For the next four years and beyond…

We’re fucked.

That’s only my opinion, but I can’t deny my sadness at the inevitable reduction of civil liberties over the next four years. Or my desperation at the thought of this president believing that he has a mandate from the people to continue to pursue his policies of fiscal destruction. Or my sense of shame for my country at the effectiveness of his despicable campaign of fear and smear. Or my nervousness about the consequences of this president believing that his inflexible tactics in the necessary war on terror were legitimized by the American people. Or, finally, my expectation that the ramifications of this president’s hubris and unquestioned mission from God now that he has free reign and a sycophant Congress will be felt by the next generation and beyond.

It’s easy to dismiss the ranting of someone when you disagree with their opinion, but that doesn’t change the truth. A re-elected president who believes that freedom is based on his judgment commandment from God is destroying the ideals that I hold most dear as an American. But he’s not stopping with me. Now that he’s learned how effectively fear works over the American psyche, we can expect nothing less going forward. What I hold dear was attacked first when the president halted the notion of free speech and backed an amendment that would add discrimination (not to mention Christian theology) into our secular government’s most important document. As angry as I am about that, I’m not alone. He hit my ideals first, but he’s coming for everyone else next. History has shown that, but we haven’t learned. The collective wisdom of Americans failed yesterday and we’ll all pay the consequences.

There’s more nuance to it than that, I know, but I don’t have faith in nuance this morning. One day we’re going to wake up from this collective nightmare. Many of us will have great difficulty in accepting what we’ve allowed to happen, but that day is far in the future. The Conservative values of small, limited government, freedom from the control of that small, limited government, and the belief that open debate and information are dead in America. No one seems poised to revive them. Unfortunately, for now, we must all live with the consequences.

I feel like I’m living the worst movie I’ve ever seen, only that movie is 70,082 hours long and I’m stuck in the theater with the realization that the exits are locked. I hope I’m wrong, but this president has given me no reason to believe in him. Like I said, I think we’re fucked.