“Great events never have minor omens. When great evil occurs, great good follows.” So says Nichiren, founder of one of the largest sects of Buddhism. The Buddhism that this writer has practiced for 43 years.  That great good doesn’t come automatically.

We’ve said it before. We say it again with more confidence, as people are changing not just in America but around the world. We’ll stick to what we know best, America, in commenting on this principle.

While others might recount the founders of the United States, he extolled as heroes, those who sought to divide it. Confederate generals that seceded in rebellion against the union. All in the name of maintaining their right of dominion over other humans–unwilling people of African descent first as slaves then as lesser beings not entitled to the privileges of whites.

He castigated those who would have torn down a statute of President  Andrew Jackson as ignorant of America’s heritage. Hardly, they knew full well Jackson was the one to  who forcibly removed Native Americans from  their historic lands to arid lands two-thirds of a way across the country. All so that Whites could settle in their verdant land. Thousands of the Cherokee died on that “Trail of Tears.” People who had a higher literacy rate than those whites who were freed from English prisons to settle in Georgia.

As we’ve said here before, Biff [AKA Trump] is the divider-in-chief. He want’s no “perfect union”—he wants a people filled with contempt for those different from themselves. His notion of making America great again is restoring those times when white supremacy was the law and the dominant culture of America.

Rather than honoring those who gave their lives in defense of the US against foreign adversaries, he and his minions ignore the payment of bounties on American soldiers in Afghanistan by Russia. We still don’t know what hold it is that Vladimir Putin has on him, but it’s clear that Biff owes his allegiance to Russia, not America.

He cares nothing for the lives of his base—encouraging them to attend rallies shoulder to shoulder in the midst of a pandemic. They emulate his disdain for wearing protective masks and for science. If some die, so what—so long as he is reelected. But not as many as before support him.

From this great evil that Biff propounds from the White House will come great good. Thanks to his inept handling of the pandemic, many of his gullible and deluded base of followers are no-shows at his rallies now. Witness Tulsa. The military supporters, likewise,  are departing—after his lack of concern for the deaths of American troops, bought and paid for by Putin.

People around the world, not just in the US, protest police brutality. Brutality that extends to murder of unarmed and restrained suspects. Biff says those protesters are Marxists, Fascists (an unlikely political combination), terrorists, looters and more. No, they’re people of conscience and humanity–unlike him.

But what of the great good then? That follows by America declaring its independence from the tyranny of the would-be dictator Biff. That will begin November 2020 in the presidential election. It will be further along with the inaugural of Joe Biden in January 2021 and a new Congress—led by Democrats. Politics alone is not the answer to truly making America great. But a fair election–untainted by foreign interference and voter suppression, may save the US from crumbling into a failed democracy, shunned by the rest of the civilized world.

The great good comes from people entering the fray to change a culture of hate and division. Not just by voting, but by altering their attitudes toward other people. People who don’t look like them. People who practice different faiths. People who have a different heritage. That’s not coming tomorrow. Not the next day or the next year. But change is happening. Despite his evil message—his fostering of hate and division, Biff has inspired us. Inspired Americans to reject his message and replace it with a humanistic one.

It’s not enough to savagely satirize his behavior as we often do here. It’s not enough to sit at a keyboard and throw virtual stones. It’s not enough to mock him with the moniker Biff (despite how much he resembles that movie character in appearance and behavior). What’s needed is to create value in society with rejection of racism when someone spouts it. What’s needed is a reaffirmation of the utility of science and nonpartisan expertise to deal with difficult issues like a pandemic and climate change.

We can do it. Be resolved. Take action. But don’t be too impatient—just be persistent. Do vote, though. At the moment, we may expect a landslide vote for Biden. Don’t stay home or fail to mail in that ballot.