And how should that apply to what we do here now? I don’t have good answers to those questions. Certainly not any optimistic ones.

We are the victims of a political earthquake. Before we can move forward, we will need to pick up the pieces of the wreckage in front of us. It will take some time. Actually, the metaphor is imperfect. It’s worse than a  single earthquake. The political tremors of this election will continue to reverberate for the next four years — at least.

Many of you will look at the wreckage and have the motivation to rebuild — and eventually return to the fray: “Americans who care about democracy have work to do.” I applaud you and your resilience. I wish you success. Nothing would please me more than to see you succeed. And, at some level, I know it is the right thing to do. Giving up only further strengthens Trump.

Yet…others may decide that enough is enough and it’s time to move on to somewhere or something else — while we still can. Sadly, that’s the direction I am heading. I feel too old to want to spend my remaining years fighting…to preserve a country where a majority clearly have no interest in being “saved”…and for a cause that has so spectacularly failed to achieve its fundamental goal.

I am shattered. I am done.

Occasionally, I’ll have a strong reaction (usually a bit snarky) to some irritating political news. More rarely these days, my spirits will be lifted by some positive story. In either case, I am moved to write something about it. The problem is that any resulting post would not be long enough to justify an entire column here. In the past, that’s when I went to Twitter. But now that X is overwhelmed by the foul stench of Elon Musk, I don’t go there anymore. So…instead I thought I would combine several of these brief observations into one column — which I am calling Small Bites. Here’s the first one.

Trump is so not off the hook for his MSG rally. Numerous comments made by the warm-up acts at Trump’s Madison Square Garden debacle were so offensive and so filled with racial hatred, that the Trump campaign was forced to issue “a rare statement distancing itself” from the remarks (especially one comedian’s insult to the island of Puerto Rico). Rare indeed, like this may be the first time an apology of any sort has come from the Trump campaign. That should tell you just how bad this all was.

Trump campaign officials can do all the disavowing they want. However, unless and until an apology comes from Trump himself, it means nothing. Trump most certainly approved of these speakers beforehand; he can’t evade responsibility for the consequences of those choices. But more importantly, Trump himself has not said a single word of contrition about any of this. His only comments thus far are to say “Last night, we had a great rally at Madison Square Garden” and boast about (you guessed it!) the crowd size. Trump, as always, is sticking to his Roy Cohn playbook. It’s all he knows how to do. And, at least up till now, it has generally worked for him. Let’s hope it will fail spectacularly next week.

By the way, Trump’s own speech did not shift the tone in any way, but you will never see any apology for that.

Scott Jennings falls flat (again). Speaking of the Garden disaster, when the matter was discussed on CNN yesterday, Scott Jennings (CNN’s resident Trump sycophant) had the rare good sense to not defend Trump. Unfortunately, he couldn’t let it rest there. He had to resort to his inevitable “what-aboutism” and claim that some Democrats have insulted Trump in ways comparable to how the speakers at MSG insulted Harris.

I won’t waste my time arguing whether or not his claim has any validity. It doesn’t have much and it doesn’t matter. The point is that Kamala Harris does not have control over every Democrat, podcaster, and late-night comedian in the country. She’s not responsible for them and couldn’t limit what they say even if she wanted to do so. That’s the big difference. The Garden event was a Trump-sanctioned, Trump-featured major political rally — probably the biggest of his campaign. Everything about it was under the direct control and oversight of Trump and his campaign staff. So what happened there is very much Trump’s responsibility. As usual, Jennings’ lame attempt to paint Harris as no different than Trump fell as flat as a pancake after it’s been run over by a steamroller.

Mass Deportation: the ignorance of Trump and his supporters. One of the pillars of Trump’s rickety platform, touted at the Madison Square Garden rally, is his promise of “mass deportation” of all illegal immigrants, starting on “day 1.” The absurdity and impossibility of actually trying to implement such a policy has now been covered in several venues — including a segment on the most recent 60 Minutes. But for my money, the best takedown was from John Oliver. Not only did he clearly lay out just how costly, unworkable and ultimately counterproductive the plan would be (not to mention immoral), he showcased the mindless support that the plan has from Trump’s MAGA-heads. Paraphrasing here, they essentially said: “I support mass deportation. Yes, absolutely, if they are not here legally, we should get rid of them…all of them.”

It’s all so sadly typical. Trump pushes some bit of fear-mongering that he believes will be a good soundbite for his campaign — while giving exactly zero thought to whether it is possible to carry out the idea — or even whether it would be wise to try. He revels in his ignorance. And then, just as surely, like mindless robots, his followers enthusiastically echo everything he says. It’s truly scary to contemplate what will happen if this man becomes President again.

The real “October surprise.” One could argue that John Kelly’s revelation that Trump fits the definition of a fascist was an October surprise. Some in the press have claimed that the Madison Square Rally amounts to an October surprise. But I’m not sure they qualify for the label. The problem is that neither of these things were especially surprising. It’s exactly what you would expect to hear about Trump and from Trump.

Paradoxically, if there was any October surprise at all this election cycle, it is that there was no surprise involving Kamala Harris. I don’t mean that we should have expected some negative story about her. Far from it. But, given that you can be sure that the Trump campaign has spent more money and resources trying to dig up some dirt on Harris than most countries spend in a year — their inability to find anything amounts to a pleasant surprise.

When is enough enough? Years ago, something like the Madison Square Garden rally might have been a determinative event, assuring a victory for Harris. But we don’t live in such times anymore. No one thing seems to move the needle significantly. Everything seems so “baked in.” And events that seem critical one day seem almost forgotten by the next.

Still, I have to ask myself: If not the MSG rally, then what? What does Trump have to do to get persuadable Trump voters (assuming any exist) to say “Enough already. This is a bridge too far. I can no longer support this guy.”? Are they really willing to look the other way at all the crap that comes out of his mouth — all the lies and violent rhetoric and fascist threats— and say: “Yes, that’s the guy I want as President“? Is this really someone they admire? Do they really want such person in charge of the country? Who knows, maybe I’m wrong. Maybe this time, it will make a difference. I can only hope.