The Weekly Screed (#750)

It Can’t Happen Here
by David Benjamin

“He was an actor of genius. There was no more overwhelming actor on the stage, in the motion pictures, nor even in the pulpit. He would whirl arms, bang tables, glare from mad eyes, vomit Biblical wrath from a gaping mouth; but he would also coo like a nursing mother, beseech like an aching lover, and in between tricks would coldly and almost contemptuously jab his crowds with figures and facts — figures and facts that were inescapable even when, as often happened, they were entirely incorrect.”
                            ― Sinclair Lewis, It Can't Happen Here (1935)

MADISON, Wis.— Distrusted by a hard core of evangelical voters in Iowa, Donald Trump loses the caucuses there, but finishes a strong second to Ted Cruz. Then, Trump’s convincing victories in both New Hampshire and South Carolina propel him toward a yooge accumulation of committed delegates in the March 1 Super Tuesday sweepstakes.

Despite his early lead, political analysts remain dubious of Trump gaining the Republican nomination. His “ceiling” among likely voters, once estimated at 30 percent, seems to be stalling at around 40 percent. Among experts, the favorite theory is that, when the field shrinks to two or three survivors, Trump will fade fast, possibly withdrawing before July’s Republican National Convention (RNC).

Political veterans also cite Trump’s failure to build  a “ground game” composed of local campaign offices, neighborhood door-knockers and get-out-the-vote teams to literally prod Trump-leaning supporters to the polls.

However, as he campaigns in early primaries, a different sort of organization, informally known as “Trump’s Troops,” begins to coalesce. These fanatic Trump believers flock to his rallies and begin to actually follow him from city to city and state to state. At speeches, they cheer wildly and unleash their wrath, sometimes physically, on any anti-Trump protester who dares to speak up, or even carry a sign. More and more often, fights break out. Beatings occur.

When asked, Trump denies any official link to his “Troops.” But he adds that politics can be pretty darn emotional and when a great candidate has ideas that stir people to their very souls, well, they can get carried away. Besides, he says, “If negative people go around insulting and heckling me, and then my supporters rough them up a little bit, well, maybe they were asking for it.”

The first beating death at a Trump rally doesn’t happen ’til early April, in Waukesha, Wisconsin. Governor Scott Walker deems the fatality “a tragic accident.” Walker visits the parents of the victim, a Black Lives Matter activist, assuring them that his “thoughts and prayers” are with them. No one is arrested.

Similar incidents follow in Pennsylvania, Indiana, West Virginia, Georgia, Texas and New Jersey. The media, however, remains hypnotized and thrilled by Trump’s outrageous statements and the horserace aspect of the primary campaign. A spokesman for Trump’s Troops gets a laugh from the “Fox and Friends” panel by referring to the dead protesters as “collateral damage.”

After a late primary surge by Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio, Trump enters the RNC in Cleveland just shy of the majority he needs for a first-ballot nomination. On day one, he announces a deal with Carly Fiorina, collecting her delegates in return for the vice-presidential spot on the GOP ticket. He adds to this the endorsement of Charles and David Koch, guaranteeing his election bid almost $1 billion in “dark money.” Trump’s nomination becomes a fait accompli.

Meanwhile, outside Quicken Loans Arena, clashes occur. A number of delegates loyal to Cruz and Rubio are hospitalized. Police are at a loss to identify their attackers, described only as “white males” who melted into a Republican crowd composed almost entirely of white males.

The turmoil of the convention and the defection of the center-right faction of the GOP puts Trump at a severe disadvantage in the race against Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton. Millions spent on TV ads and direct mail seem wasted. Fiorina is a lame stalking mare for the poised and steely Clinton. Trump consistently draws thousands of screaming supporters but makes little headway with moderate Republicans and independents. Trump’s Troops, seen at first as a lovable bunch of rascals, start to frighten voters. As dead Democrats begin to pile up on the streets, Trump’s Troops even earn mild censure from the mainstream media.

As summer turns to autumn, Trump struggles against a double-digit deficit in the polls, insisting that insidious forces are rigging the numbers against him. “I’m a winner,” he shouts to delirious fans, “and I’m winning. The Clinton people, they can’t stand it. The media can’t stand it. So they’re lying to you all. Lying, I tell ya! Don’t believe it. I’m winning. And when I win in the end, oh boy! Are they gonna be sorry! I’ll be on top, where I belong, and they won’t know what hit ‘em!”

On Sunday, October 17, 2016, a Catholic cathedral in Chicago, a Protestant wedding party in New York, a black Baptist church in Mississippi and a bar mitzvah in Los Angeles are attacked simultaneously by teams of terrorists with automatic weapons. Each consists of three masked men in back combat attire, wearing keffiyeh and repeatedly shouting — over the roar of gunfire and screams of the dying — “Alamo akbar!” The death toll exceeds 100. The assailants escape. In all four cities, a spokesman claiming affiliation with both the Islamic State and Planned Parenthood calls a local talk-radio station, taking credit for the murders. Despite a national dragnet launched by police and the FBI, the killers appear to have melted into the crowd. Six months later, not one arrest is recorded.

Less than an hour after the attacks, Trump again proposes a “total shutdown” of Muslims coming to America. Twelve bills to that effect pop up the next day in Congress. Trump goes further, demanding the immediate construction of internment facilities to house “every Muslim on American soil, until each and every one of them can be investigated so hard that we’ll be able to trace the camel they rode in on.”

Trump shoots to the lead and, two weeks later, crushes Clinton in 48 states. The next day, he announces a “Billion-American March,” calling for Trumpniks to flood Washington, D.C. and stay there, “so that these unConstitutional bastards can’t take away my victory on some sneaky technicality.”

Dutifully, his fans fill Washington. Guarded by Trump’s Troops, they turn the capital into a sprawling, chaotic tent city and the Potomac into a sewer. Trump’s inauguration triggers 24 hours of riotous celebration, leaving a shambles that will require six months and $1.2 billion in clean-up and repairs. Trump uses the pandemonium in Washington and other cities to declare martial law, suspending Congress and sequestering its members, “for their safety.”

Trump, exercising his executive prerogative under martial law, announces the temporary Extraordinary Powers Act. It authorizes the president to take action against sedition both domestic and international, to root out anti-Americanism in speech, thought and deed, to suppress insurrection by all possible means and to take any action he deems necessary to protect the Homeland from the forces arrayed against it, wherever they may be.

As he stands on a soaring dais in Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Stadium, the wind blows through his meticulously coiffed comb-over. President Trump scans a throng of 70,000 faithful packed into the stadium. His voice thick with emotion, he expresses heartfelt regret for the extraordinary temporary step of disbanding the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives and placing the Supreme Court in protective custody.

“But we have no choice!” he roars. “We have no choice!”

The cheers, lasting more than 20 minutes, can be heard as far away as Bethesda and Alexandria.