The Contrarian and many friends descended on Edmund Pettus Bridge yesterday with their unmistakeable, original messaging. Among my favorite signs…
“Jim Crow 2.0? No Faux King Way!”
Memes are going to help carry us over the top. Get busy making up your own. Mangling Ogden Nash a bit, policy is fine and dandy, but memes are quicker and slicker…
"That’s what they’re actually afraid of. They’re afraid of us coming together. They’re afraid of us protecting one another.” AOC
Once again it is time for us to organize and to come together in strong focused non-violent action. It is also time for us to make a plan of what it is we want our future to be. “Now is the time when we envision what our future can look like… When FDR came in March 1933, he hit the ground running, and we are in that envisioning period now. So don’t sit this one out; now is the time to say “Hey that’s a really cool idea. I never thought about that. I want to know more about that.” And that is kind of where we are now. -(Heather Cox Richardson.)
I was glad to hear about the march yesterday. That is what I grew up with, and more people need to take to the streets. Yes, it makes us vulnerable, but the greater the numbers the more afraid they will be as they try to squelch our rights. I have been waiting for people to march on the Supreme Court when they make corrupt and false decisions in numbers that make our military look small.
This John Roberts SCOTUS will be right up there with Roger Taney’s court as the most corrupt court in our country’s history.Not to mention that this court is working to advance the agenda of the vilest criminal potus,Donald Trump,whose name will go down in infamy.
Was the Taney Court "corrupt"? It was nine privileged white men who were, not surprisingly, very much of their time. The decision wasn't close: 7-2. The dissenters were John McLean of Ohio and Benjamin Curtis of Massachusetts. (I just looked them up. Curtis resigned from the Court in 1857, after the Dred Scott decision, but he later defended President Andrew Johnson in his impeachment trial.)
So then, we could agree that the Roberts Court is the most corrupt in the history of the U.S. The members delivering the vilest of rulings are "on the take" and we all have the receipts.
There's no stronger evidence to support the idea that appointment of Supreme Court justices MUST be taken out of the hands of the president. They MUST be subject to an enforceable ethics standard and limited terms.
a first year law student a third year told me that if I harbored any illusion of Justice coming from the Supreme Court I should read the Korematsu decision. I did. That Supreme Court in the 1940s said it was ok to put American citizens
Into concentration camps for the sole reason of their ancestery. And supposed “liberals” voted for that. But there were dissenters
We should want that every State have their district only by population - not by race, and not by political party. No gerrymandering by any means - only by population. That is something that we can do similarly to the Freedom Riders.
I agree. Color is not race anyway. There is one race. Human. I guess if we look at Republicans, many of them have lost their humanity and may be evolving a new race, the Unhumanes.
How new is it really? What we're seeing is the Confederate South rising again -- and again, and again, and again. Gotta give them one thing: they're persistent. "We," however, tend to go home when we think we're done.
Susanna-Sadly, the Confederates exist in every state. The Southern Confederates are most noted because approximately 52% of Black people live in the South.
The KKK has been notorious in Indiana. Ohio ignored their Supreme Court when maps were redrawn.
Keeping Black people “in their place” is an ongoing issue in these “united” states. You’re so right about thinking we’re done. Obama’s election was a signal to some that we’d have a “post racial” society but we can’t see clearly that we still haven’t “overcome” as President Johnson declared.
The Rs are waking up more Americans so maybe we’ll see more persistence by people who truly want the kind of democracy that values all of us. If we persist maybe we’ll really experience liberty and justice for all.
Totally agree with what you are saying, Susan. We have been learning that the far-right has been pursuing their agenda for at least the last 50 years. They are dogged, just as we need to be.
Correct. The Confederacy has now been federalized, like an uncurable political cancer. If you accept the fact that the Civil War never ended, it cannot be said that the South lost. At this moment they are winning, and they have the Roberts Court in their corner.
Yes Susanna, we must grow in our persistence. Also we will have to engage in actions more powerful than occasional demonstrations. General Strikes may be the logical next step; cripple the Oligarchs where it hurts, their cask flow.
To me, the worst Confederates are in the "Con-"Federalist Society.
Justices and Judges approved by the Federalist Society are to me the most abusive of the principles in the Declaration of Independence and evolved Constitution.
I'd suggest going back to recommendations by the best of the American Bar Association or a mix of mutually recognized ethical people.
Careful using Unhumanes to describe humans who appall us. That is an authoritarian trick.* Unfortunately those contaminated by racism, sexism, greed, etc. are just highly damaged humans. We are all still related. Which in the end can give us hope for repair and renewal and for creating systems that support physical, emotional, mental and spiritual health.
* Not saying you are authoritarian, just pointing out how easy it is to fall into dehumanization of the "other".
Janette I did not mean to imply they were not humans, which is why I did not say they were not human, but unhumane, not the same thing. I was playing around with the idea of brain evolution so that there would be those whose brains have evolved so that they did not emotionally concerned about other human beings. I know that the brain evolves really slowly, and this would not be a likely shift in recent times, but then again, what about different development. I was playing with the idea. How do people who are sociopathic, or psychopathic evolve? Want to know more about that. I do see that in the behavior of the people who are supporting Trump. I do want to call it out. It is a problem not to feel empathy, and concern for other human beings.
People who have lost their moral compass, who engage in magic thinking (e.g., fundamentalist believers in a violent god) do, in my opinion, experience intellectual and moral death. In some cases they become moral sadists. They become less than human because they don’t relate to their fellow human beings at the human level. — Human beings are people who relate to other human beings at the human level, acknowledging the pain and suffering that we all experience, acknowledging their humanity.
Janette, I don't think that is what Linda intended, but you make a good point.
I've gotten into some discussions here and on other sites, regarding my personal attempt to NOT hate MAGA. It's a struggle to walk the talk of Jesus, and I don't mean to single out anyone without a believe in a higher power. Religion has some truly awful history! However, I have a friend who, without being a progressive, is as far left as MAGA is far right. She absolutely is so dismissive of the right that she refuses to even listen to them. I can't be swayed from my liberal views, but that teaching of Jesus is to love everyone. THIS IS HARD! But I refuse to let MAGA strip away my humanity.
"Highly damaged humans" vs unhumanes seems a distinction without a difference. The cruel and evil behavior exhibited by these people warrants their characterization as inhumane at the least.
YES! YES! YES! Color is not a race! Race is a social construct, not a biological reality. Melanin is the pigment in all human skin. We all have melanin in our skin in varying amounts which has nothing to do with anything...just like eye color. All humans are created equal.
But “color blind” is a dangerous lie. “Race” is not a biological category about melanin but a social category of disrespect and the experiences that go along with being excluded or doing the excluding. White supremacy is a real thing - a belief system we often fall back on when we feel uncertain or threatened - and Black people have plenty of experience with encountering white supremacy. White people instead try to “not see race” which at the extreme leads to the disastrous decisionmaking of the Roberts court - where “not Black” voters can claim their votes are “suppressed” to protect Black voters. Race has a history and it forges social relationships that will need much entangling over generations. Just a few good readings to start with: How the Irish Became White; Caste
Linda Weide, the only way I can respond is to say "bravo!" in agreement. We are one people with many beautiful characteristics.
Maybe if we demonstrate "love and respect and appreciation" for one another ..... together we could accomplish so much more and influence others to join in.
I must confess that reality tells me there will always be decenters to our hope for love and unity.
BUT....they cannot stop our hope and the actions we take that yield love and encouragement towards our fellow human beings, unless we let them!
Linda, from what you've mentioned, I believe you are of mixed ethnicity.
This is what makes me bonkers--exactly what you say about color isn't race!
My son in law is 100% Hispanic. My children are a mix of Irish, Scottish, German, French, Bohemian, etc etc. (There is a legend there is some Native American on my side, and since my ancestors first arrived here in 1644, that's quite possible). So, my grands from that daughter are half Hispanic.
My daughter in law's father is 100% Hispanic, so her grandson is a quarter Hispanic.
Are my grandchildren considered brown, or not? None of them look particularly dark skinned.
I have a niece in law who came from Argentina. She is blonde with blue eyes. Thus, her and my nephews kids are half Hispanic--and they are very fair skinned, also with blue eyes. Are they considered "brown"? I laugh at that thought!
When oh when oh when can we stop with categorizing people by the color of their skin!?
When I was in hs, as a senior I took an Anthropology class. I had had my freshman Biology with this teacher and she was a mentor. I used to love to hang out in her class in my free periods. One day, we got on the subject of children of mixed ethnicity. (This back in 1974!) Where she got this data, who knows, but she said something that stuck with me over 50 years: she suggested that over the next 1000 years or so, people would intermate and eventually she said "humanity will all look like Polynesians. Isn't that a lovely thought of how beautiful people will be?"
Will this happen? The way things are going with climate, I think humanity won't survive to see it occur. Wouldn't it be wonderful if we all addressed this critical issue rather than fussing over skin color?
(BTW, I get so annoyed by surveys that ask if I'm "white"! If I have the choice to click "Other" and type in a response, sometimes my evil twin takes over and I type in "Caucasian" as "WHITE" is a color, not a race. But
White is a Social Category that people who think they are superior apply to themselves. Many Argentines and Chileans consider themselves “white” because they “came from the ships” (i.e. Europe) and not from “the Indians” (i.e. indigenous peoples). Skin color is used as a signal but it is very weak signal of social position as conqueror or conquered. And counting out biological percentages as if social position was inherent in genetics is simply wrong factually, even when it is invoked as support for progressive values of inclusion and equity.
There is research about the differences of “race” understood as a personal identification with a people and perspective (racial identity, which is taught, along with the value to be given to it) or as a signal to others of how one can be treated (so-called “street race” or what people will see you as). You learn your “street race” too, but also that it may not be what you think you are.
Well, it means aiding and abetting the enemy and providing comfort to them. Got think it through. We certainly have other grounds on which to impeach some members though.
People did take to the streets in other places around the country - I was at a rally in Boston - a small (maybe 100-150 people) group of dedicated folks, mostly white. Thanks to Indivisible, and in spite of short notice, people did take to the streets - we just need to keep doing it - more people, more of the time!!!
Agreed! We need to be out there. This was my first weekend not going to a rally on the weekend in a month, but we have had personal things to take care of.
Voting is such a fundamental right, and here we sit watching as Trump and SCOTUS infringe on that, and allow Trump to rob us blind and it is so open, that we need to prepare for it. We need to Hungarian this election too.
Yes Linda, it WILL take numbers. Right now Der leader has the 'Divide & Conquer operation running amongst us. One by one.. two by two.. people guilty of nothing are being easily picked off and detained. Detained for extended periods of time, not just hours or a few days. A "well armed militia"..., meaning a bunch of NRA card holders or ordinary gun-owners, is not going to work - we'll be annihilated .., dealt with as extremists.., terrrorists.., traitors..., AND SHOT. Large numbers, standing together, in peaceful protest is the only way we'll move the marker. Our Congress and senators will join in, once they see they have no choice. But, "we the people" must lead the way. Votes are not the only thing that count, because they can be tampered with. Huge crowds..? That's a whole nuther matter.
In addition to a plan, we need leaders like AOC who can bring us forward into the next century. Now is the time for all of us to become the moral and ethical leaders in every spere of our lives, local, regional, national and globally to build a new economy and body politic. WE THE PEOPLE have done this successfully before, and we will do it again.
It means more than showing up at the polls and voting. On one had we must continue to resist the current regime in every way possible and with the other we must develop ourselves and others to create a form of leadership to lead us into a brighter future.
"Leadership is understood less as dominance or charisma and more as the expression of moral clarity. Compassion. Spiritual depth. A commitment to collective well-being... such qualities do not arise in isolation. They are nurtured through the larger health and values of a society." -Christy Shaver-
YES. They are afraid of us coming together. They are afraid of us knowing what is happening to each other. They are afraid of us caring about each other.
PICKET THE MEDIA. Perpetual picket lines outside all corporate media. Wherever they go, wherever they meet.
I think there is something deeply powerful about people refusing to surrender either their humanity or their imagination during times of instability and fear.
The idea that we can come together not only to resist what is harmful, but also to help envision and build something more compassionate, democratic, and life-affirming feels incredibly important right now.
I appreciate the reminder that history is not fixed. New possibilities emerge when ordinary people begin organizing, supporting one another, and believing that a different future is still possible.
Most of you may already be aware of this, but when you go to substack.com and you hit the "home button" it takes you to the "for you" tab. This has dozens of current memes that can easily be shared with friends and family. I'm not sure who controls this content, but many of them are brilliant. If anyone can add to how you can control the "for you" content please let me know.
🤔 💬 Not the delectable glistening tofu in stirfry.image that originated from soaled soybeans ➡️ instead, ➡️ image of soaking the soybeans ➡️ image of soaking the blunders -- some slurry of them ➡️ drowning or suffocating in their labeled decomposing spheres, maybe in the bird-pooped scum of the reflecting pool .......... I'm throwing it out as a prompt to get others going .....
I do like the idea of some nutrition coming from this strean of fuck-ups, as tofu emerges in a structured cube of possibilities but then again, I like tofu as culinary potential-filled basic building block that can emerge cross-culturally.
If Brown v. Board of Education were before this Supreme Court instead of the 1954 court, the vote would be 6-3 against Brown, the six votes coming from six Roman Catholics.
Agree -- am fearing that a case will come up that will challenge it and they will overturn it as they did with Roe. And how they think that even "partisan" gerrymandering is ok is beyond me.
HCR's book "How the South Won the Civil War" [2020] should be required reading. An excellent book is Timothy Egan's "A Fever in the Heartland," [2023] about the rise of the KKK in the Midwest (Indiana, Ohio) in the 1920's. MAGA is 21st century KKK. Trump is literally idolized in his role as the Grand Wizard. Trump's "True Believers" cannot tolerate the slightest criticism of Trump. Racism is rampant here. It may be that the Union will dissolve, hopefully peacefully through negotiation. California alone is the 4th largest economy in the world. On another topic, Trump is willing to negotiate with China regarding Taiwan. What will Trump settle for as a direct deposit to his personal account: $10 billion; $100 billion; $500 billion?
In the last episode of The Civil War by Ken Burns (1990s), a black women historian whose name if forgot stated the Civil War was still being fought to this day. At the time, I couldn't understand her position. Thank goodness that over time and I became better informed, I learned she was right. Taiwan ... they're about to get the trump 2.0 Ukraine treatment.
Having come of political age in the mid/late 1960s, I've been watching it my entire adult life. Nixon's "Southern Strategy." The exodus of white Southern Democrats into the Republican Party, which shortly thereafter ceased to be "the party of Lincoln." In August 1980, presidential candidate Ronald Reagan gave a campaign speech on states' rights in -- wait for it -- Neshoba County, Mississippi. Subtle, not. As president, however, Reagan did far more for corporations than for white people, or working people in general. And so on and on . . .
Your question goes to the heart of the matter of what is wrong with civil rights jurisprudence. And on that point, Rucho v. Common Cause is worth a close read.
As Kagan's dissent joined by Sotomayor and Jackson makes plain, the reasoning behind the majority's decision is as vacant as any in modern history.
It was written by Roberts. Roberts reasons backwards from a finding, or a feeling, that he does not know what to do about a problem as large as gerrymandering, to a conclusion that it does not present a problem that can be solved by judges in black robes. From there he steps back again to conclude that the "matter" before the Court in this instance did not present a "case in controversy". As if the Court had been asked to to fill out a public opinion survey, or bet on the next World Series. Having taken that big step backwards, it was then easy to take one more little one, by concluding "Hey, we don't have jurisdiction over this matter !".
Held: "Not for us to decide. Remanded with instructions to dismiss".
