The Republicans have no intention of repealing and replacing the Affordable Care Act.

They know better than most from the exceptionally good, comprehensive healthcare they enjoy as members of Congress that affordable, national coverage makes sense – from a public health, national security, and economic standpoint. This has been researched and documented repeatedly by legitimate national and international news outlets and academic institutions.

What the Republicans actually intend to do is steal credit for the Affordable Care Act: for the pragmatic, intelligent, decent things about the Act itself, and for the diplomacy, legal expertise and hard work that went into getting it passed.

“Rebranding” is the term the President-elect has used in reference to the Affordable Care Act, and that is your very big tell about what’s actually going to happen. It’s code for steal any and all credit for anything the country’s first black president has done in an effort to obliterate his record.

Why? Because Republicans and the red states they represent cannot let go of their long-standing and deeply pathological need to define themselves as superior to, and the sole owners of, people of African descent and all their achievements, and so they  absolutely cannot stand the fact that  the country’s first black president led the way to national healthcare in the United States.

In other words, the Republicans are hating. And this faux attempt to “repeal and replace” the Affordable Care Act is, unfortunately, more about vindictiveness and hatoration than it is about actually doing the jobs they have been elected to do, which is to serve the best interests of their constituents. If they were serving the best interests of their constituents the party would be working with all stakeholders in the Affordable Care Act to make it a global model of national healthcare for other countries to admire and emulate rather than working against it which instead has other social democracies around the world shaking their heads in dismay.

Unfortunately, there is a long precedent for the Republican agenda – for stealing, raping, co-opting, killing (either literally or figuratively), tarring and feathering, stringing up, lynching (high-tech or otherwise), castrating, displacing, defrauding and/or mass incarcerating anything that black American people do. Our efforts are simply too great a reminder of how resilient we’ve proven to be in spite of appalling odds (about which no one knows better than white men as they created them – one thing they can take credit for); how creative and hard-working we are; and how committed we are to practicing democracy that benefits all people, not just white and/or wealthy people.

It is, apparently, simply impossible to overstate the profound, colossal insecurity and sense of inadequacy that black achievement inspires in many white American men.

In order to continue engaging in sadistic acts against the environment, against women, children, and people of color, it is nothing less than imperative that people like the Serial Assaulter of Women-elect Donald J. Trump and his fellow Republicans actively work to define us the problem: either as advantaged over them due to affirmative action, OR as lazy, violent, drug-addicted, welfare criminals that they have no choice but to kill, mass incarcerate, defraud, tar and feather, string up, castrate, defraud, and displace, while simultaneously stealing of ours whatever they can. It’s kind of interesting isn’t it – given how lazy and hapless we are, how come we seem to nonetheless produce so very much that white folks want to steal and/or take credit for?

There is a final point I want to make that, based on the news I watch and read, and the conversations I overhear in restaurants, at work, and during my commute, I feel many people who support democracy and decency have either missed or are in profound denial about: so vindictive, so insecure, so violent, and sadistic are men like the Serial Assaulter of Women-elect and his party members, so deeply committed are they to furthering their agenda of destroying black life in the United States, that they are absolutely prepared to compromise democracy for EVERYONE if they have to.

In other words, if, in order to take black people’s right to vote, Republicans have to do the same to you, they WILL. If, in order to take black people’s houses and equity, Republicans and their pals on Wall Street have to sell you a bad mortgage, then take your house and wealth too, they WILL. If, in the process of threatening, intimidating and maligning us in the workplace (provided we’re able to find jobs in the first place) they end up threatening, intimidating and maligning you in the workplace – they WILL. If they have to vastly increase tuition to keep us from getting an education, and end up bankrupting you with student loan debt in the process – they WILL. If they have to do business with dictators, distribute fake news that results in gunmen showing up at pizza parlors, and destroy the environment in order to poison our communities and end up poisoning, killing, and enslaving you – they WILL. If they have to flood our communities with drugs and many of you also end up desperate, homeless sick addicts as well (hey, collateral damage) – they WILL.

And though for many years this pathology has been perpetrated by faces (Paul Ryan, Jeff Sessions) who may remind you of your fathers, uncles, brothers and sons, and it has, to date, been directed at targets (people of color, women) you may have been able avoid, do not delude yourselves: these folks are coming for ALL OF US – our rights, what little wealth most of us have left, our environment, our homes, our joy, and our lives. The extent of the self-hatred, which is at the core of their need to hate on others, is simply too deep and too entrenched and awful AND fueled by an equally pathological sense of entitlement NOT to spill over into the general population in ways that have, and will continue to be, devastating for the country.