This was the headline announcing the latest Gallup poll surveying American opinions on democracy: Record Low in U.S. Satisfied With Way Democracy Is Working The summary begins this way: A new low of 28% of U.S. adults are satisfied with the way democracy is working in the country. The current figure is down from the prior low 35% measured shortly after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol by rioters trying to prevent Congress from certifying Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 presidential election.
Somebody needs to go up and kick trump right in the balls. Then shove a sock down his throat. And make that an example of what will happen to all of his ignorant minions who worship that fat piece of shit.
Sorry for the unworthy prose compared to Steve - just what I'm feeling right now.
Perhaps Liz Cheney is right. If Trump is re-elected, what is to stop him from ignoring any laws, including the one that says he can't run again. I can see him and his minions ignoring the rule of law like they have so many times already. Best thing to do is WORK NOW to make sure Trump doesn't get elected.
We are in treacherous times. It just may be that communications in 2024 and beyond are more powerful than guns. I am not quite as optimistic as Steve that the country has sufficient bedrock commitment to Democracy and all that supports it, including the Constitution, to undercut the power of communications once seized by the wrong hands. Just look at what Fox accomplished in what was thought of as a fair contest. It turned the heads of millions with a daily onslaught of lies packaged like Pablum for the masses, with bigger ratings than any other. Now imagine this in a world tipped on edge so that the good guys all roll off, where the Right decides what we will see/hear and how it will be presented. Then fold in the emerging capabilities of AI, which can make you believe the unbelievable, watching Joe Biden taking a bribe from...(fill in the blank). You will see it with your own eyes and because you are smart, (after all you are part of The Warning) you will know better, while 25 people next to you will swallow it whole. Time to recognize there are new and sinister tools to mess with your head. In the meantime you are trying to put food on the table and pay your bills. If a small cadre of agitating people are taken off never to be seen again, well maybe they got themselves in trouble and maybe its smarter to just shut up and cut the grass and have your picnic. Maybe its none of your business. This is how it will happen in 2024 and beyond. Yes it will take a while, probably 3.5 years leading to an election that will just be a formality. Maybe your credit card failed. Maybe the IRS is hassling you. Maybe the police are showing up at your door with a complaint lodged by whomever. Maybe your tires are flat or your kid is failing class. (Did you notice how DeSantis is reshaping classrooms?) Nope, no guns needed in a country that already has too many of them. When the Far Right, now looking to dictatorship as a viable model in this country of yours, puts their determination and money and imagination to shifting the playing field into a new game, do not underestimate them! It has been done before with more primitive tools. The solution is to come out, EVERYBODY and VOTE in year of our Lord, 2024. Lock the bastards out before they get their mealy meathooks back onto the levers of power.. You have one more chance. Do not lull yourselves into the notion that it will all be OK because it always has. You are not dealing with King Solomon. This guy would cut the baby in half in a heartbeat.
OMG I read this and pray you are correct. Feels very dark; almost 9 years of abuse from mentally deranged, pathological lying, toxic conspiracy spewing, divisive, hateful, hater who has owned the narrative. His clown show is like a bad car accident attracting the sick, aggrieved, schadenfreude masses. I just don’t get how millions of Trumplers really even exist. Are people that stupid? Are they such rubes and lemmings not to recognize when a grifting, lying propaganda lie machine is gaslighting them on behalf of profits for the fully corrupted billionaire class? Is America that broken?
Steve, we need a Bluenami (gigantic crashing blue wave) in November or America she slips below the inky black waters of fascism, hate and corruption. The end of a potentially greater and greater democracy.
"Some of us would be ready to stand in front of those tanks, and be prepared to be rolled over by them so others could find the courage to stand in front of the next tank."
If it should come to this..I would be there in Chicago or wherever it would be..I am fully prepared to make that commitment..