Ah, but then you might ask, what to make of the Court's decision in Bush v. Gore stopping an election recount because different Florida county and ward precincts employed different methods of recording votes, and recounting them, and assessing cases of disputed results, ie, ruling on "hanging chads" ?? Why ? Of course because this denied to the voting citizens of Florida their rights to "equal protection under the law", to which the principle of "one man, one vote" is anchored in our constitutional jurisprudence. And how, of course, to better protect that sacred principle than to award the election to the candidate who came out in the original tally 256 votes ahead. Sure. That's how. STOP THE RECOUNT ! ITS UNCONSTITUTIONAL !
So what was it about the general voting public that rated protection against unequal treatment in Bush v. Gore, that did not rate protection in Rucho v. Common Cause, or now, its sequel, Callais v. Louisiana ?? Not race. Not baseball. But also not voting preferences ?? Not politics ? Huh ? What ?
Establishing by law or custom ranks of citizens in America, or classes thereof, by any means whatsoever violates the fundamental principle of Equal Protection upon which our republic is founded. To do so on the basis of skin color being arbitrary and capricious in respect to this principle is offensive to it. But so would any other. Yes, "race" is a suspect class. But so would be a caste system that graded citizens upon the bases of their ice cream preferences. Or more to the point, one than penalized them for exercising their First Amendment Rights: one which classified them according to their political philosophies or loyalties. You say you want a CDL. ? Show us your party membership card.
By announcing open season for partisan redistricting in Rucho v. Common Cause, the Robert's Court majority has paved the way for the advancement of an advantaged class based society in America which turns the principle of one man one vote on its head by allowing those in power to choose their voters. That way lies ruin for the American Republic.
Sotomayor is Catholic, along with 5 others. She's proven to be a consistent supporter of civil rights... the other 5 not at all... so 5-4 against is more realistic. But your choice moments are right on! Years of hard work and sacrifice flushed down the toilet by an overall corrupt SCOTUS.
The suffering of others is baked into the RC orthodoxy. Suffering is supposed to be the penalty for being born a “sinful” human being. When a person is damned the moment they are born there is not much way to ever overcome that curse. The people I have known who were the most terrified of dying were those whose religions guaranteed that they were going to hell because as a normal human, there was no way they had lived lives “ holy” enough to overcome their sins.
Agreed JL, so I reactivated my CA Bar State license . Soon thereafter in early April filed a verified complaint with my CA Attorney General, ROB BONTA, to protect Early, Mail-In voting now based on: (1) CA's formidable state Constitutional express Right-of-Privacy; (2) the "CCPA " the California Consumer Protection Act that was effective back on 1/1/2020; (3) and other statutory rights & case law that has developed from same.
6 days later in April 2026 my CA AG, ROB BONTA, out did me 22 times over by getting it together with 22 AG's across the United States & filed a similar but, a national impact lawsuit in Massachusetts that is active in court at this very moment. Elections are organized state run -- Forget the Feds.
As to getting-it together, I am not into memes that much but, I am into lyrics:
🎶 Divided we Fall. Come on People let's get on the ball & work together ....... Because together we will stand every girl, boy, woman & man. .........................
2 or 3 minutes 2 or 3 hours what does it matter in this Life of ours? 🎶
There are few if any tools that cannot be abused, like flying passenger airplanes into buildings, or homicide with pairing knife. Words can be weapons as can the law, as this regime demonstrates daily. In my view law that inadvertently or manipulatively is used to frustrate justice, and there is a lot of that, it is an injury to individual and collective trust of and respect for the rule of law that is central to what the egalitarian Declaration of Independence was promoting.
The DOJ is now an Orwellian servant of tyranny, but liberty and justice have endured a thousand cuts in the prevalence of corporate-serving policies, and decisions that erode equal justice and the common weal; not to mention "perfectly legal" neo-Jim-Crow trickery. Our individual and mutual, collective dedication to liberty and justice for all is our ultimate weapon against tyranny. Or so it seems to me.
You expressed my feelings so clearly. I have had an active sense of justice since I was in grade school. And it pains me tremendously to see what’s happening now in my legal world.
One thing we can ALL do is boycott all the southern states. No travel there; no tourist dollars. Avoid any products produced there. Wouldn't take too long for Florida and Louisiana and Texas to feel it, and start screeching about it. See how they make out without any 'Lib-bucks'!
Boycotts work. Just look at the border states whining because of Canadian boycotts. And Florida and Vegas have also lost so many Canadian dollars!. This Canadian still boycotts all things American!
Several news stories this week tell the story of Trump/MAGA's pending demise.
1. Trump offers to settle his frivolous $10 billion lawsuit against the FBI by setting up a $1.7 billion non-audit slush fund through which he can pay his cronies (and himself). To push his royal presence further he's threatening to withhold Medicaid funding from California because of purported fraud. The irony will be noticed by the majority of Americans voters.
2. The Iran war has cost US gasoline consumers $45 billion so far and projected to cost $172 billion by end of the year, as reported in the WSJ today. Trump continues to claim his war is only about Iran's nuclear ambitions while global oil producers make their largest profits in years. Ask any driver of a 14 wheel long haul truck (all Trump supporters) how they feel about the price of diesel fuel. Hint: they're really pissed.
3. Racist gerrymandering across the South is polling very badly for MAGA and activating more Democrats and independents. This level of right wing fascism will backfire in November.
Merrill, sorry my comment got cut off - just I only wish any story or irony will be noticed by the majority of American voters. This assumes that the majority of Americans care about what happens in California, are not by now so used to Trump’s use of lawsuits to enrich himself that they will pay serious attention to the news of this one, that a majority of Americans even pay any attention at all to stories such as this - the majority of Americans don’t read above an 8th grade level, get their news from social media or Fox, and distrust the mainstream media to the extent that this story, I fear, will join the multitude of others in the column of oh, I didn’t know that or that’s fake news.
The price of gas, the growing inaccessibility to health care, when the serious decline in people’s standard of living spreads more widely and the remote possibility that the Democrats will actually find a way to leverage these issues in the future will we hopefully start to get people’s serious attention.
But as others have said, it is only when we the people are an organized, constant, weekly if not daily peaceful presence in the streets, are willing to engage in some extralegal activities of the kind that Greenpeace used to do in its heyday by audaciously climbing stacks and posting banners, and that Code Pink continues to do today will we really get the necessary attention. The Civil Rights movement was a success because it had strong fearless leaders who worked together on the local and national levels and were visible symbols of what the fight was about, and more importantly because it had people organizing around the country in small towns and bigger cities where organizers knew people by name and were able to mobilize people in a flash.
Right now, because I am a paid subscriber to this site, send money to AOC and support Democracy Now! with the paltry sum of $5/month I, like probably most of you, am deluged by multiple emails every day from every progressive candidate in the country exhorting me for a contribution. And from every political organization that I support. While this may be an effective way to raise money, it should never be confused as an organizing tool.
And sadly, at the few demonstrations to which I am able to make it, the truth is that there is only a small contingent of young people among a sea of elders who have more demonstrations and organizing experience under our belts than these kids have birthdays. All too often we are seen as “old school” and “stuck in the sixties” (or the seventies and onward as the case may be) but the 60’s and 70’s were a pretty great time to be and there were more lessons learned than some may realize.
I sure hope so, and there is good reason for hope. So many times in the last many years I thought to myself "OK, this time they really crossed the line. Republicans are toast!" and they weren't, but now it's really biting their own supporters big time.
Thank you, Heather, for so skillfully piecing together the voting rights stories to make “a quilt” that shows the power of people to come together to resist the racist injustice! The encouraging subject matter in today’s “ Letter from An American” is lifting my spirits! AOC’s recognition of how important the votes of black community have been in creating and funding education, health care and access to other important services at yesterday’s voting rights rallies in Selma, make me feel that it may be possible that WE THE PEOPLE can steer America back on course!🇺🇸
We should want that every State have their district only by population - not by race, and not by political party. No gerrymandering by any means - only by population. That is something that we can do similarly to the Freedom Riders.
Gerrymandering is patently the most consequential and blatant form of the "voter fraud" that MAGA's always banging on about. That and defrauding legitimate voters of their right to vote by edict. We are being had; and it needs to stop. Solidarity can match the power of money. It's the real lesson of 1776. If we don't hang together, we shall most assuredly hang separately.
We should want every person to live in a nation where every person is judged by the content of their character and not by the color of their skin, and not by political party.
So ... I suggest a "measuring content of character" 3-step process ... Step 1: Count C = the number of people "I" care about. Step 2: Count H = number of people. Step 3: Calculate "my" content of character = C divided by H.
Thus, President Dissembling Don's content of character = one divided by eight billion and counting.
My potentially erroneous but testable assumption: We need to stop talking about the reflecting pool where the dream was spoken and start talking about the dream (MLK's version of Lincoln's "public sentiment") similar to the Freedom Riders, but we also need the conversation about enacting statutes and/or pronouncing judicial decisions to continue.
Exactly. Kind of like a group of baseball players agreeing that they're all on the same team before competing in the World Series. The "how" might seem more important, but the "why" is more important.
Pack the Supreme Court. This isn’t a meme exactly, but Dems need to take power and take action. Dems always fight with one hand behind their backs while Republicans know they have to break every rule in the book to win— because their policies are so unpopular. Time for Dems to recognize that’s not a fair fight. Pack the Court. Eliminate the filibuster. Statehood for DC and Puerto Rico. Overturn Citizens United. And most importantly—pass as much legislation as possible that actually helps working people (Universal Healthcare?) so you can (and should) get re-elected. You will only get one more shot at this, at most. Time to get serious.
Power comes in two varieties, cooperation and coercion, and people differ in which they choose to primarily support. That's been the choice for eons. Social compassion vs narcissistic greed. It's plain as day, but the hard but more rewarding road, and the one that is likely to be the key to our species' long term survival is the former, why the horror pages of history document the latter.
Poetry also defines the world, from a more experiential perspective. Not just our guess at the 'thing in itself" but our experiential connection with it. I suspect that both are required for wisdom; gravitationally induced hydrogen to helium fusion, as well as "rosy fingered dawn".
I think it can be pretty much universal, but i think it speaks to the inner being as well as defining a thing or idea. In the end we are alone in our own nervous systems, and yet we can resonate richly with one another. Nature's greatest gift to our species.
That sign made me laugh despite my raging anger. I'm so old that I remember all the agony in the Johnson years, and despite many of his other actions, it made me respect Johnson. Look at where we are now.
Bill Moyers who worked in the Johnson White House was so helpful over the years with his news shows and interviews. Learning about Lady Bird Johnson so really to know about the reality behind her nature efforts. Never any saints on earth whine living. Just people trying in their own way to create better. Sometimes it works well other times all sorts of obstacles. Now this administration not even a small finger lifted to help. Not one. May this be their legacy. The Not Helpful, non Hero administration.
I agree totally. Moyers was very impressive, and Lady Bird's efforts were wonderful and helpful. The Johnsons would be pretty ashamed of Texas and the entire country at this point.
I agree with a Commentor yesterday, the way to have a big impact is thru calling for boycotts that gets the attention of the Targets, Walmarts, and the 5 tech bros. etc.
Republican voters should understand that unless they are top 1% income group, they get nothing from voting for Repbulicans. Rather, they are voting for poor school education, losing their health care, Medicaid and other safety net programs.
These Rethuglicans have kicked a hornets nest. Let’s see how the droves of southern voters will respond to blatant disenfranchisement. How often do we need to go back to Selma and Montgomery? How far back into our history does anyone think this political cult wants to return to our past?… Who’s next on the list in removing their voice, their vote?…
It’s well past time to “Get into some Good Trouble!”
The head of the South Carolina state Senate — 1 of 5 Republicans who voted against a last-ditch effort to gerrymander — last week said: ‘all we are doing is encouraging Black turnout.’
That's likely true ICTT, unless they can't get registered to vote. Potential black and brown voters in the deep red states mostly outnumber the number of white voters. But they have been so disenfranchised, many have given up. And their polling places have been moved to make them as inconvenient as possible. If this block of voters can register and vote, it's game over for the Republicans.
One has to wonder, why would an American Black or Brown person ever vote for Trump and other Republicans? Is it the feigned Christianity of Trump and the Republican politicians that fools them? It must be because there is absolutely nothing in the Republican-sponsored economic programs that benefit anyone other than the ultra-wealthy, proving that our school systems have failed miserably to teach critical-thinking skills and our churches have failed to teach the core messages of Jesus. For all intents and purposes, MAGA is 21st century KKK. Many of Trump's supporters idolize him, almost as though God anointed Trump to be president. To argue to the contrary is tantamount to attacking their religion. We aren't dealing with rational people when it comes to Trump's supporters.
Yesterday I shared this with one of our contributors: The Christians (maga, blacks, hispanics maybe....) voted for trump because after his demise and after conquering the earth he will ascend to the stars and conquer the heavens too and be seated with the Almighty. Authoritarians know no limit.....He is the father of many sons, the husband of many wives, monarch of the world. May he be possessed by the demons of loneliness.
I’m a Catholic Christian and have never voted for a Republican presidential candidate. Trump is the worst and I thought GWB was bad. The white Christian Nationalists pretend they are the only “true Christians,” but Jesus would never believe that their attitude and desire to control others would entitle them to political power. They have decided to accept the offer Jesus refused from Satan, that of worldly wealth and power. The Gospel of Luke tells the story of the encounter. Satan offers Jesus unlimited power and dominion over the earth if Jesus would bow to Satan. Jesus refuses and tells Satan to take a hike. The Christian Nationalists are effectively accepting the offer Jesus refused. The point of my comment is that many of us don’t like or accept white Christian Nationalism, and we recognize Trump’s sociopathy, malignant narcissism and increasing disconnect from reality for what it is.
Yes, you have described the tyranny, adulteration and perversion of religion quite well. Differences, conflicts and reimaginings of deities and ways of worship have evolved probably along with cultural changes for centuries. To me it represents a pseudo philosophy.
Project 2025 has outlined the next group of voters to be disenfranchised: women! The SAVE America Act shows how it will be done: insist that the name on your current ID (except for passport) match your birth certificate. Married women who did not keep their maiden name do not qualify. The bill doesn’t provide for usage of a marriage certificate to prove the name change; it leaves it up to the states to determine how, or if, married women who did not keep their maiden name can prove citizenship.
Right about that time, in 1963/64, in my northern town of Hartford, I confronted a neighborhood chum who described the new neighbors using the “N” word. My mama had schooled me to never use that bad word and I communicated this to Marty. As kids often do, he got belligerent with me and began screaming the word over and over again until a lunged at him and we commenced a terrible fight. By and by, I placed his head in a head lock. I looked down at his now reddened face as tears were streaming down, and he continued to scream that word. I knew by that time I had to release him or kill him. I released him and as I walked home, he continued to scream that word. I sware I can still hear Marty Jacobs yelling that word at me at times.
My favorite thing about your post (besides appreciation for your mama) is that you named him. I hope Marty Jacobs is alive more than six decades later to feel the shame. (But he's probably a huge success in the world of finance, or similar parasitic enterprise, and as a sociopath lacks the shame gene. )
No. I neglected to tell you he came from a single parent home and was on state aid. Marty also had a twisted foot it was in the genes because his uncle had the same defect. He used to wear out one of his sneakers that dragged sideways as he walked. So ya, I kicked the crap out of a cripple, lol. And proud of it. I tried a search but couldn’t find anything of his family. It’s much easier to search males for obvious reasons.
“Donuts+Democracy offers a simple, cost-effective solution: engaging, educating, and empowering young voters one donut and one conversation at a time.”
“People Power for Florida Empowerment Fund is building a youth-led multi-generational movement that aims to reshape Florida’s electorate by registering, educating, and mobilizing new voters across the state.”
Because they are coming for white women using their married name as an excuse. They’re coming because they know that women and POC together are greater than them!
Nothing will ever convince men whose only accomplishment is having been born white that people of color are equal in any way. Republicans welcomed the Dixicrats in order to get the votes of these racists, and in so doing have sealed their fate as a hateful and soon to be irrelevant political party.
