An Age-Old Power Struggle

Prior to my trip to Guadalajara with Lisa and a mutual friend of ours to visit with family members with whom I stayed with when I was first learning Spanish, I read about a woman who had been murdered in that very same city.  During her work at a hair salon, she was asked if her name was “Vanessa,” and when she said yes, she was shot in cold blood by a man wearing a mask.  Mexico has had a poor record of apprehending and bringing to justice the perpetrators of violence against women.

Recently on Amanapour and Company, Gabriela Jauregui, Mexican author, poet and women’s rights activist, was interviewed.  During the interview, she stated that only 3% of sexual crimes in Mexico are reported.  She further reported that 70% of women have been victimized in some way with 10 females murdered daily in Mexico.  Although these statistics do not offer much hope, Ms. Jauregui pointed to the fact that Claudia Sheinbaum, Mexico’s president, in public had been recently groped by a male on the street.  Ms.  Sheinbaum was incensed at what had happened to her and made a case for all the women who had been violated in the past.  The fact that a female president had suffered an abuse herself made Ms. Jauregui sanguine that the problem of sexual abuse in the female population would be finally addressed.

Unfortunately, America is not free of the the predatory behavior against women so prevalent in many countries.  Surprisingly enough, several female Republicans in both the House and the Senate defied President Trump in demanding that the administration come clean about the web of depravity engendered by Jeffrey Epstein.  Although I generally agree with David Brooks’ essays, I disagreed with an article he wrote for the New York Times, where he maintained that it was not worth spending good time on an issue that had been resolved with the incarceration and subsequent suicide of Epstein.  If you are a man, whether the Epstein files should be released or not might not be so important.  But women who have either experienced themselves as the victims of sex trafficking and abuse or have been aware of other women suffering such degeneracy, may think differently.

Earlier Trump had agreed to release the contents of the Epstein files, but subsequently, changed his mind.  Trump’s reversal of his previous decision to open the Epstein files to the public, created much anger and dissension with several female Republicans.  Marjorie Taylor Greene, once one of the staunchest supporters of Trump believed that Trump had betrayed her and other women by refusing to release the Epstein files.  Trump then replied to this comment by voicing very negative statements about Greene.  Finally, in protest Greene has decided to step down from her position at the House in the beginning of next year! Additionally, she had received several death threats after her quarrel with Trump resulting in the latter’s toxic tirades toward her.  As pointed out in the above, other Republican Congressional women rallied to force the hand of Trump, in opening the acts of Epstein and his would-be accomplices, to the public.

Although I do not agree with many of Greene’s ideas of good governance, for example her isolationist attitude toward foreign affairs (e.g. Ukrainian and Russian war), I admire her for standing up to Trump.  Ironically, the gender issue unified Republican women to speak up and risk the wrath of Donald Trump.  We have all watched with both concern and disgust at a Republican Congress unwilling to stand up to the president.  When a major ally, such as Greene, voices her opinion of Trump in a negative way, I consider the Trump support to have faced a   major crack in its bulwark of strength.  In offending Greene, Trump may have lost many of her followers.  In fact, a recent poll reported by Reuters found that 39% of Americans approve of Trump’s handling of the presidency while 59% disapprove of his job performance.  The latest polls have indicated that Trump’s approval rating by the public has reached an all-time low of between 42 and 43%.

No doubt Trump’s increasing disapproval rating has been affected by his outrageous X postings such as the nasty way he responded to the tragic deaths of Rob Reiner and his wife, Michele Singer.  Trump immediately faced blowback from fellow Republicans after telling reporters Reiner suffered from Trump Derangement Syndrome.   Rather than show any compassion after the Reiners died, Trump affirmed that Reiner was a deranged person who was bad for the country.  Even Republicans, who had been his steadfast followers, were appalled by Trump’s reaction to what had befell the Reiners.   

Ms. Greene will be remembered for her outspoken defiant reactions to a leader that others in her party have feared would result in severe repercussions to their livelihood.  Let us hope the reactions by both the Republican females in Congress and Claudia Sheinbaum in Mexico indicate that women are no longer willing to accept the role of victimhood.    To conclude, as I pointed out in an earlier blog, when Trump goes over the line of decency so clearly that even his most avid advocates become disenchanted with him, his days as the sole person in charge of leading America, abruptly may come to an end.