Do What is Right, Let the Consequence Follow

I'm not surprised in the slightest that Trump's impeachment ended with him facing no consequences for his actions. The orange blob has built his entire political career off of facing no consequences for his actions. And regardless of which side you're on, it's really really obvious that the whole trial was a sick farce and that the evidence never mattered, since the voting split exactly along party lines like we suspected it would all along.

Oh, except it didn't quite go exactly along party lines. One of the two hundred fifty Republicans demonstrated an ounce of integrity. Willard "Mitt" Romney sided against his own party, against Trump, and cited his Latter-day Saint faith as the driving force behind this act of conscience. Fully aware of the persecution he would face for standing up to the the Republican cult's wicked god, Romney quoted a song that I, having grown up in the same church as him, heard many times: "Do what is right, let the consequence follow."

This church, due to the historical circumstances surrounding Utah's admission to statehood, leans rather conservative / Republican (notwithstanding those terms are all but mutually exclusive nowadays) in the United States (unlike everywhere else in the world where members' political leanings are indistinguishable from the general population). This wouldn't be so much of a problem if it hadn't led to the existence of a substantial number of morons who are only Republicans because their great-great-grandparents were, yet wrongly believe that they're Republicans because the Republican Party platform is the only one compatible with the gospel, and in practice elevate it to the level of scripture itself. And these morons are very angry at Romney (in addition to the same reason that other Republicans are very angry at Romney) for embarrassing them by bringing their shared religion into his act of treason against their true god.

Well, all I can say to those people is deal with it. If I can tolerate sharing my religion young earth creationists, anti-vaxxers, and Trump apologists, then they can tolerate sharing it with someone who actually lives by its precepts. I can't speak for Romney's experience, but the church I grew up in did not teach me to downplay, rationalize, and/or straight-up defend corrupt, dishonest, lecherous, and/or rabidly xenophobic behavior. It taught me not to judge hearts, but it did not teach me to pretend that a repugnant human being is an example of character and leadership because worse people exist. It did not teach me to abandon my principles at a moment's notice for political expediency. I'm not sure where these other Latter-day Saints picked all that stuff up.

So the Republican cult wants to censure Romney for doing what he (correctly) believed was right. It wants him to face actual consequences for not mindlessly voting along party lines. And the harassment from rank-and-file cultists will probably continue for a good while. But the best part is their god's passive-aggressive pronouncement, "I don’t like people who use their faith as justification for doing what they know is wrong." I mean, this statement is itself so wrong, asinine and completely backwards that it's actually hilarious. In fairness, Trump has never needed justification for doing what he knows is wrong, because his worshipers bend over backwards and fall over themselves time and time again to provide it for him. But one would be hard-pressed to find a more obvious example of the biblical warning, "Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!" Yeah, I went there and I'm not sorry.

Oh, my mistake.

​​Though I have a much smaller platform than Romney and would hardly seek to portray myself as a shining specimen of moral rectitude, I'm somewhat familiar with the price of honesty. It really pisses people off. Speaking the truth as I understand - not to say that I'm always right by any means, but that I follow my own intellect and conscience the best I can instead of pandering to what other people consider acceptable and want to be true - got me hit by my parents and bullied by my peers as a child, and has alienated scores of former friends and counting as an adult. But I've also been informed that others find it refreshing and love my blog and Facebook posts for that reason. So my blog would be a lot more popular if more people weren't fake and shallow. Oh well, that's life.

Of course, this joke of an impeachment trial and the backlash against Romney are symptomatic of the nauseating polarization of American politics which in turn is a direct result of the impossibly stupid two-party system. Why am I even wasting my time writing this? I've talked about it before and it didn't make a difference then and it won't now. I feel like I'm talking to a nation of lobotomized tree sloths. You don't have to choose between Republicans and Democrats. There are other options. There always have been. You saying "They have no chance of winning" is literally the only reason they have no chance of winning, you ******* imbeciles. Cripes.

Sorry about that. I feel better now.