By Gene Jones, FLVCS President
Veterans understand the words, “I’ve got the conn.” For those of you who may not be vets, the term is the Navy tradition that only one officer has responsibility to give orders to the helmsman for the speed and direction of a ship. The purpose is always to know who is in charge with no ambiguity. At the change of watch, the officer with the conn relinquishes it to another officer who specifically acknowledges that he is the officer with the conn, which the crew also confirms. No doubt ever exists about who is in charge and who has responsibility. If the ship then rams a lighthouse, everyone knows who’s at fault.
With Trump at the conn, our ship of state scrapes against one hazard after another and the helmsman is uncertain where to steer. Fortunately, America’s strong ship of state has held up to the collisions so far.
Steering Toward Disunity
Trump’s first scrape against the hull was a disastrous course change that has weakened social cohesion and increased divisiveness in America. Instead of uniting all of us to work toward the promise of America, Trump has encouraged extremism and the worst impulses among some citizens. He castigates those working for racial harmony and equality as agitators and threats to America while acclaiming armed fanatics as good people. Trump supports keeping statues in civic places of honor and naming bases for those who fought to preserve slavery and betrayed the United States. Instead of building harmony, he divides us on his belief that the resulting social turmoil will increase his election chances. Trump angers and incites people with insults and name calling. He has even called former President Obama a traitor.
The result has been that our country is more divided now than when he took office. Protests, riots, violence, and killings are on the rise. But, Trump’s only idea to repair the damage is repression and violence. He has run the ship of state into a hazard and ripped a jagged hole in the hull. He has the conn and he is responsible.
COVID-19 Response Off Course
A second Trump catastrophic wrong turn has wreaked havoc on our health and economy. Instead of ordering all hands on deck to hammer the pandemic, he equivocated and failed to take the necessary steps to stop the virus’s spread while blaming governors and health professionals for crashing the ship. Undoubtedly, the COVID-19 pandemic would have been difficult for any president to manage successfully, but Trump failed to recognize the pandemic as a serious threat, which exacerbated the damage.
To manage a pandemic there must be a plan that adheres to facts and science. Problems cannot be solved with magical thinking. From the outset, Trump declared that the pandemic was a hoax, that it would mysteriously disappear, and that it was totally harmless in 99% of the cases. Trump inherited a plan to address pandemics, but he countermanded the plan at critical points so the virus flared.
We are now forced to live a new normal with the threat of infection, sickness, and death ever present. With a level-headed leader at the conn we could have stamped down the pandemic by now as other countries have. Instead, we’ve experienced over six million COVID-19 cases and nearly 200,000 deaths with no end in sight. Rushing an undertested vaccine into use will result in low adoption rates and potentially serious health consequences for those who do take it.
Rudderless Ship
We have a president who puts his re-election and enrichment ahead of America’s institutions, health, and safety. Trump encourages conspiracy theories and fear to increase his popularity. He denies facts to make circumstances appear better than they are. This irrationality results in an unpredictable course that can sink the ship of state. With Trump at the helm, the danger increases daily. He does not strive for the promise of America, but what’s best for him.
America faces other dangerous shoals that must be navigated, as well. Unemployment is over ten per cent and food lines are growing. Climate change is upon us and getting worse, and experts view it as an existential threat. Trump is incompetent and unwilling to deal with these threats.
Trump might as well be blind at the conn because his record establishes how poorly he steers the ship. His magical thinking prevents him from addressing threats realistically. It’s impossible to develop a plan to solve an unacknowledged problem. As a result, Trump has no coherent plan to mend the economy or combat climate change. His belief that unemployment will dissipate as if by magic and that climate change is not real negates rational solutions.
Beacons of Reason
We have been warned by many citizens including the former head of the Republican National Committee, Michael Steele, that we could go to the bottom with Trump. Imagine what happens if Trump has four more years to appoint more enablers to our beloved country’s institutions like the Supreme Court, military, Department of Justice, and other executive offices. Like Trump, his enablers will likely be out of touch with reality and perhaps conspiracy theorists to boot. Then, the ship of state may list so far that it will go under.
We must all work harder to educate our fellow citizens about Trump’s failures at the conn.
I’m grateful for this article. The eyes of the public must be opened, and I hope more veterans view this and carry the message.. To vote for a different party President is not a betrayal of your core political beliefs, it is a realization of needed change to protect and better the Republic.
Republicans should listen to the message of other intelligent Republicans who served under the President and learned to know him will. If your conscious won’t allow you to vote for a candidate of another party, then simply don.t vote for that person, or write in another name.
There is a reason that Generals Mattis and Kelly could no longer served this President, and the many other appointees that left his administration.
It is said that if you do not read History, it is bound to repeat itself. Read..Vote.
Mr. Jones — Yes, our ship of state is foundering because about 40% of the crew gave a sociopathic con the conn. To carry the analogy further it is like a Cain Mutiny where socially aggrieved left behinds, who were passed over for promotion, along with racist and religious theocrats decided to support Capt. Queeg.
At this point in the election cycle it is impossible for me to imagine anyone somehow struggling with moral and policy choices between Trump and Biden.
The choice while clear is once again ugly. Biden as our next President will be faced with (again with naval analogies, sorry) a ship whose bulkheads are flooded with bilge, and that crew core of 40% of now insanely angry crew members who are more than happy to finish the job of scuttling the ship since their Queeg was forced to walk the plank.
Then again perhaps Capt. Bone Spurs will encourage the 40% to arrest and put the 60% of the crew in the brig, or release the ships missiles at a North Korean PT boat in international waters.
The possibilities seem endless.
It is also disappointing to live in a time and place where I must spend hours of my life and my retirement funds in an effort to beg and plead with so-called Independents, non-partisans and weak Democrats for the 5% margin we must eke out.
I’ve been thinking very much about abandoning ship more and more if Queeg retains the conn.