There is an angry convicted felon coming this way to raise hell on the otherwise quiet streets of our town. He is out for revenge, and the fury and fear he sent before him are already here, forces of hostility that make otherwise good people run for cover, lock their doors, and look the other way.
As much as it seems I am describing where we our country is at this moment in presidential politics, I just summarized the plot of the 1952 movie High Noon, a classic American western starring Gary Cooper as Will Kane, the marshal of a small western town called Hadleyville in the New Mexico Territory, with Grace Kelly as his young bride. If you haven’t seen it, I highly recommend it. I used to teach it to high school students in a film studies course during my Westerns unit, and it was always a favorite. It’s tense, emotional, innovative, and surprising, and it clips along at a brisk, 85-minute pace. The villain is on the train, the train is getting closer and closer: every approaching whistle is a warning that danger is nearly upon us, and the danger is whether law and order will survive or be destroyed.
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| Gary Cooper as Marshal Will Kane in High Noon (1952). |
The film was made at the height of the Red Scare and McCarthyism, when the House Un-American Activities Committee was accusing innocent Americans of spreading communism and Hollywood was blacklisting film directors and stars who were thought to be sympathetic with the forces of communism. Everyday Americans were swept up in the hysteria and absurdity, and old friends and even family members found themselves on opposite sides of the issue. The country was deeply divided by those who got caught up in the perceived threat against America and dedication to the founding principles of America. It's often the case that when a strongman in government claims there is a threat to America, that strongman is the threat to America.
The film won four Academy Awards,
but its impact was much deeper than that. It used a classic Western motif to
create a metaphor for a deeply divided America, and how law and order was being pushed to the very brink of survival because the good people of Hadleyville
were too afraid to do the right thing with the threat of violence on the horizon,
just like the good people of America were too afraid to speak out against the
threat that was the Red Scare, too afraid to do the right thing.
What happened next: as you might guess,
it all centered around a violent figure on the horizon, a convicted felon
promising violence and revenge, and whether or not a good citizen or two can
summon the courage to tell face the truth and defend law and order and the
American way.
And here we are again.
It is High Noon in America
and it’s time for citizens to choose: you can choose Donald Trump or you can choose
a country of law and order. You cannot choose both. One will cancel out the other.
Donald Trump is a convicted felon
who promises violence and revenge and the destruction of law and order. Minutes
after being convicted by a jury of his peers in a New York courtroom, he walked
out of the courtroom and called the system that convicted him, our American
system of jury by peers, a sham, a witch hunt, a rigged trial, accusing the
judge, the prosecution team, and even the jurors of being political actors who
ran a dishonest and politically motivated trial against him.
This rhetoric is dangerous from
anybody, but it is deadly dangerous from a man who would be President of the
United States. A president, or ex-president, or candidate for president must be an unwavering defender of the Constitution and the American justice system. Yet Donald Trump attacks and weakens it every day. The more power
he has, the more he will use that power to undermine the systems that keep him
in check: laws, regulations, traditions, precedents, the decency of those around
him. Donald Trump has show time and time again that he either does not know
better, or he does not care. The law doesn’t apply to him.
Donald Trump was convicted of the
felony of falsifying business records to influence the 2016 election. He broke the law and almost got away with it, but a court of law, with systems and protocols
and protections for both prosecution and defense, with strict rules for handling
and examining evidence, and with twelve random Americans sitting in assessment and then judgement on that process, found him guilty. It was no sound bite on Fox
News. It was no TikTok video. It was a process that took weeks. And it was
process in which Donald Trump could not control the narrative: law and order
controlled the narrative; and when the trial was done, with evidence both plain
and protected from his malfeasance and spin, Donald Trump was found guilty on
all 34 counts.
But Donald Trump isn’t just a
convicted felon. In an earlier New York trial, he was found liable for damages
for sexually assaulting a woman in a department store decades earlier. The
evidence was overwhelming and plain for all to see and Donald Trump could not spin it or lie about it or hide it away in a box in a
Mar-a-Lago bathroom. Once again, the outcome was clear: he committed a sexual assault
and is responsible for the damages it caused.
But Donald Trump is not just a
convicted felon and person found to have committed sexual assault, he is also under
indictment for criminal activity related to causing an insurrection on January
6, 2021, a violent attack on the American Capitol building that resulted in the
deaths of police officers, destruction to the Capitol, and the interruption of
official government proceedings. He has also been indicted for trying to corrupt
the 2020 election results in Georgia. And he has also been indicted for his mishandling of classified documents, including very sensitive state secrets that
deal with nuclear and military matters. Two of these cases are considered slam
dunks for the prosecution based on the evidence that is already known, if they
ever come to trial.
For all of these reasons Donald Trump needs to evade or destroy the law and order that
will otherwise continue to hold him accountable for his crimes. He needs your help to destroy law and order in America, or at least your blind eye.
So what is going to be, America?
It’s almost High Noon. The train is speeding towards the station.
Donald Trump has made it very
clear that he will not be beholden by law, precedent, or decency. Don’t believe
me, just read his social media posts for yourself, or look at this article from
The Guardian that summarizes them: Donald
Trump Vows Revenge, Retribution, and Retaliation.
The showdown on Main Street will take place in November at the ballot box. Meanwhile, you can hear the train whistle getting closer and closer. The threat is almost here. Time to choose: Donald Trump or law and order.
