There's a certain person I would not and will not miss. But people I respect have been pointing out that trumpism must be repudiated, not just deposed, i.e. it would be best if he survives to be beaten in November. I suppose that's right. But he'll be a martyr to the fascists either way. A new lost cause, or a New Lost Cause.
One of the most bothersome things to me is that one might have to let go of assumptions and habits of thought one has had all of one's thinking life, which, as I've said before, underlie and animate both the idea of democracy and leftism. Maybe the arc doesn't necessarily bend toward justice, and maybe there is always a critical mass of people who are just too clueless to make good political decisions.
That New Lost Cause, to be clear, is more or less the old one in new clothes and carrying more modern weapons. But I don't know if anyone predicted that it would metastasize from out of the South the way it has. Well, maybe some people did; I haven't read everything. Neither Mencken nor Hofstadter are on my bedside table. And the KKK was huge in the North during the nineteen-twenties, not to mention the nazi rallies in thirties New York City.
Pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the will--yes. But that pessimism, and that which seemingly compels it, are a fucking drag.