Steve, my power to vote against DJT and the ability to provide some funds to the Dems is the power I have to give Biden a second term. The second thing is we have to support a Dem majority in both houses to get the MAGA group out of governing and pass some commons sense laws supporting women's rights and gun law legislation. We need to show our global strength and deal through our economic and innovative might to keep Russia, China, and Iran at bay. The fight is real but, we can do it starting at the ballot box. We need November to come quickly.
I was not born here and had to study the Constitution to become a citizen. After 58 years this country is still not over the Civil War and the label they so proudly wear as Republicans or Democrats. Whatever happened to being an American first. You were not born with these labels. I am an American turning 80 this year and know what is morally right and will fight to keep my country free from Donald Trump. You hear the moronic things he says and it's getting worse. Republicans are either too stupid or don't want to listen to the truth. I won't back down.
Most democracies fall apart little by little, true. Then again, Hitler dismantled German democracy in 6 months. So that IS a possibility. Yes, some would fight but that may be a full blown civil war. Trump would have a better excuse to invoke the insurrection act. Best to keep Trump and Trumpists out of office and make the GOP lose until conservatives are forced to reform in an ethical party.
Just as the earth will go on with or without homo sapiens, the constitution will survive the trumps and stefaniks...there may be darkness for a while, but in the long run, yes.. both will prevail
We will likely face a defining moment in November, when Trump either wins the election or loses and rejects the results. At that point, we as individuals will have a decision to make. Do we resist or do we capitulate. The fate of our great nation may depend on just how many of us are willing to oppose Trumps tyranny.
Steve, I appreciate your thoughts. Intellectually I think you are right that a Trump victory in the elections this year will not wipe out 250 years of democracy or more broadly the American culture aimed at freedom and rights for all. But emotionally I worry that it could do so. My reason is that in looking at people’s comments to your and other people’s posts, as well as even my own few posts, this comments display such evil intent. They indicate such a deep seated hatred for other people in the country. For Black and Brown people, for Jews, for immigrants of any kind but in particular those coming through Mexico from countries further south. They indicate such deep seated anger at allowing abortions even though no one is forcing them or their families to have an abortion, but just allow it for medical and other social, psychiatric or other legitimate personal reasons. They show such disdain for the poor and disadvantaged who might require societies help to live better lives. They just hate all “others” and all the desires and needs that “others” may legitimately have. And they do this through absolute reverence for a person who is a through and through dangerous, lying, racist, narcissistic, just plain speaking horrid and deplorable individual. This is what makes me worried. That we could loose our democratic past and all freedoms if Trump wins. Because I fear the fact that the implication is, as you allude to, that it is not just Trump who is bad, but that a really horribly significant portion of the American population is just plain bad. This is something I just never thought would be possible. Too many, what I would have thought of before as decent, good human beings, seem to actually be really bad people. Nasty, selfish, self centered, even cruel. They don’t want “others” to exist, they want all “others” to just disappear. Go away - just, I don’t know, I guess, just die. This saddens me. Makes me fear not just this election, but the future. What has brought this upon us?
Steve, your call to courage and to never surrender reminds me of the wise sage Rabbi Nachman of Bretslof who said: “the whole world is like a very narrow bridge; the important thing is not to give in to fear at all”.
We each may on some days (understandably) find it hard to feel “hopeful,” but we are not ever allowed to give in to **despair.** Or to paraphrase (holocaust survivor) Viktor Frankl: although we each cannot control what happens to us, no one can take away from us the power to choose our own RESPONSE to what happens. In other words don’t identify as a victim!
Many of the people who managed to survive Hitler and co’s attempted Final Solution - of mass extermination/Genocide of Jews, Gypsies, gays, intellectuals and other free thinkers - ended up alive because they chose to serve and help others thinking they would die as a result, and this includes many righteous gentiles who remembered to be decent people as all are created in the image of the Eternal.
We must never forget their strength now, when we are the “adults in the room” determining how the story of this defining time of peril for our freedoms will be recorded for posterity.
BTW I heard that Dem Message testing showed “taking away our freedom” polls even better than just talking about saving our “democracy.” Note how Biden always follows mention of the latter with a message about protecting our hard won freedoms. Not an accident; and Worth shamelessly copying this year. Onward.