It was as if their real selves were liberated. US Rep Steve Cohen, the one white Dem left, who’d represented Memphis for years, recently announced he will not run for reelection. Justin Pearson had challenged him. (Pearson was one of the two who was expelled from the TN lege a few years ago; Gloria Johnson, who is white, was saved by one vote.)
It is the return of American apartheid aka Jim Crow.
It appears that the fascist GOP plan is to remove citizenship from naturalized citizens and married women, I imagine that they are trying to figure out how to remove citizenship from all people of color no matter how many generations their families have had citizenship.
It is truly rich that it is the party of Lincoln committing these atrocities against American minorities.
Ronald Reagan touted the "Party of Lincoln "and then began his Presidential campaign with a speech in Philadelphia Mississippi utilizing the Southern Strategy to draw the votes of former Dixiecrats.
Our government is under the sway of the new Golden Age, where only the wealthy have power in politics and law.
It is not so much that we women outnumber these misogynist men, but that women have a far superior sense of morality and are not afraid of calling them out for their lack of same.
We should want that every State have their district only by population - not by race, and not by political party. No gerrymandering by any means - only by population. That is something that we can do similarly to the Freedom Riders.
any trouble is bad trouble. no trouble to trouble makers is a bad thing because then in trouble makers mind it becomes good and ignored trouble, this pattern repeats and before you know it, its affected millions of citizens of the country under the radar, and when they finally come into radar what happens to them? ABSO-F-LUTELY NOTHING.
I believe the answer to that question “How far back into our history does anyone think this political cult wants to return to our past?…Who’s next on the list in removing their voice, their vote?…” is women’s right to vote. They are just following their Project2025 play list. Disgusting and disturbing.
All of this gerrymandering is awful but it can often be thwarted by overwhelming Democratic turnout augmented by Independents and disillusioned Republicans. The midterms are no longer just a contest between Republicans and Democrats. It's a fight to determine whether we want to continue as a constitutional republic or if we prefer an autocracy ruled by a strongman.
The hidden threat to the midterms may be corrupted election software, something that is receiving little attention. Both companies that manufacture most of the election equipment and write the election software are now owned by Trump supporters. The Election Assistance Commission, like most federal agencies and commissions, has been stacked with Trump supporters and as recently noted by Mark Elias' "Democracy Docket," its technical committee that oversees election software has been gutted by Trump. The vendors contracted by the Election Assistance Commission to certify that the election software works correctly are owned by Trump supporters.
It is not inconceivable that the election software could be written to tweak close votes without detection to favor desired candidates. Election Truth Alliance conducted numerous studies of data from the 2024 presidential election and found numerous unexplainable statistical anomalies in an election where Trump improbably won all swing states yet Democrats failed to insist on any recounts. Paper ballots are an effective tool only if they are used to verify results of the computer tabulated vote. Local election officials test voting equipment on election day, but computer code can be written to deceive tests much as Volkswagen wrote their diesel engine management software to deceive emissions tests for years. So called "risk limiting audits" are so hit or miss they are a joke. For instance, in the 2024 election in Pennsylvania where there were questions about the presidential vote count, the risk limiting audit was conducted on the state treasurer race!
Trump must corrupt the midterms to keep Republicans in control of the House and Senate to complete his authoritarian takeover and protect himself and his cronies. We know he has no ethical or moral limits. He will do anything, legal and illegal, to achieve his goals. He and his sycophants are constantly surprising us with their ingenuity and brazzeness. While enormous attention is being paid to Trump's attempts to suppress the vote, no attention is being paid to whether or not he and his operatives are attempting to manipulate the vote count. Someone in authority must conduct a line by line forensic analysis of the computer code in our election software before the midterms. Democrats must challenge improbable wins by Republicans and stand firm if Trump tries to seize ballots and equipment in districts being challenged.
The Supreme Court will probably overturn Brown v Bd. Maybe it will find women's suffrage unconstitutional and tell women not to worry their pretty little heads about who the president is.
The time has come to stop abiding by the Supreme Court’s brazen super partisan rulings. The Court actually has no enforcement power; the ruling majority is wholly dependent on citizens acquiescing to its decision. The SC has just made its decision in favor of dilution of black voting by “allowing” white partisan gerrymandering; “now let them enforce it!”
Gerrymandering should not be according to race - just a gerrymander should not be done by political party. Districts should be neutral and done by a neutral third party regardless of political party or by race.
We should want that every State have their district only by population - not by race, and not by political party. No gerrymandering by any means - only by population. That is something that we can do similarly to the Freedom Riders.
On Friday, the League of Women Voters hosted a panel discussion which including a long-term clerk who has overseen dozens of elections in her town and Shenna Bellows the current Secretary of State for ME. Bellows, talked about the protections that are in place against voter fraud and how the ballots in ME are secured. She mentioned that all of the voting machines are testing before each election by at least four people in each town including one Democrat and one Republican. NONE of the voting machines is ever connected to the Internet. As she put it, these machines are basically modern day abacuses (Is that the plural form). They count paper ballots. Once the town finishes the count, the ballots are sent to Augusta where they are stored for 22 months and then destroyed.
Shenna oversees the election committee of all of the Secretaries of State and she communicates with various SoSs "every day."
But, they are concerned about Trump sending ICE thugs into the polling places which is illegal in most states.
If this were the case in all states it would be fabulous. Maybe she should contact the group of governors or the group of attorneys general and offer to participate and share their experience in her state.
But there has to be supervision of the programming itself I suppose, even if the machines are never connected to the Internet.
Since ME has relatively few voters compared to NY, FL, TX, CA counting is relatively easy. The machines tabulate the votes and count the number of ballots entered. A hand count is done by a person or persons from each party to verify the number of ballots cast against the machine. Many towns report their votes within an hour after the polls close. The ballot box is then sealed and can only be opened by the Secretary of State and then only if there is a recount.
“It’s not who votes that counts, it is who counts the votes.” Attributed to J. Stalin, but apocryphal or not, is certainly true.
Look for efforts to decertify ballot counts by MAGA election officials. Massive challenges to every vote and voter qualification. Throw in some staged violence by agitators and then emergency declarations from Trump. Chaos at the polls is the probable plan.
Pardoned thugs, ICE paramilitaries and possibly some military will stop at nothing to ensure keeping MAGA in power. Cornered rats are dangerous, but rats nonetheless.
Still, massive turnout for the election is the best defense. We need to encourage businesses to either close for Election Day or allow employees off to vote.
Dominion was founded in 2002 in Canada. It was first deployed in an election in Ontario in 2003. It was not widely distributed in the US the Bush/Kerry election issues in 2004. It changed its incorporation to the US in 2006.
The main voting machine manufacturers associated with alleged irregularities in the 2004 election were Diebold Election Systems (now Premier Election Solutions), Election Systems & Software (ES&S), and Sequoia Voting Systems.
Diebold Election Systems
Diebold was the most prominent company facing scrutiny in 2004. California banned 15,000 Diebold voting machines from use in the 2004 election due to undisclosed flaws in the systems. A 2003 study by Johns Hopkins and Rice University computer experts revealed hundreds of security flaws in Diebold's software. Independent candidate Ralph Nader obtained a recount in 11 New Hampshire precincts that used Diebold's Accuvote voting machines. The company's CEO Walden O'Dell had drawn controversy for his fundraising efforts on behalf of President Bush, raising questions about potential conflicts of interest.
Sequoia was the company responsible for the “hanging chads” in 2000. In 2004 Riverside County, California, technicians from Sequoia apparently interrupted the election to tamper with the machines' software, leading to possible criminal activity allegations. Like other manufacturers, none of Sequoia's voting machines used in these incidents was equipped with a paper backup system, and all were programmed with proprietary code developed with a Microsoft-based operating system that was developed by Smartmatic, which was founded by Venezuelan programmers, hence the “Maduro connection.” Smartmatic machines were thought to have been used to throw the election of Hugo Chavez in Venezuela.
Eventually, Sequoia was bought by Smartmatic, then Dominion bought legacy Sequoia and Diebold voting machines as it expanded its presence in the US.
States and/or communities in the US buy their voting machines. But voting machine manufacturers also provide maintenance, upgrades, and testing services to the states through contracts that are put out for bids.
That whole story in the last link below. Dominion-manufactured systems were never proven to have been manipulable.
Security studies commissioned by Maryland (the SAIC and RABA reports) confirmed many of the vulnerabilities identified in earlier research and revealed additional security flaws. An Ohio study examining the four major voting machine manufacturers showed they all had serious security vulnerabilities, prompting Ohio's Secretary of State to delay DRE (Direct Recording Electronic) voting machine installation until after the 2004 election.
Thanks for the history lesson. I wasn't writing about the much alleged vulnerability of election software to malevolent outside tampering. I am concerned about malevolent computer code written into the base software or approved changes that may enable the equipment to subtly tweak the vote count to favor the desired candidate while defeating security checks by appearing to function normally during testing. The only way I see defeating this exploit is either to insist on a full handcount of the paper ballots wherever there is an improbable Republican win or a complete line by line forensic examination of the computer code to verify it contains no malware. The evil genius of Trump and his operatives is boundless. Expect the unimaginable.
I totally agree with your last statement!!! Democratic leadership is not doing that, so they are always in reactive mode rather than proactive mode.
There are lots of vulnerabilities. Dominion got in trouble in 2020 because it used Serbian programmers who had to patch a software error. The base code is going to be different for every state because the audit requirements are different. So that adds another layer of complications.
I'm just as worried about the electronic registration rolls being tampered with by purges to “avoid fraud,” and about people turning up and then not being allowed to vote because they aren’t registered, or they are, but the documentation they bring doesn't meet some strict set of criteria. Of course, it only happens in Democratic-leaning precincts. The process slows down the lines, and people have to leave to get to work or pick up their kids, so the impact is magnified.
I want it to be a blue tsunami, but there is a stench of corruption about the midterms. I think it will be closer than anticipated.
We all need to protect our vote. As always, the devil is in the details, in this case that administering elections is a power delegated to the states, and there are 50 different mechanisms for assuring election integrity and verifying the code in both the voting machines and the voter rolls, as well as verifying that each machine does not have embedded elements on the circuit boards that would allow the software to be hacked remotely post inspection, and then reinstalling "checked" version after when the polls close.
Despite statewide oversight, the practical safeguarding of election integrity is highly decentralized and handled by thousands of county and municipal officials. These local administrators are responsible for maintaining voter registration lists, staffing and operating polling places, securing equipment, and tabulating and reporting results, all of which are subject to state audits and legal requirements.
This is where the danger of having electronic voter rolls and the voting equipment itself under the control of a single person, the Republican owner Scott Leindecker of Liberty Vote, the rebranded Dominion Voting Systems. You could hack the software to "disappear" people from both the voter roll and the ballot trail for machines in areas that can swing specific House districts or Senate seats. That is why the DOJ's demand for voter rolls is so concerning, because it would allow them to identify areas that vote Democratic down to the precinct level, where suppression of the vote in those specific areas would help the Republican candidate.
The potential for interference is not just in the voting machines, but also in the electronic voter rolls and is lower tech. Voters could be denied the right to vote because they have been purged from the electronic voter rolls and do not have the state-required ID with them to cast a provisional ballot. The SAVE America Act may not be passed at the national level, but the Heritage Foundation has been pushing "voting integrity" acts in the states. If the aim is to cause confusion and voter suppression, states could pass last-minute versions of SAVE America with new onerous ID requirements when you go to cast your ballot.
Many states now require post‑election audits (including risk‑limiting audits in places like Colorado, Georgia, Nevada, Rhode Island, and Virginia) that local officials must conduct to verify that reported outcomes match the actual ballots. Federal law also requires election officials to retain ballots and related materials for specified periods, which creates an evidence trail for any integrity review. So the software running on the electronic voting machines and the voter rolls should also be "locked down" in some way.
Most of the Liberty Vote voting machines in service are old Dominion Voting machines. If they have been properly secured, they are unlikely to be remotely hackable. The window of opportunity for interference is during their inspection, testing and "upgrading" before the elections. Who will be watching as every voting machine in America is tested? Newly manufactured ones are the bigger threat.
The electronic roll books pose a different issue because most of them were manufactured by a company controlled by Scott Leiendecker. The interference threat is not just from software hacks; it is from how states have chosen to purge their voter rolls ahead of elections and how they have chosen to inform voters that they have been purged.
Assume the worst case scenario and be prepared for it. Each of us has to take the time to NOW to be proactive to make sure that we can vote:
1. Make sure you are registered to vote with exactly the same name that is on your proof of citizenship paperwork (birth certificate, passport). You can check online with your state board of elections. Do it now, a couple of weeks ahead of every election, and ahead of when you vote. Capture screenshots when you do as proof.
2. Assemble documentation that would be required for registration under the SAVE America Act in case it is passed nationally, or by your state, just ahead of the election. Bring it with you when you vote.
3. If you have changed your name at any time in your life, be sure you have documentation to prove you officially changed your name. A marriage certificate with a raised seal from a state and a divorce decree do not automatically change government records. You have to use them to officially request a name change on government records like the DMV, Social Security, and voter registration. It can take a long time to get some of these records if you live in a different state. START NOW.
4. If you vote early or by mail, check the status of your vote until it shows up as received. Everyone should keep checking after the election until it shows up as accepted or whatever terminology is used in your state to indicate that it was considered valid. If your vote shows up as rejected, immediately go to your local board of elections with your documentation to correct any deficiencies to "cure" your ballot. It could be that something like a wrong date was written on an outer envelope.
No matter what voter interference or suppression tactics Trump and his minions throw at us, we each have a responsibility to protect OUR OWN VOTE.
I know it is a pain in the ass, but personally, I aim to be a really hard ass about my vote.
Thank you and yes, remember that this whole election integrity fear is built around "if one illegal vote is cast, that is one too many" which the facts show is not ever a remote statistical problem like .00004%. The problem is so small that the fear is NOT justified and I can guarantee you that Chuck Grassley refuses to acknowledge that fact as do all the republican. My new slogan -"None of this chaos and corruption happens without republican approval. NONE OF IT."
“if one illegal vote is cast, that is one too many”
Thank you for highlighting this statement of the GOP’s alleged philosophy: of course we can see now that it was just the false veneer over their true aim to disenfranchise millions of voters who they deem to be unworthy. But the phrase is brilliant in a dastardly way because anyone who tries to argue against it will be ridiculed as “for illegal voting”.
Similarly, the GOP writes their policies of social safety nets such that “if even one person receives aid who doesn’t need it, that’s one too many.” When thousands of families who might be helped by food / healthcare assistance are driven away from needed aid by onerous paperwork and documentation hurdles, the GOP pretends that the rare welfare fraud they’ve prevented is a “job well done”. Meanwhile, anyone who questions their cruel policies will be derided as “for fraud”.
I would love to hear a good rebuttal to the “you Libs are OK with fraud” or “you Libs are for illegals voting”. Our usual response that “the documented number of fraud/illegal voter cases is very low” just doesn’t have much zing.
Their plans are extremely wide and well detailed. That is something I keep in mind. 2024 was the first major rigged election we have had. No other way that he could have won all the swing states without the aid of the tech nerds of muskrat.
I never understood why we thought it was a good idea to have voting machines. I’ve been lucky and have always voted in places with paper ballots. Seems much more reliable. Tweaking code could really fly under the radar and it definitely looks like that’s their plan.
It depends on the machine. Ours reads the ballot & tallies by candidate. The ballots themselves drop into a bag that is in a locked cabinet. We confirm numbers voters with ballots tallied on the screen throughout the day. After the election, three tally tapes are printed—one is returned to the election commission in a locked bag, one is posted on the polling place door and the third remains attached to the machine itself, which is locked with a recorded, numbered zip tie and returned to the EC that same night. Machines are not connected to the Internet; they are publicly tested before each election. I’m not a devious genius, but I would have a hard time figuring out how to cheat as there are safeguards along the way.
As far as intimidating, interfering people outside the 100’ boundary—well, we have not yet had to deal with that.
