Angry days

A few days after the inauguration, a friend posted on Facebook, “Anybody else glad it’s over?” Meaning a tumultuous election, nights of protest, and a massive nationwide march led by women in pink headgear. I had to respond, “It’s not over.”

Take that women’s march. I understand that the pink headgear referred to crude sexist comments by now-President Trump, recorded some 10 years ago by Access Hollywood. Those comments make me angry too, but not in-your-face, crank-it-up-to-eleven mad. The women reminded me of bitter wives with a husband who just won’t listen: every stupid comment he makes reminds them of every other stupid comment, not to mention every slight, oversight, and mistake. They find themselves married to a boor, and they want a divorce, now.

As I write, college campuses are exploding over scheduled appearances by Milo Yiannoupolos, who’s touring with a new book. Yiannoupolos, a gay, Trump-loving, flame-throwing, Greek-British import, spent the last few years infuriating the conservative establishment as an alt-right gadfly for Breitbart News. Provocateur is one of the nicer ways to describe him, but what may have riled the left more than anything (besides his stumping for Trump) were insulting comments about the female stars of the Ghostbusters remake. To keep him off their campus, protesters at Berkeley smashed windows and started fires, reminiscent of the good old days of 1964. What were students protesting back then? Oh yes: being denied the right to promote controversial causes and speakers while on campus.

If the White House seems like a china closet after the bull has been let loose, that’s mostly perception. But yes, our new president is not like any other. To everyone’s surprise, he’s doing what he said he would do, not like a politician but like a CEO: no compromise, no debate, no Oval Office addresses; just write up the executive order and deliver it to his desk. Some of these actions have been hasty and ill-executed; others make conservatives cheer. To the opposition, it doesn’t matter—if it’s Trump, it’s outrageous.

They’ve been sowing this wind for years. Here comes the whirlwind.

During the George W. Bush years, a new ailment was identified: BDS, or Bush Derangement Syndrome. A razor-thin election that had to be decided by the Supreme Court didn’t help, but after eight years of Clinton, Democrats channeled their frustration into routine outrage. With the election of Barack Obama it was the right’s turn to contract ODS, especially as the years dragged on and a Republican-majority Congress failed to do anything about Obama’s overreach. By now it’s common knowledge that growing fury on the right swept (or pitched) Donald Trump into office, and now everybody’s mad. About everything.

Our new president is not like any other. To everyone’s surprise, he’s doing what he said he would do.

We’re reaching a point, if we haven’t already, where anger is its own justification. It almost doesn’t matter what the issue is; anger is virtue. When President Trump announced his choice for the next Supreme Court justice, protesters were already on the court steps with signs reading #Stop _______, with space below to write in the nominee’s name. Participants at the women’s march were unable to cohere around a single Trump policy (or promised policy, since his presidency was one day old) they were most upset about. It was enough that they were upset.

His executive order on immigration threw red meat to the opposition: finally something to sink their teeth into! But not to talk about; rather to march and yell and break things about. The immigration order could have opened up useful dialogue about mercy vs. safety and how to help refugees who can’t move in next door. But anger is not conducive to constructive solutions. Instead of flooding relief organizations with much-needed funds, protesters flooded the ACLU with $24 million for a futile effort to sue the government.

Now bureaucrats in the executive department are vowing to undermine their own boss, who threatened to “drain the swamp.” “A house divided against itself cannot stand,” but now we’re looking at a government divided against itself. How long will that stand?

These are perilous times. Pray hard.