Somebody needs to go up and kick trump right in the balls. Then shove a sock down his throat. And make that an example of what will happen to all of his ignorant minions who worship that fat piece of shit.
Sorry for the unworthy prose compared to Steve - just what I'm feeling right now.
Perhaps Liz Cheney is right. If Trump is re-elected, what is to stop him from ignoring any laws, including the one that says he can't run again. I can see him and his minions ignoring the rule of law like they have so many times already. Best thing to do is WORK NOW to make sure Trump doesn't get elected.
This here is why I subscribe and read your good work.
We are in treacherous times. It just may be that communications in 2024 and beyond are more powerful than guns. I am not quite as optimistic as Steve that the country has sufficient bedrock commitment to Democracy and all that supports it, including the Constitution, to undercut the power of communications once seized by the wrong hands. Just look at what Fox accomplished in what was thought of as a fair contest. It turned the heads of millions with a daily onslaught of lies packaged like Pablum for the masses, with bigger ratings than any other. Now imagine this in a world tipped on edge so that the good guys all roll off, where the Right decides what we will see/hear and how it will be presented. Then fold in the emerging capabilities of AI, which can make you believe the unbelievable, watching Joe Biden taking a bribe from...(fill in the blank). You will see it with your own eyes and because you are smart, (after all you are part of The Warning) you will know better, while 25 people next to you will swallow it whole. Time to recognize there are new and sinister tools to mess with your head. In the meantime you are trying to put food on the table and pay your bills. If a small cadre of agitating people are taken off never to be seen again, well maybe they got themselves in trouble and maybe its smarter to just shut up and cut the grass and have your picnic. Maybe its none of your business. This is how it will happen in 2024 and beyond. Yes it will take a while, probably 3.5 years leading to an election that will just be a formality. Maybe your credit card failed. Maybe the IRS is hassling you. Maybe the police are showing up at your door with a complaint lodged by whomever. Maybe your tires are flat or your kid is failing class. (Did you notice how DeSantis is reshaping classrooms?) Nope, no guns needed in a country that already has too many of them. When the Far Right, now looking to dictatorship as a viable model in this country of yours, puts their determination and money and imagination to shifting the playing field into a new game, do not underestimate them! It has been done before with more primitive tools. The solution is to come out, EVERYBODY and VOTE in year of our Lord, 2024. Lock the bastards out before they get their mealy meathooks back onto the levers of power.. You have one more chance. Do not lull yourselves into the notion that it will all be OK because it always has. You are not dealing with King Solomon. This guy would cut the baby in half in a heartbeat.
OMG I read this and pray you are correct. Feels very dark; almost 9 years of abuse from mentally deranged, pathological lying, toxic conspiracy spewing, divisive, hateful, hater who has owned the narrative. His clown show is like a bad car accident attracting the sick, aggrieved, schadenfreude masses. I just don’t get how millions of Trumplers really even exist. Are people that stupid? Are they such rubes and lemmings not to recognize when a grifting, lying propaganda lie machine is gaslighting them on behalf of profits for the fully corrupted billionaire class? Is America that broken?
Steve, we need a Bluenami (gigantic crashing blue wave) in November or America she slips below the inky black waters of fascism, hate and corruption. The end of a potentially greater and greater democracy.
"Some of us would be ready to stand in front of those tanks, and be prepared to be rolled over by them so others could find the courage to stand in front of the next tank."
If it should come to this..I would be there in Chicago or wherever it would be..I am fully prepared to make that commitment..
What the hell Meet the Press? What the hell?
Steve, my power to vote against DJT and the ability to provide some funds to the Dems is the power I have to give Biden a second term. The second thing is we have to support a Dem majority in both houses to get the MAGA group out of governing and pass some commons sense laws supporting women's rights and gun law legislation. We need to show our global strength and deal through our economic and innovative might to keep Russia, China, and Iran at bay. The fight is real but, we can do it starting at the ballot box. We need November to come quickly.