So the sum of the numbers of voters for each candidate matches the number of voters who were checked in? How does this prove the scanners weren't flipping votes? The only way to verify the accuracy of the electronic vote counts is to hand count the paper ballots. No Democrat has been willing to demand a recount no matter how improbable the Republican win. The number of tally tapes and the physical security while important are not relevant to the possibility that the election software is flipping votes.
MLMinET, I don’t really consider this as the same thing as the voting machines where you are using a touch screen etc. My town has a similar thing and I consider that to be paper ballots, not electronic. I have issue with machines where the ballot is on a screen. Someone has to load software that “designs” the ballot. Whether it’s connected to the internet or not, if you need to load software updates, it can be tampered with.
Can we pass some laws regarding seizure of ballots and taking them away??? I was shocked, shocked, shocked when Republicans were able to just walk in to some office in Phoenix and remove them. I thought ballots were sacrosanct! I thought there had to be people of both parties present whenever the ballots were handled! How is it that one party can just walk off with ballots? How do we know what they are going to do with them? There need to be far stricter laws, obviously, regarding storage of ballots and procedures required to retrieve ballots. And of course, course that would apply to treatment of voting machines, and any other thing related to processing a ballots. Why is it that Trump people are never never never prosecuted for breaking laws?
My understanding about elections, granted, taught to me many many years ago, was that ballots were protected by having people from both parties oversee the entire process of elections and vote counting to be sure everything was being done fairly and correctly. What has happened to that idea? How is it that one party has taken control of the electronic apparatus required to vote? If we Democrats have permitted this to happen , shame on us! There must be applicable laws.
Me too. I hadn't taken part in a demonstration for nearly 60 years until the "Hands Off" demo last year. Been to several others since. And you're right, it's the same damned fight against the same damned people. Must be something in the water.
Because, after five decades of relentless conditioning in the neoliberal rat-maze, the Moronic Majority is too fanatically self-obsessed -- too reduced to permanent moral imbecility -- to care that our masters are literally abolishing every humanitarian advancement our species' has ever achieved.
Just realized that this Supreme Court ruling in 1954 was 6 weeks after my birth. I lived in Little Rock for 4 years in the late '80s and toured the high school as part of a historic places tour. We can't allow this nation to slip back. We the People!
But we have no means to enforce our will; the (only) force that truly moves Nazis -- Christo and otherwise -- is brute force, and the Regime has an unbreakable monopoly on that.
No, Loren, we will not use brute force because that’s exactly what they want us to! MLK, Jr. never wanted that to occur even when people faced death. Trump wants to proclaim martial law while he throws the ballots his way. We cannot and will not give he or the Repubs any opportunity to let that happen.
Gerrymandering should not be according to race - just as gerrymander should not be done by political party. Districts should be neutral and done by a neutral third party regardless of political party or by race.
Unfortunately, roughly 60% of white voters, 70% of white working class voters, and 80% of white evangelical voters think going back to 1950 is a good thing.
I discovered when I lived there that right after the Brown decision, the white families started up "church schools" in church basements to avoid segregation. Now I had attended parochial school through 6th grade (my dad was a pastor), but then switched to public school. The roots of the southern evangelical movement has it's roots in the Brown decision. These people didn't create these schools to embrace faith. It was to embrace segregation.
Yes. Most home “schooling” has, I’ll bet, similar motivations. We should have laws requiring home “schoolers” and private schools to have the same credentialing requirements for teachers as public schools.
I expect many readers will finish this letter in tears and feeling some level of despair for their country and their fellow Americans, so I thought it might be time to enjoy the Brits (Led by Donkeys activist group) challenging fascists, nazis and white supremacists with ingenuity, humour and a dash of kindness. I've watched this 1min 20secs at least 10 times and every time its made me laugh (because love makes us smart and creative) and cry (because hate just makes us stupid and useless) - https://youtube.com/shorts/JUeC_v9Pvcg?si=ddyt1cONRpvRGBy9
Brits can truly be funny as hell. They specialize in slicing your balls off without you even knowing. Witness King Charles on his visit giving Trump a little golden bell.
‘When you need us, just give it a tinkle…’
Diplomacy is the art of telling people to go to hell in such a way that they ask for directions.
I'm an 84-year-old white guy from WV, a veteran of the fight for equality in Chicago and in Cairo, IL. Like the great battles for Civil Rights in the '60s and '70s, in which I fought, we are now in an incredibly momentous point in our nation's history. This is a time when all hands must be on deck to the greatest of our capabilities. I recently read a new bio of John Lewis; we must meet the challenge of his bravery, being beaten to cross that bridge, and, most important, to stick America's nose in the stink of the injustice and brutality. We must all be in the fight. As I learned on the battlefield more than half a century ago, "if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem." Think, "what can I do besides subscribing to Substack and posting comment to the choir," to which the choir will compose long "Amens" but do nothing more than read more Substacks and post more "Amens."
My message is simple. Get off your ass and DO something. Most of us live within range of an election at the national, state, or local level where we could work to support a candidate in a competitive election, or where we can work to register voters, or get them out to the poles by knocking on doors. I've done a lot of that in three electoral cycles, and it was quite satisfying. I was working with a lot of great people, enjoying the relationships, and doing my part as a citizen.
Politics is not a spectator sport. In the years before the Obama campaign, there was a lot of talk about what "they, meaning the Democrats," should be doing, and I realized that "them" is really "us," including me. I travelled to an orientation session in San Jose for volunteers, and a week later I was in Carson City, NV, knocking on doors. I was retired, so there for a couple of months, but many folks joined us on weekends. That could be YOU!
Grant Gallop, my Episcopal priest in Chicago who later took a parish in El Salvador, once defined his Christianity by saying that "any priest who owns more than one suit is a piker." We live in the most challenging times possible without being in a war zone. We must be out there in the battle, not wringing our hands and preaching to the choir.
Hats off to you sir. The importance of the small -- the election monitor, the door-knocker, the guy/gal registering new voters, the sign-painters, the unseen who make the coffee, bake the cookies, greet new visitors. Some place for all of us in whatever capacity.
It's the boots on the ground that really counts for elections. That's how Hungary recently did it. It's when you talk one on one with neighbours that moves people. No one should discount their influence. If they're respected then they can influence a voter to HOTV in their 'hood.
HCR's quote of Johnson bears repeating. "On March 15, President Johnson addressed a nationally televised joint session of Congress to ask for the passage of a national voting rights act. “Their cause must be our cause too,” he said. “[A]ll of us…must overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry and injustice. And we shall overcome.”
Appalling that much of this history is within my lifetime despite all the efforts to eliminate racial injustice. I fervently hope the sleeping giant that has been awakened includes many white allies and is successful in settling this ugly racism issue for current and future generations.
The racism continues because the corruption at the top worsens.
On his MSNOW broadcast today, Ali Velshi nabbed the worst effect of our elite corruption.
Yes, corruption atop many U.S. elites let many over many years rape the 1,200 underage girls and young women. It let tens of millions of Americans see their communities fall into abandonment and poverty due to mostly the same elites offshoring the millions of working-class jobs.
The corruption – led by the same networks of the similarly dehumanized – has also led to too many daily deaths by opioids, too many mass murders by typically loner young men with military-style assault rifles. It’s widened the wealth gap to the top 1% fantastically beyond the bottom 99%. More racism. More misogyny. More white supremacist hatreds.
But Ali Velshi proposes none of that is the worst – which is, as he sees it, now being how a stupefied U.S. during the ten years of chief-of-the-corrupt Donald lost the lead in almost everything positive to China.
Most costly: his scorn for the allies in every field we once shared with many other nations and groups of nations. Military strength. Technology. Health. The sciences. Ship building. Rail and highways. Green energy. Democracy itself.
It’s what happens (I say this, not Ali), for instance in schools, when all abandon the essaying arts and necessary humanities for seeing others. And embrace instead another of our deadening corruptions – the billionaire testers feasting on all their captives.
OK, this might sound off the wall. But you notice how the billionaires moving to control the media. I dogsat for a friend the other day who had two recently purchased smart TVs. I’m a proud left leaning democrat with a PhD in history. Added that detail to just let y’all know. I’m not prey to conspiracy theories and I’m just putting this out there for all of you to contemplate. I sat there with the remote in my hand, shifting through apps trying to find a station that would provide me fact based news content. Got lots of ways to connect to. I think it’s OAN but whatever, found a gazillion apps that led to Fox and other right wing networks. I noticed that left tLeaning networks weren’t represented. My TVs were low budget TV, but I couldn’t even find a way to add networks and MS Now, was actually willing to pay for a subscription to DIRECTV so I could watch my peeps. Just saying folks - and y’all wonder why the billionaires are buying up the media. Wonder wonder wonder 1984 me thinks.
Soon I will be watching PBS Nova reruns. Just looking at options on Discovery. It’s reality bullschittery, food fights, housewives of hell and such tripe. The Ellison’s have schitt taste, or is that just for us idiots. About to cancel the crap and watch old DVDs
Heather’s reflection on Brown v. Board of Education reminds us that the fight for civil rights is far from over. That 1954 ruling outlawed legal segregation, yet equality remained elusive. Activists faced intimidation, violence, and systemic obstruction, proving that progress demands both courage and enforcement. The Civil Rights Acts and Voting Rights Act were not gifts—they were earned through relentless struggle.
Her account makes clear that today’s debates over voting rights, school equity, and systemic discrimination are part of the same long struggle. Legal guarantees alone cannot produce real equality. History shows that protecting rights requires vigilance, advocacy, and moral commitment. Her piece is a call to action: to honor the sacrifices of those who fought before us, resist efforts to roll back progress, and ensure the promise of equality under the law becomes reality in everyday life. Recognizing this history strengthens our resolve and reminds us that justice is not automatic—it must be defended and expanded continuously.
You have it backwards, Phil. The corruption boils over because the Christian Aryan Male Supremacists demand corruption as the shortest road to their Neu Reich.
That's another way of saying normal people look up to those above them. That persons in public view more likely model behavior for others. And that those with money and power are in positions to control, manipulate, manage, blind, anesthetize, lie to, and hurt others.
That wannabe king in the White House is going to try to build that tasteless monstrosity between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington Cemetery. Is there nothing we can do to stop him? He tore down the east wing of the people’s house, his hideous portraits hang from government buildings in DC. With regard to the arch I’d like to see people massed on that site every day saying no you will not do this. He could tear down the East wing overnight but he can’t build the monstrosity he’s contemplating overnight.
It’s hard I know, but I’m tired of everybody blaming democrats. Why doesn’t anybody look - blame the Republican members of the Congress and Senate and ask why don’t y’all have spines. They control all the branches of government and people keep blaming Democrats for what’s happening. Why don’t you blame the 70 million plus American idiots who empowered the corruption. That psychopath Trump is the epitome of corruption. I just said all the time and wonder what the hell is wrong with this country who in the world was reelect Republicans who’ve done nothing except allow a president to make your life for the most of us anyway much more costly and miserable. Pogo and I’m probably not getting it right but we have seen the enemy and it is us. Sorry to end like this but dumb ass Americans who voted for him they got what they deserve, but I’ll be damned if I deserved it.
His record as incorrigible racist has been as long and virulent as you note, JBR.
Then there're his records involving rape, fraud, tax evasion, and stochastic violence before he won public office, and since then further records in public building desecration, more racism, more fraud, violent insurrection, emoluments clause violations, and murder and mass murder involving his use of the U.S. military voters gave him.
I am particularly saddened by the dismantling of USAID! This program helped our farmer’s fiscal bottom line, but even more importantly, the poorest people on earth, many of them children, are now dying from hunger, and the lack of life-saving medical care like HIV protection.
I was a 22-year-old college grad when I began one year at South Post Ft. Myer, J L.
This was 1969. Daytimes, and for three hours every night, I was studying Vietnamese, southern dialect (Saigon).
Those barracks (now long since gone) had been built for women soldiers of WWII, and used again in the Korean war. Then abandoned till Nam.
I spent hours many weekends walking over those hillside memorial grounds. Perfectly clear that Arlington Cemetery memorialized those who gave their lives for democracy, for the republic, for each other, for the U.S. enslaved, for others in other lands who might be free (including my father in WWII, and a great-great grandfather -- among many who also fought against the types who rule the U.S. now.
Yes, as to the other U.S. history. It sorrowfully happened. Is still happening.
But if you walk those grounds, stand on the hill upon which the Custis-Lee mansion still sits, you won't need to ask of this, at least, "what monuments actually memorialize."
I’ve been thinking a lot about atonement lately. Seems that as a flawed human, I have made mistakes that resurrect in my memory about 3 am as I get older. I have never been deliberately cruel nor have I been able to “sanewash” very much as I see this as a currently popular way to rationalize cruelty disguised in myriad ways. But still some memories haunt. I keep waiting for a national reckoning. As WW2 drew to a close, Gen. Eisenhower made sure that the German people knew what was done in their names. Some were held to account, some accepted the truth and atoned. It was a national effort.
It is long past time for this country, which pretends to espouse righteousness, fairness, justice, and, at times, Godliness. To say that we, as a citizenry, have fallen short is etched in our history. HCR knows all for which we need to atone. Many of us do too. Many reject that premise because cruelty is a human characteristic that seeps in to a society , seemingly by osmosis. Along with greed, envy, wrath, pride and other traits that lead to actions that harm either by omission or commission. A little self-reflection need not wait until one is old, but that seems to happen, ready or not.
At our celebration of being an old country (250 years), maybe it’s time for some serious atonement.
Our “president” seems to think that we need fights, races, idols, and other such tripe. I vehemently disagree. It is the time for atonement, for the United States of America, the love of my life, to recognize the mistakes (well recorded) and seek to atone. It is so far past time that the recognition is denied by many. But that atones not. Check it out…
Well said and I understand. 250 is not a magic number. It will be difficult to celebrate this year, because, as you put it, atonement seems due. We have elected a so-called leader who is addicted to revenge and protects nothing other than his bank account, and it has put the whole world on a slippery slope. The whole world is watching.
Well said. We all individually and as a nation need to reflect. I’m afraid this president has taken reflection out of not only the pool but out of our soul.
Let's not forget that love is a human characteristic as well. Yes, let's atone for allowing slavery to be a horrible part of our culture, but please let's recognize that it is our history.
Let us stop thinking that we are better than that, and accept that we are not better than that, and that it was a central part of the formation of our country, as it is obviously now!
So, with love for the failure that we are as humans, let us love those who were enslaved and whose rights and families we trampled. Let us love ourselves as we are, and let us feel the pain of being alive as we feel the "10,000 joys and 10,000 sorrows" of being human. Let us choose the joy that comes with every day and forgive those who enslave in thought and deed.
How about we make a 400-year plan to atone for the 400 years of slavery in the USA? It is folly to think that another short-term plan or vow to change will actually be sustainable. But we could plan to create a "more just union" if we dedicated ourselves to it. Yes, I know it sounds as if I am just another Polly Andy, but these types of plans have been implemented in several Asian countries and met with success.
I find "loving kindness" meditation to be an effective way to deal with the 3 am wake-up guilt thoughts
I was born two weeks after Brown v Board of Education, and I was shaped by the liberalism of my family, followers of FDR and his New Deal. I will die a liberal, and will never stop resisting the incipient fascism and racism of "conservatives".
The bigoted white minority keeps doing these shameful things to attempt to stay in control and all they do is shine a light on their intolerance and speed up and strengthen the resistance in the rest of us.
Rage and sorrow choke me, reading this. What would Eisenhower do now? What Johnson did, I guess. Unfortunately, there's no President. The people must prevail.
The President we have has full-on dementia. And it's getting worse. Trump picked this group of incompetent sycophants because he knows they are cowards who will support him no matter what. One admission the 2020 election wasn't stolen and they're back on the street.
Explicitly in the name of "We the People" and as Lincoln pointed out:
"It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."
I imaging that Trump will leave us hold the bill for a @#$%-ton of repair, but yeah, clear out all the pool floaties, and spray it with some more natural shade. Erase the all the geopedofiti.
