Good morning, America, how are you? The good news, America, is that you are showing the world your unique version of “exceptionalism” in a choreographed shitshow with a corrupt, cruel, dangerous ringmaster at the helm. The bad news is that you are going to be living that unique brand of exceptionalism. So hang on for the ride.

US President Donald Trump brought overt racism out from under the rocks in his first term. America did nothing meaningful in response. Instead, Americans elected Trump a second time so that he could fully expose that unique brand of exceptionalism for all to see. “Make America Great Again” is coded language targeted at White people to ensure their enthusiasm for a new America somehow modeled on the old one, without any defined parameters.

It should be easy to recall those wonderful days of yore when Black people understood that they were second-class citizens and supposedly loved every minute of it. Immigrants swarmed to America so they could work in sweatshops, meatpacking plants, and agricultural fields for little pay and no benefits. Children appreciated every dollop of charity food they could scrounge. Millions lacked access to meaningful health care. If “making America great again” refers to that, the nation has a lot to look forward to.

For entertainment, those blinded by the “light” of all the wondrous adoration in America for our precious children, beloved seniors, honored veterans and welcomed immigrants are watching a hypocrisy carnival like none before. It is easier to feel the collective enthusiasm for the increased quality of available dog food than to believe our “precious” children will be better fed, better educated and healthier than their pet dogs. With a little imagination, we may soon see some of those children, dirty and abused, fronting a $19-per-month pledge campaign to adopt a Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) family, complete with an autographed picture of a grateful child to hang on your refrigerator.

I am laying all of this out for a purpose: so that the Republican Party lap dogs, who can’t get enough of the insane cruelty at the heart of the Trump world agenda, can no longer say that no one told them. Their demented focus is limited to tax reductions for those who don’t need them and to eliminating any semblance of a federal regulatory structure. The rest of us must up the ante by refusing to give any Republican a comfortable space to cut the nation’s limited social safety net or to further undermine the governance essential to meeting fundamental human needs.

Many on the progressive left in America have worked for decades for an America that is so much more than what it has become in my lifetime, never mind the mythology of what it was before then. Americans have delivered some shining moments. However, as a nation, we have consistently failed to realize our national promise and to confront preventable inequality, poverty, hunger and gun violence. It always seems easier to promote our precious capitalism as the path forward, yet that path consistently fails those who need help the most.

This doesn’t even touch on the national myth of a beacon on a hill, splattered across every noble slogan used to justify arming the world to do our bidding and the bidding of anyone else who will buy the weapons we sell. Our real international face to large swaths of the world is the bombs that rain from the sky — proudly made in America and sold for use anywhere else but America.

For now, we must do what we can to confront too much suffering, too much cruelty and too much flat-out corruption. The nation is in full retreat from the limited national progress of recent decades. Working to halt that retreat must become a priority for all who say they care about America’s future.

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) alone has, in just four months, become an ongoing national and human tragedy. Reversing the damage may take years, even decades. What we are doing to immigrants is only the most sickening display of the humanitarian outrage at play. Look just a little deeper, and that disgraceful list will grow — maybe even finding its way into your neighborhood. There are no silver linings. America’s longstanding and widespread governance deficit is deepening and spreading into what was left of a functioning institutional infrastructure. What to do about it is the challenge. So far, our political system and social fabric have again proven far beneath the task.

Sadly, in these times in America, it is fitting to shame everyone who stands silent. To gain the conscience necessary to find a voice, tell someone — someone you don’t think cares enough — that their caring more matters to you.

How many silently looked away as Trump, in his role as president, singled out a transgender high school junior for public derision during a track and field competition in California? Trump routinely preys on those most in need of praise, support and encouragement from the nation’s leaders. This time, he publicly despised a high school junior — someone’s child — for little more than seeking to be the best she believes she can be. Then, just to make sure he got everyone’s attention, Trump threatened California’s federal funding if state officials allowed her to compete in the event for which she had clearly qualified. Cowardly state officials let her compete, but changed the rules so that no “real” girl would lose out if the transgender girl medaled. And medal she did.

If that story, and the stories of so many others, do not reach your conscience and make you want to scream or cry, you will never be on any team capable of making an America that at least tries to be what it says it is. A failing nation will always seek to find enemies within to obscure the corruption, greed and incompetence of those in charge. That is what America is today.

In this context, remember that Trump is the symptom, not the cause. Ridding our midst of his cancer will leave us no better off as a nation than we were before he showed up. And that has never been good enough for me.

Historically, nonviolent resistance and civil disobedience have provided an urgent catalyst for meaningful change. Unfortunately, I find it hard to imagine a collective American citizenry willing to sacrifice much of anything for any cause.

[Hard Left Turn first published this piece.]

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy.