Last week, I yielded my space to the newly elected County Commission member, Kirk deViere. He had a message for this community, and he used Up & Coming Weekly to go “on the record” about his commitment to Cumberland County residents. This is what local community newspapers do: education and awareness. Once you go on the record in print, you own the message, unlike unvetted social media posts or electronic newsletters that evaporate practically overnight. Up & Coming Weekly is committed to being this community’s voice. Below is an article submitted by Fayetteville resident Mary Zahran. It’s her evaluation and opinion, and she owns it. Every business, organization, or person, including elected officials, we come in contact with know that they have unfeathered access to share their thoughts and opinions with our U&CW readers. Enjoy, and thank you for reading Up & Coming Weekly.
— Bill Bowman, publisher

The 2024 election has come and gone, and two things are certain—Donald Trump is returning to the White House, and Republicans will control both the Senate and the House.
Amid this backdrop of an overwhelming Republican victory, one question remains—what has been learned from this election? Judging by some of the statements many Democrats have made, it doesn't appear they have begun asking themselves why they lost. Instead, they seem to be doubling down on their determination to thwart Trump's efforts to reverse many of the policies of the Biden-Harris administration.
Several Democratic governors have already issued statements threatening to fight Trump to protect the freedoms of their citizens. For these and other Democratic governors, their citizens include illegal immigrants that Trump has promised to deport. They are declaring war on Trump before he even gets into office, and their belligerence suggests they will not change their minds.
Instead of devoting their time and energy to creating a Trump resistance movement, perhaps they should engage in some honest introspection to find out why they lost in the first place. In the days following this election, all we have heard from most of the Democratic world is that either their messaging was not successful or that Trump supporters are stupid. If the MAGA voters had only been more intelligent and more aware of all the achievements of the Biden-Harris administration that have improved their lives, they would never have voted the way they did.
It didn't occur to them that the policies implemented during the last four years are not considered successful by most Americans. On Biden's first day in office, he began signing executive orders reversing most of Trump's policies. Biden revoked the Keystone XL pipeline permit, costing Americans thousands of jobs. He also signed an order to immediately halt the construction of the U.S.-Mexico border wall. He soon ended the Remain in Mexico agreement, a policy that significantly reduced the number of illegal immigrants crossing the border.
By signing these orders, Biden created conditions that would cause severe problems for many Americans. His attack on the fossil fuel industry led to an increase in gas and oil prices and helped to contribute to overall inflation. His decision to open the Southern border, allowing millions of illegal immigrants to come into the country, led to financial hardships for sanctuary cities as they tried to house and feed their new residents.
Because there was little, if any, vetting of these immigrants, numerous gangs entered, causing an increase in crime not only in sanctuary cities but throughout the country.
In addition to ignoring the disastrous domestic policies of this administration, Democrats have also ignored its catastrophic foreign policies. When Biden described our withdrawal from Afghanistan in August of 2021 as an "extraordinary success," many Americans disagreed. They had spent countless hours watching this catastrophe unfold in real-time, and many began to fear his weakness as a leader on the world stage would create other problems abroad.
Perhaps Democrats didn't connect Biden's fiasco in Afghanistan with Putin's invasion of Ukraine. Maybe they didn't believe that Biden's payments of billions of dollars to the Iranians would enable them to finance proxy wars in the Middle East, including the October 7th attack on Israel by Hamas. These are ongoing conflicts that Trump will have to deal with when he begins his second term as president.
Perhaps the Democrats will never learn that their blatant indifference to the safety and well-being of Americans is the reason for their defeat. When you pass legislation or endorse policies that create financial hardships for people, when you appear indifferent to their suffering because of violent crime that you choose to ignore, or when you dismiss their concerns about cultural issues that allow men to play in women's sports or allow minors to have "gender affirming surgery" without parental consent, don't be surprised when they vote you out of office.
Say what you will about Trump's many flaws; one thing he knows that Democrats do not know and will probably never learn is that successful leaders care deeply about the people they are elected to serve.