When I was out pruning in the sunshine, a memory floated up of my sixth grade teacher waxing poetic on the irony of Lincoln's claim that "The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here," and while I was not particularly fond of that teacher, I think she "got it" and we "got it" that Lincoln's modesty was part of what made him so great.
No claim about how HE was winning the war. Nothing about how HIS words were the greatest that anyone has ever heard. It is certainly a stark contrast on many levels.
A QUESTION FOR HEATHER: In your “What the heck just happened” of 5/16/26 you and historian Joanne Freeman discussed that the original 13 colonies were populated by a mixture of people who immigrated for reasons of economic opportunity, land ownership, religious freedom and trade. And that religious freedom was an academic debate between the founding fathers. My U.S. history classes in a big ten university taught a slightly different picture:
“Many of the British North American colonies that eventually formed the United States of America were settled in the seventeenth century by men and women, who, in the face of European persecution, refused to compromise passionately held religious convictions and fled Europe. The New England colonies, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Maryland were conceived and established "as plantations of religion." Some settlers who arrived in these areas came for secular motives--"to catch fish" as one New Englander put it--but the great majority left Europe to worship God in the way they believed to be correct. They enthusiastically supported the efforts of their leaders to create "a city on a hill" or a "holy experiment," whose success would prove that God's plan for his churches could be successfully realized in the American wilderness. Even colonies like Virginia, which were planned as commercial ventures, were led by entrepreneurs who considered themselves "militant Protestants" and who worked diligently to promote the prosperity of the church.” “The religious persecution that drove settlers from Europe to the British North American colonies sprang from the conviction, held by Protestants and Catholics alike, that uniformity of religion must exist in any given society. This conviction rested on the belief that there was one true religion and that it was the duty of the civil authorities to impose it, forcibly if necessary, in the interest of saving the souls of all citizens. Nonconformists could expect no mercy and might be executed as heretics. The dominance of the concept, denounced by Roger Williams as "inforced uniformity of religion," meant majority religious groups who controlled political power punished dissenters in their midst. In some areas Catholics persecuted Protestants, in others Protestants persecuted Catholics, and in still others Catholics and Protestants persecuted wayward coreligionists. Although England renounced religious persecution in 1689, it persisted on the European continent. Religious persecution, as observers in every century have commented, is often bloody and implacable and is remembered and resented for generations.”. “America as a Religious Refuge: The Seventeenth Century, Part 1 - Religion and the Founding of the American Republic | Exhibitions (Library of Congress)”. https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/religion/rel01.html
This became an issue when many of the colonies in the Confederation refused to ratify the Constitution unless their rights including religious freedom were guaranteed. Thus the “Bill of Rights” was written and included in the Constitution.
Since you are both highly esteemed historians of American history, can you comment on this schism between the northern colonies being populated with more religious immigrants and the southern colonies being populated with immigrants who were primarily motivated by the promise of land, cash crops like tobacco and cotton, commerce and economic advancement? Was the die cast for a civil war over slavery right from the beginning?
When and by whom each colony was established/populated is an important element. Kevin Phillips book "The Cousins Wars" provides an enlightening explanation. It's a long slog but his thesis, in broad strokes, is roughly that the cultural differences brought over by the puritans in New England, settlers in royal chartered land, and loyal monarchists fleeing Cromwell carried the idealogical and philosophical seeds of the civil war.
The Contrarian and many friends descended on Edmund Pettus Bridge yesterday with their unmistakeable, original messaging. Among my favorite signs…
“Jim Crow 2.0? No Faux King Way!”
Memes are going to help carry us over the top. Get busy making up your own. Mangling Ogden Nash a bit, policy is fine and dandy, but memes are quicker and slicker…
"That’s what they’re actually afraid of. They’re afraid of us coming together. They’re afraid of us protecting one another.” AOC
Once again it is time for us to organize and to come together in strong focused non-violent action. It is also time for us to make a plan of what it is we want our future to be. “Now is the time when we envision what our future can look like… When FDR came in March 1933, he hit the ground running, and we are in that envisioning period now. So don’t sit this one out; now is the time to say “Hey that’s a really cool idea. I never thought about that. I want to know more about that.” And that is kind of where we are now. -(Heather Cox Richardson.)
I was glad to hear about the march yesterday. That is what I grew up with, and more people need to take to the streets. Yes, it makes us vulnerable, but the greater the numbers the more afraid they will be as they try to squelch our rights. I have been waiting for people to march on the Supreme Court when they make corrupt and false decisions in numbers that make our military look small.
This John Roberts SCOTUS will be right up there with Roger Taney’s court as the most corrupt court in our country’s history.Not to mention that this court is working to advance the agenda of the vilest criminal potus,Donald Trump,whose name will go down in infamy.
It too need to have members who are corrupt impeached.
Justice is Blind has a new meaning with the Roberts Court
There is a theory, in law, that deliberate ignorance of a fact can lead to liability.
⬆️🎯👏🏼👏🏼
The majority of the SCOTUS, by their actions, have defined themselves as Nazis.
True, this!!!
Was the Taney Court "corrupt"? It was nine privileged white men who were, not surprisingly, very much of their time. The decision wasn't close: 7-2. The dissenters were John McLean of Ohio and Benjamin Curtis of Massachusetts. (I just looked them up. Curtis resigned from the Court in 1857, after the Dred Scott decision, but he later defended President Andrew Johnson in his impeachment trial.)
Maybe” corrupt” wasn’t the right term.The decision of that court was racist and a product of the wealthy white men of that time.
So then, we could agree that the Roberts Court is the most corrupt in the history of the U.S. The members delivering the vilest of rulings are "on the take" and we all have the receipts.
There's no stronger evidence to support the idea that appointment of Supreme Court justices MUST be taken out of the hands of the president. They MUST be subject to an enforceable ethics standard and limited terms.
When I was
a first year law student a third year told me that if I harbored any illusion of Justice coming from the Supreme Court I should read the Korematsu decision. I did. That Supreme Court in the 1940s said it was ok to put American citizens
Into concentration camps for the sole reason of their ancestery. And supposed “liberals” voted for that. But there were dissenters
Do the 6-3 decisions by the Roberts court make them less corrupt?
Yes. Roberts has been working on moving the US to a white, right wing dictatorial country. Read Lisa Graves.
We should want that every State have their district only by population - not by race, and not by political party. No gerrymandering by any means - only by population. That is something that we can do similarly to the Freedom Riders.
I agree. Color is not race anyway. There is one race. Human. I guess if we look at Republicans, many of them have lost their humanity and may be evolving a new race, the Unhumanes.
How new is it really? What we're seeing is the Confederate South rising again -- and again, and again, and again. Gotta give them one thing: they're persistent. "We," however, tend to go home when we think we're done.
Susanna-Sadly, the Confederates exist in every state. The Southern Confederates are most noted because approximately 52% of Black people live in the South.
The KKK has been notorious in Indiana. Ohio ignored their Supreme Court when maps were redrawn.
Keeping Black people “in their place” is an ongoing issue in these “united” states. You’re so right about thinking we’re done. Obama’s election was a signal to some that we’d have a “post racial” society but we can’t see clearly that we still haven’t “overcome” as President Johnson declared.
The Rs are waking up more Americans so maybe we’ll see more persistence by people who truly want the kind of democracy that values all of us. If we persist maybe we’ll really experience liberty and justice for all.
Totally agree with what you are saying, Susan. We have been learning that the far-right has been pursuing their agenda for at least the last 50 years. They are dogged, just as we need to be.
Correct. The Confederacy has now been federalized, like an uncurable political cancer. If you accept the fact that the Civil War never ended, it cannot be said that the South lost. At this moment they are winning, and they have the Roberts Court in their corner.
Yes Susanna, we must grow in our persistence. Also we will have to engage in actions more powerful than occasional demonstrations. General Strikes may be the logical next step; cripple the Oligarchs where it hurts, their cask flow.
To me, the worst Confederates are in the "Con-"Federalist Society.
Justices and Judges approved by the Federalist Society are to me the most abusive of the principles in the Declaration of Independence and evolved Constitution.
I'd suggest going back to recommendations by the best of the American Bar Association or a mix of mutually recognized ethical people.
Careful using Unhumanes to describe humans who appall us. That is an authoritarian trick.* Unfortunately those contaminated by racism, sexism, greed, etc. are just highly damaged humans. We are all still related. Which in the end can give us hope for repair and renewal and for creating systems that support physical, emotional, mental and spiritual health.
* Not saying you are authoritarian, just pointing out how easy it is to fall into dehumanization of the "other".
Janette I did not mean to imply they were not humans, which is why I did not say they were not human, but unhumane, not the same thing. I was playing around with the idea of brain evolution so that there would be those whose brains have evolved so that they did not emotionally concerned about other human beings. I know that the brain evolves really slowly, and this would not be a likely shift in recent times, but then again, what about different development. I was playing with the idea. How do people who are sociopathic, or psychopathic evolve? Want to know more about that. I do see that in the behavior of the people who are supporting Trump. I do want to call it out. It is a problem not to feel empathy, and concern for other human beings.
People who have lost their moral compass, who engage in magic thinking (e.g., fundamentalist believers in a violent god) do, in my opinion, experience intellectual and moral death. In some cases they become moral sadists. They become less than human because they don’t relate to their fellow human beings at the human level. — Human beings are people who relate to other human beings at the human level, acknowledging the pain and suffering that we all experience, acknowledging their humanity.
Janette, I don't think that is what Linda intended, but you make a good point.
I've gotten into some discussions here and on other sites, regarding my personal attempt to NOT hate MAGA. It's a struggle to walk the talk of Jesus, and I don't mean to single out anyone without a believe in a higher power. Religion has some truly awful history! However, I have a friend who, without being a progressive, is as far left as MAGA is far right. She absolutely is so dismissive of the right that she refuses to even listen to them. I can't be swayed from my liberal views, but that teaching of Jesus is to love everyone. THIS IS HARD! But I refuse to let MAGA strip away my humanity.
"Highly damaged humans" vs unhumanes seems a distinction without a difference. The cruel and evil behavior exhibited by these people warrants their characterization as inhumane at the least.
YES! YES! YES! Color is not a race! Race is a social construct, not a biological reality. Melanin is the pigment in all human skin. We all have melanin in our skin in varying amounts which has nothing to do with anything...just like eye color. All humans are created equal.
But “color blind” is a dangerous lie. “Race” is not a biological category about melanin but a social category of disrespect and the experiences that go along with being excluded or doing the excluding. White supremacy is a real thing - a belief system we often fall back on when we feel uncertain or threatened - and Black people have plenty of experience with encountering white supremacy. White people instead try to “not see race” which at the extreme leads to the disastrous decisionmaking of the Roberts court - where “not Black” voters can claim their votes are “suppressed” to protect Black voters. Race has a history and it forges social relationships that will need much entangling over generations. Just a few good readings to start with: How the Irish Became White; Caste
Linda, nicely put, the Unhumanes. Death star has given them carte blanche to be their worst selves.
Emily Pfaff,
Linda Weide, the only way I can respond is to say "bravo!" in agreement. We are one people with many beautiful characteristics.
Maybe if we demonstrate "love and respect and appreciation" for one another ..... together we could accomplish so much more and influence others to join in.
I must confess that reality tells me there will always be decenters to our hope for love and unity.
BUT....they cannot stop our hope and the actions we take that yield love and encouragement towards our fellow human beings, unless we let them!
Linda, from what you've mentioned, I believe you are of mixed ethnicity.
This is what makes me bonkers--exactly what you say about color isn't race!
My son in law is 100% Hispanic. My children are a mix of Irish, Scottish, German, French, Bohemian, etc etc. (There is a legend there is some Native American on my side, and since my ancestors first arrived here in 1644, that's quite possible). So, my grands from that daughter are half Hispanic.
My daughter in law's father is 100% Hispanic, so her grandson is a quarter Hispanic.
Are my grandchildren considered brown, or not? None of them look particularly dark skinned.
I have a niece in law who came from Argentina. She is blonde with blue eyes. Thus, her and my nephews kids are half Hispanic--and they are very fair skinned, also with blue eyes. Are they considered "brown"? I laugh at that thought!
When oh when oh when can we stop with categorizing people by the color of their skin!?
When I was in hs, as a senior I took an Anthropology class. I had had my freshman Biology with this teacher and she was a mentor. I used to love to hang out in her class in my free periods. One day, we got on the subject of children of mixed ethnicity. (This back in 1974!) Where she got this data, who knows, but she said something that stuck with me over 50 years: she suggested that over the next 1000 years or so, people would intermate and eventually she said "humanity will all look like Polynesians. Isn't that a lovely thought of how beautiful people will be?"
Will this happen? The way things are going with climate, I think humanity won't survive to see it occur. Wouldn't it be wonderful if we all addressed this critical issue rather than fussing over skin color?
(BTW, I get so annoyed by surveys that ask if I'm "white"! If I have the choice to click "Other" and type in a response, sometimes my evil twin takes over and I type in "Caucasian" as "WHITE" is a color, not a race. But
White is a Social Category that people who think they are superior apply to themselves. Many Argentines and Chileans consider themselves “white” because they “came from the ships” (i.e. Europe) and not from “the Indians” (i.e. indigenous peoples). Skin color is used as a signal but it is very weak signal of social position as conqueror or conquered. And counting out biological percentages as if social position was inherent in genetics is simply wrong factually, even when it is invoked as support for progressive values of inclusion and equity.
There is research about the differences of “race” understood as a personal identification with a people and perspective (racial identity, which is taught, along with the value to be given to it) or as a signal to others of how one can be treated (so-called “street race” or what people will see you as). You learn your “street race” too, but also that it may not be what you think you are.
What of the Rat race?
Exactly, Linda!!
Treason is not too strong a word to apply to Trump's Jim Crow Toadies on the Supreme Court.
Well, it means aiding and abetting the enemy and providing comfort to them. Got think it through. We certainly have other grounds on which to impeach some members though.
People did take to the streets in other places around the country - I was at a rally in Boston - a small (maybe 100-150 people) group of dedicated folks, mostly white. Thanks to Indivisible, and in spite of short notice, people did take to the streets - we just need to keep doing it - more people, more of the time!!!
Agreed! We need to be out there. This was my first weekend not going to a rally on the weekend in a month, but we have had personal things to take care of.
Voting is such a fundamental right, and here we sit watching as Trump and SCOTUS infringe on that, and allow Trump to rob us blind and it is so open, that we need to prepare for it. We need to Hungarian this election too.
Yes Linda, it WILL take numbers. Right now Der leader has the 'Divide & Conquer operation running amongst us. One by one.. two by two.. people guilty of nothing are being easily picked off and detained. Detained for extended periods of time, not just hours or a few days. A "well armed militia"..., meaning a bunch of NRA card holders or ordinary gun-owners, is not going to work - we'll be annihilated .., dealt with as extremists.., terrrorists.., traitors..., AND SHOT. Large numbers, standing together, in peaceful protest is the only way we'll move the marker. Our Congress and senators will join in, once they see they have no choice. But, "we the people" must lead the way. Votes are not the only thing that count, because they can be tampered with. Huge crowds..? That's a whole nuther matter.
In addition to a plan, we need leaders like AOC who can bring us forward into the next century. Now is the time for all of us to become the moral and ethical leaders in every spere of our lives, local, regional, national and globally to build a new economy and body politic. WE THE PEOPLE have done this successfully before, and we will do it again.
It means more than showing up at the polls and voting. On one had we must continue to resist the current regime in every way possible and with the other we must develop ourselves and others to create a form of leadership to lead us into a brighter future.
"Leadership is understood less as dominance or charisma and more as the expression of moral clarity. Compassion. Spiritual depth. A commitment to collective well-being... such qualities do not arise in isolation. They are nurtured through the larger health and values of a society." -Christy Shaver-
https://crisistransition.substack.com/p/the-conditions-that-shape-leadership
YES. They are afraid of us coming together. They are afraid of us knowing what is happening to each other. They are afraid of us caring about each other.