I was not born here and had to study the Constitution to become a citizen. After 58 years this country is still not over the Civil War and the label they so proudly wear as Republicans or Democrats. Whatever happened to being an American first. You were not born with these labels. I am an American turning 80 this year and know what is morally right and will fight to keep my country free from Donald Trump. You hear the moronic things he says and it's getting worse. Republicans are either too stupid or don't want to listen to the truth. I won't back down.
Most democracies fall apart little by little, true. Then again, Hitler dismantled German democracy in 6 months. So that IS a possibility. Yes, some would fight but that may be a full blown civil war. Trump would have a better excuse to invoke the insurrection act. Best to keep Trump and Trumpists out of office and make the GOP lose until conservatives are forced to reform in an ethical party.
Grant was a great President. He was the target of a 19th Century disinformation campaign. I'll proudly stand in front of a tank. No fear!!
Just as the earth will go on with or without homo sapiens, the constitution will survive the trumps and stefaniks...there may be darkness for a while, but in the long run, yes.. both will prevail
We will likely face a defining moment in November, when Trump either wins the election or loses and rejects the results. At that point, we as individuals will have a decision to make. Do we resist or do we capitulate. The fate of our great nation may depend on just how many of us are willing to oppose Trumps tyranny.
Steve, I appreciate your thoughts. Intellectually I think you are right that a Trump victory in the elections this year will not wipe out 250 years of democracy or more broadly the American culture aimed at freedom and rights for all. But emotionally I worry that it could do so. My reason is that in looking at people’s comments to your and other people’s posts, as well as even my own few posts, this comments display such evil intent. They indicate such a deep seated hatred for other people in the country. For Black and Brown people, for Jews, for immigrants of any kind but in particular those coming through Mexico from countries further south. They indicate such deep seated anger at allowing abortions even though no one is forcing them or their families to have an abortion, but just allow it for medical and other social, psychiatric or other legitimate personal reasons. They show such disdain for the poor and disadvantaged who might require societies help to live better lives. They just hate all “others” and all the desires and needs that “others” may legitimately have. And they do this through absolute reverence for a person who is a through and through dangerous, lying, racist, narcissistic, just plain speaking horrid and deplorable individual. This is what makes me worried. That we could loose our democratic past and all freedoms if Trump wins. Because I fear the fact that the implication is, as you allude to, that it is not just Trump who is bad, but that a really horribly significant portion of the American population is just plain bad. This is something I just never thought would be possible. Too many, what I would have thought of before as decent, good human beings, seem to actually be really bad people. Nasty, selfish, self centered, even cruel. They don’t want “others” to exist, they want all “others” to just disappear. Go away - just, I don’t know, I guess, just die. This saddens me. Makes me fear not just this election, but the future. What has brought this upon us?
I have faith but every now and then I need a reminder. Thank you, Steve.
Steve, your call to courage and to never surrender reminds me of the wise sage Rabbi Nachman of Bretslof who said: “the whole world is like a very narrow bridge; the important thing is not to give in to fear at all”.
We each may on some days (understandably) find it hard to feel “hopeful,” but we are not ever allowed to give in to **despair.** Or to paraphrase (holocaust survivor) Viktor Frankl: although we each cannot control what happens to us, no one can take away from us the power to choose our own RESPONSE to what happens. In other words don’t identify as a victim!
Many of the people who managed to survive Hitler and co’s attempted Final Solution - of mass extermination/Genocide of Jews, Gypsies, gays, intellectuals and other free thinkers - ended up alive because they chose to serve and help others thinking they would die as a result, and this includes many righteous gentiles who remembered to be decent people as all are created in the image of the Eternal.
We must never forget their strength now, when we are the “adults in the room” determining how the story of this defining time of peril for our freedoms will be recorded for posterity.
BTW I heard that Dem Message testing showed “taking away our freedom” polls even better than just talking about saving our “democracy.” Note how Biden always follows mention of the latter with a message about protecting our hard won freedoms. Not an accident; and Worth shamelessly copying this year. Onward.