PICKET THE MEDIA. Perpetual picket lines outside all corporate media. Wherever they go, wherever they meet.
TELL US MORE TELL US THE TRUTH
Marc, this gives me hope.
I think there is something deeply powerful about people refusing to surrender either their humanity or their imagination during times of instability and fear.
The idea that we can come together not only to resist what is harmful, but also to help envision and build something more compassionate, democratic, and life-affirming feels incredibly important right now.
I appreciate the reminder that history is not fixed. New possibilities emerge when ordinary people begin organizing, supporting one another, and believing that a different future is still possible.
Christy, I am with you 100%.
Most of you may already be aware of this, but when you go to substack.com and you hit the "home button" it takes you to the "for you" tab. This has dozens of current memes that can easily be shared with friends and family. I'm not sure who controls this content, but many of them are brilliant. If anyone can add to how you can control the "for you" content please let me know.
And if you creative geniuses out there can build a meme for TOFU (Trump Only Fucks Up) I would appreciate it.
AND WHERE ARE THE EPSTIEN FILES? WE CANNOT ALLOW THIS TO GET BURIED!!
🤔 💬 Not the delectable glistening tofu in stirfry.image that originated from soaled soybeans ➡️ instead, ➡️ image of soaking the soybeans ➡️ image of soaking the blunders -- some slurry of them ➡️ drowning or suffocating in their labeled decomposing spheres, maybe in the bird-pooped scum of the reflecting pool .......... I'm throwing it out as a prompt to get others going .....
I do like the idea of some nutrition coming from this strean of fuck-ups, as tofu emerges in a structured cube of possibilities but then again, I like tofu as culinary potential-filled basic building block that can emerge cross-culturally.
I like my Tofu FRIED.
I would appreciate it too!
I saw one that said "The only good thing from this administration is a "TOFU TACO".
Sweet! Thanks for sharing. I think it was one of your comments months ago that tied the two together here, if memory serves.
I can hardly claim originality on it, but yes, I've posted it before.
52 52 for TOFU LETTERS.
Was not aware - thank you!
All I see are my subscriptions (using an iPhone).
If Brown v. Board of Education were before this Supreme Court instead of the 1954 court, the vote would be 6-3 against Brown, the six votes coming from six Roman Catholics.
Agree -- am fearing that a case will come up that will challenge it and they will overturn it as they did with Roe. And how they think that even "partisan" gerrymandering is ok is beyond me.
HCR's book "How the South Won the Civil War" [2020] should be required reading. An excellent book is Timothy Egan's "A Fever in the Heartland," [2023] about the rise of the KKK in the Midwest (Indiana, Ohio) in the 1920's. MAGA is 21st century KKK. Trump is literally idolized in his role as the Grand Wizard. Trump's "True Believers" cannot tolerate the slightest criticism of Trump. Racism is rampant here. It may be that the Union will dissolve, hopefully peacefully through negotiation. California alone is the 4th largest economy in the world. On another topic, Trump is willing to negotiate with China regarding Taiwan. What will Trump settle for as a direct deposit to his personal account: $10 billion; $100 billion; $500 billion?
In the last episode of The Civil War by Ken Burns (1990s), a black women historian whose name if forgot stated the Civil War was still being fought to this day. At the time, I couldn't understand her position. Thank goodness that over time and I became better informed, I learned she was right. Taiwan ... they're about to get the trump 2.0 Ukraine treatment.
Having come of political age in the mid/late 1960s, I've been watching it my entire adult life. Nixon's "Southern Strategy." The exodus of white Southern Democrats into the Republican Party, which shortly thereafter ceased to be "the party of Lincoln." In August 1980, presidential candidate Ronald Reagan gave a campaign speech on states' rights in -- wait for it -- Neshoba County, Mississippi. Subtle, not. As president, however, Reagan did far more for corporations than for white people, or working people in general. And so on and on . . .
Dr Barbara Fields.
Mahalo
I agree. Both books should be required reading...so informative.
Your question goes to the heart of the matter of what is wrong with civil rights jurisprudence. And on that point, Rucho v. Common Cause is worth a close read.
As Kagan's dissent joined by Sotomayor and Jackson makes plain, the reasoning behind the majority's decision is as vacant as any in modern history.
It was written by Roberts. Roberts reasons backwards from a finding, or a feeling, that he does not know what to do about a problem as large as gerrymandering, to a conclusion that it does not present a problem that can be solved by judges in black robes. From there he steps back again to conclude that the "matter" before the Court in this instance did not present a "case in controversy". As if the Court had been asked to to fill out a public opinion survey, or bet on the next World Series. Having taken that big step backwards, it was then easy to take one more little one, by concluding "Hey, we don't have jurisdiction over this matter !".
Held: "Not for us to decide. Remanded with instructions to dismiss".
Ah, but then you might ask, what to make of the Court's decision in Bush v. Gore stopping an election recount because different Florida county and ward precincts employed different methods of recording votes, and recounting them, and assessing cases of disputed results, ie, ruling on "hanging chads" ?? Why ? Of course because this denied to the voting citizens of Florida their rights to "equal protection under the law", to which the principle of "one man, one vote" is anchored in our constitutional jurisprudence. And how, of course, to better protect that sacred principle than to award the election to the candidate who came out in the original tally 256 votes ahead. Sure. That's how. STOP THE RECOUNT ! ITS UNCONSTITUTIONAL !
So what was it about the general voting public that rated protection against unequal treatment in Bush v. Gore, that did not rate protection in Rucho v. Common Cause, or now, its sequel, Callais v. Louisiana ?? Not race. Not baseball. But also not voting preferences ?? Not politics ? Huh ? What ?
Establishing by law or custom ranks of citizens in America, or classes thereof, by any means whatsoever violates the fundamental principle of Equal Protection upon which our republic is founded. To do so on the basis of skin color being arbitrary and capricious in respect to this principle is offensive to it. But so would any other. Yes, "race" is a suspect class. But so would be a caste system that graded citizens upon the bases of their ice cream preferences. Or more to the point, one than penalized them for exercising their First Amendment Rights: one which classified them according to their political philosophies or loyalties. You say you want a CDL. ? Show us your party membership card.
By announcing open season for partisan redistricting in Rucho v. Common Cause, the Robert's Court majority has paved the way for the advancement of an advantaged class based society in America which turns the principle of one man one vote on its head by allowing those in power to choose their voters. That way lies ruin for the American Republic.
Sotomayor is Catholic, along with 5 others. She's proven to be a consistent supporter of civil rights... the other 5 not at all... so 5-4 against is more realistic. But your choice moments are right on! Years of hard work and sacrifice flushed down the toilet by an overall corrupt SCOTUS.
Sadly true.
The suffering of others is baked into the RC orthodoxy. Suffering is supposed to be the penalty for being born a “sinful” human being. When a person is damned the moment they are born there is not much way to ever overcome that curse. The people I have known who were the most terrified of dying were those whose religions guaranteed that they were going to hell because as a normal human, there was no way they had lived lives “ holy” enough to overcome their sins.
Very true. I was raised the same. Not at home, but in catholic school.
Pope Leo, can you help remind this SCOTUS what true Catholicism is all about.
They and their Opus Dei confreres reject Vatican II and Leo.
Evidently, in name only, Richard.
Shameful hypocrites.
disgusting but likely true
Sad but true.
Whatever it takes.
Agreed JL, so I reactivated my CA Bar State license . Soon thereafter in early April filed a verified complaint with my CA Attorney General, ROB BONTA, to protect Early, Mail-In voting now based on: (1) CA's formidable state Constitutional express Right-of-Privacy; (2) the "CCPA " the California Consumer Protection Act that was effective back on 1/1/2020; (3) and other statutory rights & case law that has developed from same.
6 days later in April 2026 my CA AG, ROB BONTA, out did me 22 times over by getting it together with 22 AG's across the United States & filed a similar but, a national impact lawsuit in Massachusetts that is active in court at this very moment. Elections are organized state run -- Forget the Feds.
As to getting-it together, I am not into memes that much but, I am into lyrics:
🎶 Divided we Fall. Come on People let's get on the ball & work together ....... Because together we will stand every girl, boy, woman & man. .........................
2 or 3 minutes 2 or 3 hours what does it matter in this Life of ours? 🎶
I always recognize the lyrics you post! ☺️
🎶 Takin' care of Business ever day Takin' care Business every way ...
Work out 🎶
I never gave mine up, even though I don’t actively practice. Thank you for inspiring me to get back out there and use it!
I do not represent typical clients in the same practice like I did on Montgomery Street in SF. I want see a 250th July 4th for all of us ⚖️
There are few if any tools that cannot be abused, like flying passenger airplanes into buildings, or homicide with pairing knife. Words can be weapons as can the law, as this regime demonstrates daily. In my view law that inadvertently or manipulatively is used to frustrate justice, and there is a lot of that, it is an injury to individual and collective trust of and respect for the rule of law that is central to what the egalitarian Declaration of Independence was promoting.
The DOJ is now an Orwellian servant of tyranny, but liberty and justice have endured a thousand cuts in the prevalence of corporate-serving policies, and decisions that erode equal justice and the common weal; not to mention "perfectly legal" neo-Jim-Crow trickery. Our individual and mutual, collective dedication to liberty and justice for all is our ultimate weapon against tyranny. Or so it seems to me.
You expressed my feelings so clearly. I have had an active sense of justice since I was in grade school. And it pains me tremendously to see what’s happening now in my legal world.
The price for caring; but much thanks for doing so. We need that.
"Let me make the songs of a nation, and I care not who makes its laws."
-- Andrew Fletcher
Surely there is truth to it; tyrants always being keen to control the arts.
One thing we can ALL do is boycott all the southern states. No travel there; no tourist dollars. Avoid any products produced there. Wouldn't take too long for Florida and Louisiana and Texas to feel it, and start screeching about it. See how they make out without any 'Lib-bucks'!
Boycotts work. Just look at the border states whining because of Canadian boycotts. And Florida and Vegas have also lost so many Canadian dollars!. This Canadian still boycotts all things American!
A better response might be to only visit Black-owned businesses. Otherwise, as usual, they get the brunt of a boycott.
A good thought!
Yes. We are getting ready to sell our house and move back to NYS and get out of awful TN.
Several news stories this week tell the story of Trump/MAGA's pending demise.
1. Trump offers to settle his frivolous $10 billion lawsuit against the FBI by setting up a $1.7 billion non-audit slush fund through which he can pay his cronies (and himself). To push his royal presence further he's threatening to withhold Medicaid funding from California because of purported fraud. The irony will be noticed by the majority of Americans voters.
2. The Iran war has cost US gasoline consumers $45 billion so far and projected to cost $172 billion by end of the year, as reported in the WSJ today. Trump continues to claim his war is only about Iran's nuclear ambitions while global oil producers make their largest profits in years. Ask any driver of a 14 wheel long haul truck (all Trump supporters) how they feel about the price of diesel fuel. Hint: they're really pissed.
3. Racist gerrymandering across the South is polling very badly for MAGA and activating more Democrats and independents. This level of right wing fascism will backfire in November.
Merrill, sorry my comment got cut off - just I only wish any story or irony will be noticed by the majority of American voters. This assumes that the majority of Americans care about what happens in California, are not by now so used to Trump’s use of lawsuits to enrich himself that they will pay serious attention to the news of this one, that a majority of Americans even pay any attention at all to stories such as this - the majority of Americans don’t read above an 8th grade level, get their news from social media or Fox, and distrust the mainstream media to the extent that this story, I fear, will join the multitude of others in the column of oh, I didn’t know that or that’s fake news.
The price of gas, the growing inaccessibility to health care, when the serious decline in people’s standard of living spreads more widely and the remote possibility that the Democrats will actually find a way to leverage these issues in the future will we hopefully start to get people’s serious attention.
But as others have said, it is only when we the people are an organized, constant, weekly if not daily peaceful presence in the streets, are willing to engage in some extralegal activities of the kind that Greenpeace used to do in its heyday by audaciously climbing stacks and posting banners, and that Code Pink continues to do today will we really get the necessary attention. The Civil Rights movement was a success because it had strong fearless leaders who worked together on the local and national levels and were visible symbols of what the fight was about, and more importantly because it had people organizing around the country in small towns and bigger cities where organizers knew people by name and were able to mobilize people in a flash.
Right now, because I am a paid subscriber to this site, send money to AOC and support Democracy Now! with the paltry sum of $5/month I, like probably most of you, am deluged by multiple emails every day from every progressive candidate in the country exhorting me for a contribution. And from every political organization that I support. While this may be an effective way to raise money, it should never be confused as an organizing tool.
And sadly, at the few demonstrations to which I am able to make it, the truth is that there is only a small contingent of young people among a sea of elders who have more demonstrations and organizing experience under our belts than these kids have birthdays. All too often we are seen as “old school” and “stuck in the sixties” (or the seventies and onward as the case may be) but the 60’s and 70’s were a pretty great time to be and there were more lessons learned than some may realize.
Merrill, I wish I could agree that any story about what’s happening today will be noticed
I sure hope so, and there is good reason for hope. So many times in the last many years I thought to myself "OK, this time they really crossed the line. Republicans are toast!" and they weren't, but now it's really biting their own supporters big time.
Thank you, Heather, for so skillfully piecing together the voting rights stories to make “a quilt” that shows the power of people to come together to resist the racist injustice! The encouraging subject matter in today’s “ Letter from An American” is lifting my spirits! AOC’s recognition of how important the votes of black community have been in creating and funding education, health care and access to other important services at yesterday’s voting rights rallies in Selma, make me feel that it may be possible that WE THE PEOPLE can steer America back on course!🇺🇸
Brace yourselves for MEMES.
I'm not saying memes are not going to carry us over the top. I am saying every tool in the toolbox all the time are what get memes over the top.
We should want that every State have their district only by population - not by race, and not by political party. No gerrymandering by any means - only by population. That is something that we can do similarly to the Freedom Riders.
Gerrymandering is patently the most consequential and blatant form of the "voter fraud" that MAGA's always banging on about. That and defrauding legitimate voters of their right to vote by edict. We are being had; and it needs to stop. Solidarity can match the power of money. It's the real lesson of 1776. If we don't hang together, we shall most assuredly hang separately.
We should want every person to live in a nation where every person is judged by the content of their character and not by the color of their skin, and not by political party.
So ... I suggest a "measuring content of character" 3-step process ... Step 1: Count C = the number of people "I" care about. Step 2: Count H = number of people. Step 3: Calculate "my" content of character = C divided by H.
Thus, President Dissembling Don's content of character = one divided by eight billion and counting.
My potentially erroneous but testable assumption: We need to stop talking about the reflecting pool where the dream was spoken and start talking about the dream (MLK's version of Lincoln's "public sentiment") similar to the Freedom Riders, but we also need the conversation about enacting statutes and/or pronouncing judicial decisions to continue.
I'm feeling mouldy.
We need to talk about both, but I get your point. We need to articulate the prize that holds our eyes in this crossfire hurricane.
Exactly. Kind of like a group of baseball players agreeing that they're all on the same team before competing in the World Series. The "how" might seem more important, but the "why" is more important.
Pack the Supreme Court. This isn’t a meme exactly, but Dems need to take power and take action. Dems always fight with one hand behind their backs while Republicans know they have to break every rule in the book to win— because their policies are so unpopular. Time for Dems to recognize that’s not a fair fight. Pack the Court. Eliminate the filibuster. Statehood for DC and Puerto Rico. Overturn Citizens United. And most importantly—pass as much legislation as possible that actually helps working people (Universal Healthcare?) so you can (and should) get re-elected. You will only get one more shot at this, at most. Time to get serious.
“Clarence Crow 2.0….”
Good one!
Poem of the Day: We
will
be
known
as
a
culture
that
feared
death
but
adored
power
Power comes in two varieties, cooperation and coercion, and people differ in which they choose to primarily support. That's been the choice for eons. Social compassion vs narcissistic greed. It's plain as day, but the hard but more rewarding road, and the one that is likely to be the key to our species' long term survival is the former, why the horror pages of history document the latter.
I totally agree with you. I was merely quoting a poem - not opining on the definition of power.
Poetry also defines the world, from a more experiential perspective. Not just our guess at the 'thing in itself" but our experiential connection with it. I suspect that both are required for wisdom; gravitationally induced hydrogen to helium fusion, as well as "rosy fingered dawn".
Poetry expresses the universal, history only the particulars.....
I think it can be pretty much universal, but i think it speaks to the inner being as well as defining a thing or idea. In the end we are alone in our own nervous systems, and yet we can resonate richly with one another. Nature's greatest gift to our species.
At our rally yesterday a rally-goer's sign was the state of Tennessee with its new districts. Underneath: AKA RACISM!
How could it be otherwise?
DR. HEATHER, You said, "Make Art!" so I did! My favorite design says “Diversity, Equity, Inclusion: American values since 1964”!
https://whenwewerentlooking.substack.com/p/merch?utm_source=direct&r=31ppjj&utm_campaign=post-expanded-share&utm_medium=post%20viewer
That sign made me laugh despite my raging anger. I'm so old that I remember all the agony in the Johnson years, and despite many of his other actions, it made me respect Johnson. Look at where we are now.
Bill Moyers who worked in the Johnson White House was so helpful over the years with his news shows and interviews. Learning about Lady Bird Johnson so really to know about the reality behind her nature efforts. Never any saints on earth whine living. Just people trying in their own way to create better. Sometimes it works well other times all sorts of obstacles. Now this administration not even a small finger lifted to help. Not one. May this be their legacy. The Not Helpful, non Hero administration.
I agree totally. Moyers was very impressive, and Lady Bird's efforts were wonderful and helpful. The Johnsons would be pretty ashamed of Texas and the entire country at this point.
Poor Johnson fell into the quagmire. It lost him the War on Poverty as well as Vietnam.
And Johnson was a popular senator from... Texas?
As Texas as they come!
At long last, no decency.
Little Lord Flaunt le Roi throwing his food on the gold leaf.
Ubu Roi
Or Uber Roi.
I agree with a Commentor yesterday, the way to have a big impact is thru calling for boycotts that gets the attention of the Targets, Walmarts, and the 5 tech bros. etc.
Republican voters should understand that unless they are top 1% income group, they get nothing from voting for Repbulicans. Rather, they are voting for poor school education, losing their health care, Medicaid and other safety net programs.
These Rethuglicans have kicked a hornets nest. Let’s see how the droves of southern voters will respond to blatant disenfranchisement. How often do we need to go back to Selma and Montgomery? How far back into our history does anyone think this political cult wants to return to our past?… Who’s next on the list in removing their voice, their vote?…
It’s well past time to “Get into some Good Trouble!”
The head of the South Carolina state Senate — 1 of 5 Republicans who voted against a last-ditch effort to gerrymander — last week said: ‘all we are doing is encouraging Black turnout.’
From your lips to God’s ear, sir.
That's likely true ICTT, unless they can't get registered to vote. Potential black and brown voters in the deep red states mostly outnumber the number of white voters. But they have been so disenfranchised, many have given up. And their polling places have been moved to make them as inconvenient as possible. If this block of voters can register and vote, it's game over for the Republicans.
One has to wonder, why would an American Black or Brown person ever vote for Trump and other Republicans? Is it the feigned Christianity of Trump and the Republican politicians that fools them? It must be because there is absolutely nothing in the Republican-sponsored economic programs that benefit anyone other than the ultra-wealthy, proving that our school systems have failed miserably to teach critical-thinking skills and our churches have failed to teach the core messages of Jesus. For all intents and purposes, MAGA is 21st century KKK. Many of Trump's supporters idolize him, almost as though God anointed Trump to be president. To argue to the contrary is tantamount to attacking their religion. We aren't dealing with rational people when it comes to Trump's supporters.
Yesterday I shared this with one of our contributors: The Christians (maga, blacks, hispanics maybe....) voted for trump because after his demise and after conquering the earth he will ascend to the stars and conquer the heavens too and be seated with the Almighty. Authoritarians know no limit.....He is the father of many sons, the husband of many wives, monarch of the world. May he be possessed by the demons of loneliness.
I’m a Catholic Christian and have never voted for a Republican presidential candidate. Trump is the worst and I thought GWB was bad. The white Christian Nationalists pretend they are the only “true Christians,” but Jesus would never believe that their attitude and desire to control others would entitle them to political power. They have decided to accept the offer Jesus refused from Satan, that of worldly wealth and power. The Gospel of Luke tells the story of the encounter. Satan offers Jesus unlimited power and dominion over the earth if Jesus would bow to Satan. Jesus refuses and tells Satan to take a hike. The Christian Nationalists are effectively accepting the offer Jesus refused. The point of my comment is that many of us don’t like or accept white Christian Nationalism, and we recognize Trump’s sociopathy, malignant narcissism and increasing disconnect from reality for what it is.
Well said, may I copy your comment to share with my friends? I will add your name as the author.
Yes, you have described the tyranny, adulteration and perversion of religion quite well. Differences, conflicts and reimaginings of deities and ways of worship have evolved probably along with cultural changes for centuries. To me it represents a pseudo philosophy.
Both things can be true. Both fights can be won.
Make a community plan to get the voters registered and driven to the polls. Check your registration often!!
TJ,
Project 2025 has outlined the next group of voters to be disenfranchised: women! The SAVE America Act shows how it will be done: insist that the name on your current ID (except for passport) match your birth certificate. Married women who did not keep their maiden name do not qualify. The bill doesn’t provide for usage of a marriage certificate to prove the name change; it leaves it up to the states to determine how, or if, married women who did not keep their maiden name can prove citizenship.
People just assume that they will be ok. Women, wake up, you are next
Right about that time, in 1963/64, in my northern town of Hartford, I confronted a neighborhood chum who described the new neighbors using the “N” word. My mama had schooled me to never use that bad word and I communicated this to Marty. As kids often do, he got belligerent with me and began screaming the word over and over again until a lunged at him and we commenced a terrible fight. By and by, I placed his head in a head lock. I looked down at his now reddened face as tears were streaming down, and he continued to scream that word. I knew by that time I had to release him or kill him. I released him and as I walked home, he continued to scream that word. I sware I can still hear Marty Jacobs yelling that word at me at times.
My favorite thing about your post (besides appreciation for your mama) is that you named him. I hope Marty Jacobs is alive more than six decades later to feel the shame. (But he's probably a huge success in the world of finance, or similar parasitic enterprise, and as a sociopath lacks the shame gene. )
No. I neglected to tell you he came from a single parent home and was on state aid. Marty also had a twisted foot it was in the genes because his uncle had the same defect. He used to wear out one of his sneakers that dragged sideways as he walked. So ya, I kicked the crap out of a cripple, lol. And proud of it. I tried a search but couldn’t find anything of his family. It’s much easier to search males for obvious reasons.
How horrendous!
VoteRiders has your back on getting an ID to vote. We set up appointments & cover costs.
https://voteriders.org/
Upcoming VoteRiders events:
https://www.mobilize.us/voteriders/
💙💪💪🏾
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This, along with the donuts-democracy, needs to be shared and funded by all of us.
Why? Why did you feel the need to put this post here?
We just read a letter and a comment about how 'good white people' always seem to make it about themselves to the detriment of black people.
And you change the subject to white women.
I am so freaking tired of liberals.
MLK had it right. You guys care more about "order than justice".
Because they are coming for white women using their married name as an excuse. They’re coming because they know that women and POC together are greater than them!
They will never join with us and I don't blame them. We have failed them over and over and over.
If we accidentally do the right thing.. I'm sure they will be happy. But they sure as heck aren't counting on it.
All women will absolutely lose the vote if the GOP stays in power. For real not just paperwork hassles, but that's not what the letter was about.
Patricia, thank you for putting it succinctly.
And Tennessee kicked all Democrats and people of color off committees. They are not even pretending to be anything but racist anymore.
They are wearing their racism as a badge of honor now. It’s despicable
Nothing will ever convince men whose only accomplishment is having been born white that people of color are equal in any way. Republicans welcomed the Dixicrats in order to get the votes of these racists, and in so doing have sealed their fate as a hateful and soon to be irrelevant political party.
I just hope all the people of color and more women will get out and vote these evil people out. There are more of us than them!
It was as if their real selves were liberated. US Rep Steve Cohen, the one white Dem left, who’d represented Memphis for years, recently announced he will not run for reelection. Justin Pearson had challenged him. (Pearson was one of the two who was expelled from the TN lege a few years ago; Gloria Johnson, who is white, was saved by one vote.)
It is the return of American apartheid aka Jim Crow.
It appears that the fascist GOP plan is to remove citizenship from naturalized citizens and married women, I imagine that they are trying to figure out how to remove citizenship from all people of color no matter how many generations their families have had citizenship.
It is truly rich that it is the party of Lincoln committing these atrocities against American minorities.
Ronald Reagan touted the "Party of Lincoln "and then began his Presidential campaign with a speech in Philadelphia Mississippi utilizing the Southern Strategy to draw the votes of former Dixiecrats.
Our government is under the sway of the new Golden Age, where only the wealthy have power in politics and law.
So , back to the 17th Century when it was wealthy educated white male landowners that controlled everything
TN also took all women off committees! They’re coming for women and POC because together we outnumber them!
It is not so much that we women outnumber these misogynist men, but that women have a far superior sense of morality and are not afraid of calling them out for their lack of same.
I said women and POC outnumber white men and I believe that scares them.
Um, the "Dark Ages"? Cave dwellings? Sometime prior to the Magna Carta anyway.
We should want that every State have their district only by population - not by race, and not by political party. No gerrymandering by any means - only by population. That is something that we can do similarly to the Freedom Riders.
any trouble is bad trouble. no trouble to trouble makers is a bad thing because then in trouble makers mind it becomes good and ignored trouble, this pattern repeats and before you know it, its affected millions of citizens of the country under the radar, and when they finally come into radar what happens to them? ABSO-F-LUTELY NOTHING.
My guess is they want to take America back to before women could vote.
I believe the answer to that question “How far back into our history does anyone think this political cult wants to return to our past?…Who’s next on the list in removing their voice, their vote?…” is women’s right to vote. They are just following their Project2025 play list. Disgusting and disturbing.
All of this gerrymandering is awful but it can often be thwarted by overwhelming Democratic turnout augmented by Independents and disillusioned Republicans. The midterms are no longer just a contest between Republicans and Democrats. It's a fight to determine whether we want to continue as a constitutional republic or if we prefer an autocracy ruled by a strongman.
The hidden threat to the midterms may be corrupted election software, something that is receiving little attention. Both companies that manufacture most of the election equipment and write the election software are now owned by Trump supporters. The Election Assistance Commission, like most federal agencies and commissions, has been stacked with Trump supporters and as recently noted by Mark Elias' "Democracy Docket," its technical committee that oversees election software has been gutted by Trump. The vendors contracted by the Election Assistance Commission to certify that the election software works correctly are owned by Trump supporters.
It is not inconceivable that the election software could be written to tweak close votes without detection to favor desired candidates. Election Truth Alliance conducted numerous studies of data from the 2024 presidential election and found numerous unexplainable statistical anomalies in an election where Trump improbably won all swing states yet Democrats failed to insist on any recounts. Paper ballots are an effective tool only if they are used to verify results of the computer tabulated vote. Local election officials test voting equipment on election day, but computer code can be written to deceive tests much as Volkswagen wrote their diesel engine management software to deceive emissions tests for years. So called "risk limiting audits" are so hit or miss they are a joke. For instance, in the 2024 election in Pennsylvania where there were questions about the presidential vote count, the risk limiting audit was conducted on the state treasurer race!
Trump must corrupt the midterms to keep Republicans in control of the House and Senate to complete his authoritarian takeover and protect himself and his cronies. We know he has no ethical or moral limits. He will do anything, legal and illegal, to achieve his goals. He and his sycophants are constantly surprising us with their ingenuity and brazzeness. While enormous attention is being paid to Trump's attempts to suppress the vote, no attention is being paid to whether or not he and his operatives are attempting to manipulate the vote count. Someone in authority must conduct a line by line forensic analysis of the computer code in our election software before the midterms. Democrats must challenge improbable wins by Republicans and stand firm if Trump tries to seize ballots and equipment in districts being challenged.
“Too Big to Rig.” Lawyers are already all over this, but remember that none of it will work as long as we turn out.
As Robert Hubbell says, “Ignore the noise. Be the signal.”
I like it.
If there was ever a time not to bother with voting, this sure ain't it.
Vote for someone who DOES care about you and the life you are trying to live sucessfully.
The Supreme Court will probably overturn Brown v Bd. Maybe it will find women's suffrage unconstitutional and tell women not to worry their pretty little heads about who the president is.
The time has come to stop abiding by the Supreme Court’s brazen super partisan rulings. The Court actually has no enforcement power; the ruling majority is wholly dependent on citizens acquiescing to its decision. The SC has just made its decision in favor of dilution of black voting by “allowing” white partisan gerrymandering; “now let them enforce it!”
AMEN! Maybe call it King Georges Courtiers. Jesters included
Gerrymandering should not be according to race - just a gerrymander should not be done by political party. Districts should be neutral and done by a neutral third party regardless of political party or by race.
Some formula involving Zip codes and population density would be a good way to start.
Or, the "Minute Men" were the terrorists. Kings and fiefdoms was the right way all along.
It's always helpful to remember that one man's terrorist is another's patriot.
That’s the plan man, already greased up
Good thing the US is now short of grease... ;)
We should want that every State have their district only by population - not by race, and not by political party. No gerrymandering by any means - only by population. That is something that we can do similarly to the Freedom Riders.
Simple rules about geometry and decision
On Friday, the League of Women Voters hosted a panel discussion which including a long-term clerk who has overseen dozens of elections in her town and Shenna Bellows the current Secretary of State for ME. Bellows, talked about the protections that are in place against voter fraud and how the ballots in ME are secured. She mentioned that all of the voting machines are testing before each election by at least four people in each town including one Democrat and one Republican. NONE of the voting machines is ever connected to the Internet. As she put it, these machines are basically modern day abacuses (Is that the plural form). They count paper ballots. Once the town finishes the count, the ballots are sent to Augusta where they are stored for 22 months and then destroyed.
Shenna oversees the election committee of all of the Secretaries of State and she communicates with various SoSs "every day."
But, they are concerned about Trump sending ICE thugs into the polling places which is illegal in most states.
If this were the case in all states it would be fabulous. Maybe she should contact the group of governors or the group of attorneys general and offer to participate and share their experience in her state.
But there has to be supervision of the programming itself I suppose, even if the machines are never connected to the Internet.
Since ME has relatively few voters compared to NY, FL, TX, CA counting is relatively easy. The machines tabulate the votes and count the number of ballots entered. A hand count is done by a person or persons from each party to verify the number of ballots cast against the machine. Many towns report their votes within an hour after the polls close. The ballot box is then sealed and can only be opened by the Secretary of State and then only if there is a recount.
“It’s not who votes that counts, it is who counts the votes.” Attributed to J. Stalin, but apocryphal or not, is certainly true.
Look for efforts to decertify ballot counts by MAGA election officials. Massive challenges to every vote and voter qualification. Throw in some staged violence by agitators and then emergency declarations from Trump. Chaos at the polls is the probable plan.
Pardoned thugs, ICE paramilitaries and possibly some military will stop at nothing to ensure keeping MAGA in power. Cornered rats are dangerous, but rats nonetheless.
Still, massive turnout for the election is the best defense. We need to encourage businesses to either close for Election Day or allow employees off to vote.
Agreed. I wrote about the background of the acquisition of Dominion Voting Systems back in November 2025.
https://georgiafisanick.substack.com/p/controlling-the-midterm-election
https://georgiafisanick.substack.com/p/controlling-the-midterm-election-3af
Contains link to your state voting officials:
https://substack.com/@georgiafisanick/note/c-215661151?r=dvhmb&utm_source=notes-share-action&utm_medium=web
Dominion was a factor in 2004 also
JD: Do you have a link for that?
Here is what I found out.
Dominion was founded in 2002 in Canada. It was first deployed in an election in Ontario in 2003. It was not widely distributed in the US the Bush/Kerry election issues in 2004. It changed its incorporation to the US in 2006.
The main voting machine manufacturers associated with alleged irregularities in the 2004 election were Diebold Election Systems (now Premier Election Solutions), Election Systems & Software (ES&S), and Sequoia Voting Systems.
Diebold Election Systems
Diebold was the most prominent company facing scrutiny in 2004. California banned 15,000 Diebold voting machines from use in the 2004 election due to undisclosed flaws in the systems. A 2003 study by Johns Hopkins and Rice University computer experts revealed hundreds of security flaws in Diebold's software. Independent candidate Ralph Nader obtained a recount in 11 New Hampshire precincts that used Diebold's Accuvote voting machines. The company's CEO Walden O'Dell had drawn controversy for his fundraising efforts on behalf of President Bush, raising questions about potential conflicts of interest.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_United_States_election_voting_controversies
Election Systems & Software (ES&S)
ES&S faced issues with data loss and system failures. Officials from ES&S were forced to concede that all records from Florida's 2002 Democratic primary election were erased following two unforeseen computer crashes that occurred just months after the election. Together with Diebold, ES&S was responsible for tallying as much as 80% of votes cast in the United States during this period. https://hemisphericinstitute.org/en/emisferica-1-1-enacting-democracy/1-1-essays/dysfunctional-performance-the-u-s-voting-machine-debacle-and-the-machinery-of-democracy.html
Sequoia Voting Systems
Sequoia was the company responsible for the “hanging chads” in 2000. In 2004 Riverside County, California, technicians from Sequoia apparently interrupted the election to tamper with the machines' software, leading to possible criminal activity allegations. Like other manufacturers, none of Sequoia's voting machines used in these incidents was equipped with a paper backup system, and all were programmed with proprietary code developed with a Microsoft-based operating system that was developed by Smartmatic, which was founded by Venezuelan programmers, hence the “Maduro connection.” Smartmatic machines were thought to have been used to throw the election of Hugo Chavez in Venezuela.
Eventually, Sequoia was bought by Smartmatic, then Dominion bought legacy Sequoia and Diebold voting machines as it expanded its presence in the US.
States and/or communities in the US buy their voting machines. But voting machine manufacturers also provide maintenance, upgrades, and testing services to the states through contracts that are put out for bids.
That whole story in the last link below. Dominion-manufactured systems were never proven to have been manipulable.
https://hemisphericinstitute.org/en/emisferica-1-1-enacting-democracy/1-1-essays/dysfunctional-performance-the-u-s-voting-machine-debacle-and-the-machinery-of-democracy.html
Industry-Wide Issues
Security studies commissioned by Maryland (the SAIC and RABA reports) confirmed many of the vulnerabilities identified in earlier research and revealed additional security flaws. An Ohio study examining the four major voting machine manufacturers showed they all had serious security vulnerabilities, prompting Ohio's Secretary of State to delay DRE (Direct Recording Electronic) voting machine installation until after the 2004 election.
https://verifiedvoting.org/publication/summary-of-the-problem-with-electronic-voting/
https://wjno.iheart.com/featured/brian-mudd/content/2023-04-21-qa-the-truth-about-dominion-voting-systems-floridas-history/
Thanks for the history lesson. I wasn't writing about the much alleged vulnerability of election software to malevolent outside tampering. I am concerned about malevolent computer code written into the base software or approved changes that may enable the equipment to subtly tweak the vote count to favor the desired candidate while defeating security checks by appearing to function normally during testing. The only way I see defeating this exploit is either to insist on a full handcount of the paper ballots wherever there is an improbable Republican win or a complete line by line forensic examination of the computer code to verify it contains no malware. The evil genius of Trump and his operatives is boundless. Expect the unimaginable.
I totally agree with your last statement!!! Democratic leadership is not doing that, so they are always in reactive mode rather than proactive mode.
There are lots of vulnerabilities. Dominion got in trouble in 2020 because it used Serbian programmers who had to patch a software error. The base code is going to be different for every state because the audit requirements are different. So that adds another layer of complications.
I'm just as worried about the electronic registration rolls being tampered with by purges to “avoid fraud,” and about people turning up and then not being allowed to vote because they aren’t registered, or they are, but the documentation they bring doesn't meet some strict set of criteria. Of course, it only happens in Democratic-leaning precincts. The process slows down the lines, and people have to leave to get to work or pick up their kids, so the impact is magnified.
I want it to be a blue tsunami, but there is a stench of corruption about the midterms. I think it will be closer than anticipated.
We all need to protect our vote. As always, the devil is in the details, in this case that administering elections is a power delegated to the states, and there are 50 different mechanisms for assuring election integrity and verifying the code in both the voting machines and the voter rolls, as well as verifying that each machine does not have embedded elements on the circuit boards that would allow the software to be hacked remotely post inspection, and then reinstalling "checked" version after when the polls close.
Despite statewide oversight, the practical safeguarding of election integrity is highly decentralized and handled by thousands of county and municipal officials. These local administrators are responsible for maintaining voter registration lists, staffing and operating polling places, securing equipment, and tabulating and reporting results, all of which are subject to state audits and legal requirements.
This is where the danger of having electronic voter rolls and the voting equipment itself under the control of a single person, the Republican owner Scott Leindecker of Liberty Vote, the rebranded Dominion Voting Systems. You could hack the software to "disappear" people from both the voter roll and the ballot trail for machines in areas that can swing specific House districts or Senate seats. That is why the DOJ's demand for voter rolls is so concerning, because it would allow them to identify areas that vote Democratic down to the precinct level, where suppression of the vote in those specific areas would help the Republican candidate.
The potential for interference is not just in the voting machines, but also in the electronic voter rolls and is lower tech. Voters could be denied the right to vote because they have been purged from the electronic voter rolls and do not have the state-required ID with them to cast a provisional ballot. The SAVE America Act may not be passed at the national level, but the Heritage Foundation has been pushing "voting integrity" acts in the states. If the aim is to cause confusion and voter suppression, states could pass last-minute versions of SAVE America with new onerous ID requirements when you go to cast your ballot.
Many states now require post‑election audits (including risk‑limiting audits in places like Colorado, Georgia, Nevada, Rhode Island, and Virginia) that local officials must conduct to verify that reported outcomes match the actual ballots. Federal law also requires election officials to retain ballots and related materials for specified periods, which creates an evidence trail for any integrity review. So the software running on the electronic voting machines and the voter rolls should also be "locked down" in some way.
Most of the Liberty Vote voting machines in service are old Dominion Voting machines. If they have been properly secured, they are unlikely to be remotely hackable. The window of opportunity for interference is during their inspection, testing and "upgrading" before the elections. Who will be watching as every voting machine in America is tested? Newly manufactured ones are the bigger threat.
The electronic roll books pose a different issue because most of them were manufactured by a company controlled by Scott Leiendecker. The interference threat is not just from software hacks; it is from how states have chosen to purge their voter rolls ahead of elections and how they have chosen to inform voters that they have been purged.
Assume the worst case scenario and be prepared for it. Each of us has to take the time to NOW to be proactive to make sure that we can vote:
1. Make sure you are registered to vote with exactly the same name that is on your proof of citizenship paperwork (birth certificate, passport). You can check online with your state board of elections. Do it now, a couple of weeks ahead of every election, and ahead of when you vote. Capture screenshots when you do as proof.
2. Assemble documentation that would be required for registration under the SAVE America Act in case it is passed nationally, or by your state, just ahead of the election. Bring it with you when you vote.
3. If you have changed your name at any time in your life, be sure you have documentation to prove you officially changed your name. A marriage certificate with a raised seal from a state and a divorce decree do not automatically change government records. You have to use them to officially request a name change on government records like the DMV, Social Security, and voter registration. It can take a long time to get some of these records if you live in a different state. START NOW.
4. If you vote early or by mail, check the status of your vote until it shows up as received. Everyone should keep checking after the election until it shows up as accepted or whatever terminology is used in your state to indicate that it was considered valid. If your vote shows up as rejected, immediately go to your local board of elections with your documentation to correct any deficiencies to "cure" your ballot. It could be that something like a wrong date was written on an outer envelope.
No matter what voter interference or suppression tactics Trump and his minions throw at us, we each have a responsibility to protect OUR OWN VOTE.
I know it is a pain in the ass, but personally, I aim to be a really hard ass about my vote.
Thank you and yes, remember that this whole election integrity fear is built around "if one illegal vote is cast, that is one too many" which the facts show is not ever a remote statistical problem like .00004%. The problem is so small that the fear is NOT justified and I can guarantee you that Chuck Grassley refuses to acknowledge that fact as do all the republican. My new slogan -"None of this chaos and corruption happens without republican approval. NONE OF IT."
“if one illegal vote is cast, that is one too many”
Thank you for highlighting this statement of the GOP’s alleged philosophy: of course we can see now that it was just the false veneer over their true aim to disenfranchise millions of voters who they deem to be unworthy. But the phrase is brilliant in a dastardly way because anyone who tries to argue against it will be ridiculed as “for illegal voting”.
Similarly, the GOP writes their policies of social safety nets such that “if even one person receives aid who doesn’t need it, that’s one too many.” When thousands of families who might be helped by food / healthcare assistance are driven away from needed aid by onerous paperwork and documentation hurdles, the GOP pretends that the rare welfare fraud they’ve prevented is a “job well done”. Meanwhile, anyone who questions their cruel policies will be derided as “for fraud”.
I would love to hear a good rebuttal to the “you Libs are OK with fraud” or “you Libs are for illegals voting”. Our usual response that “the documented number of fraud/illegal voter cases is very low” just doesn’t have much zing.
Their plans are extremely wide and well detailed. That is something I keep in mind. 2024 was the first major rigged election we have had. No other way that he could have won all the swing states without the aid of the tech nerds of muskrat.
I never understood why we thought it was a good idea to have voting machines. I’ve been lucky and have always voted in places with paper ballots. Seems much more reliable. Tweaking code could really fly under the radar and it definitely looks like that’s their plan.
It depends on the machine. Ours reads the ballot & tallies by candidate. The ballots themselves drop into a bag that is in a locked cabinet. We confirm numbers voters with ballots tallied on the screen throughout the day. After the election, three tally tapes are printed—one is returned to the election commission in a locked bag, one is posted on the polling place door and the third remains attached to the machine itself, which is locked with a recorded, numbered zip tie and returned to the EC that same night. Machines are not connected to the Internet; they are publicly tested before each election. I’m not a devious genius, but I would have a hard time figuring out how to cheat as there are safeguards along the way.
As far as intimidating, interfering people outside the 100’ boundary—well, we have not yet had to deal with that.
So the sum of the numbers of voters for each candidate matches the number of voters who were checked in? How does this prove the scanners weren't flipping votes? The only way to verify the accuracy of the electronic vote counts is to hand count the paper ballots. No Democrat has been willing to demand a recount no matter how improbable the Republican win. The number of tally tapes and the physical security while important are not relevant to the possibility that the election software is flipping votes.
MLMinET, I don’t really consider this as the same thing as the voting machines where you are using a touch screen etc. My town has a similar thing and I consider that to be paper ballots, not electronic. I have issue with machines where the ballot is on a screen. Someone has to load software that “designs” the ballot. Whether it’s connected to the internet or not, if you need to load software updates, it can be tampered with.
Ok, I see your point.
Arizona does use paper ballots as do other some other states, I assume. The paper ballots are then counted by machine.
Can we pass some laws regarding seizure of ballots and taking them away??? I was shocked, shocked, shocked when Republicans were able to just walk in to some office in Phoenix and remove them. I thought ballots were sacrosanct! I thought there had to be people of both parties present whenever the ballots were handled! How is it that one party can just walk off with ballots? How do we know what they are going to do with them? There need to be far stricter laws, obviously, regarding storage of ballots and procedures required to retrieve ballots. And of course, course that would apply to treatment of voting machines, and any other thing related to processing a ballots. Why is it that Trump people are never never never prosecuted for breaking laws?
My understanding about elections, granted, taught to me many many years ago, was that ballots were protected by having people from both parties oversee the entire process of elections and vote counting to be sure everything was being done fairly and correctly. What has happened to that idea? How is it that one party has taken control of the electronic apparatus required to vote? If we Democrats have permitted this to happen , shame on us! There must be applicable laws.
Maybe just for this one election we should mandate recounts.
And 72 years later we are still fighting the same damn fight (and I was there for it 60 years ago).
Me too. I hadn't taken part in a demonstration for nearly 60 years until the "Hands Off" demo last year. Been to several others since. And you're right, it's the same damned fight against the same damned people. Must be something in the water.
Or in human nature. We need to get a better handle on that.
"Nip the shoots of arbitrary power in the bud, is the only maxim which can ever preserve the liberties of any people." - John Adams
A lot of us were. United we stand. Same damn serpent keeps rearing its head.
We're probably going back to Vietnam although iran is probably today's Vietnam. Same outrageous conduct minus the same massive protest.
Because, after five decades of relentless conditioning in the neoliberal rat-maze, the Moronic Majority is too fanatically self-obsessed -- too reduced to permanent moral imbecility -- to care that our masters are literally abolishing every humanitarian advancement our species' has ever achieved.
I know we certainly see signs of self-obsession and imbecility, but I hope the dire outcome you are predicting will not come true!
I too fervently hope it will not come true.
I agree with you 100%!
Just realized that this Supreme Court ruling in 1954 was 6 weeks after my birth. I lived in Little Rock for 4 years in the late '80s and toured the high school as part of a historic places tour. We can't allow this nation to slip back. We the People!
But we have no means to enforce our will; the (only) force that truly moves Nazis -- Christo and otherwise -- is brute force, and the Regime has an unbreakable monopoly on that.
No, Loren, we will not use brute force because that’s exactly what they want us to! MLK, Jr. never wanted that to occur even when people faced death. Trump wants to proclaim martial law while he throws the ballots his way. We cannot and will not give he or the Repubs any opportunity to let that happen.
Gerrymandering should not be according to race - just as gerrymander should not be done by political party. Districts should be neutral and done by a neutral third party regardless of political party or by race.
Unfortunately, roughly 60% of white voters, 70% of white working class voters, and 80% of white evangelical voters think going back to 1950 is a good thing.
I discovered when I lived there that right after the Brown decision, the white families started up "church schools" in church basements to avoid segregation. Now I had attended parochial school through 6th grade (my dad was a pastor), but then switched to public school. The roots of the southern evangelical movement has it's roots in the Brown decision. These people didn't create these schools to embrace faith. It was to embrace segregation.
Yes. Most home “schooling” has, I’ll bet, similar motivations. We should have laws requiring home “schoolers” and private schools to have the same credentialing requirements for teachers as public schools.
I expect many readers will finish this letter in tears and feeling some level of despair for their country and their fellow Americans, so I thought it might be time to enjoy the Brits (Led by Donkeys activist group) challenging fascists, nazis and white supremacists with ingenuity, humour and a dash of kindness. I've watched this 1min 20secs at least 10 times and every time its made me laugh (because love makes us smart and creative) and cry (because hate just makes us stupid and useless) - https://youtube.com/shorts/JUeC_v9Pvcg?si=ddyt1cONRpvRGBy9
Brits can truly be funny as hell. They specialize in slicing your balls off without you even knowing. Witness King Charles on his visit giving Trump a little golden bell.
‘When you need us, just give it a tinkle…’
Diplomacy is the art of telling people to go to hell in such a way that they ask for directions.
Trump's got reservations.
ICYMI…
Rod Stewart congratulates King for putting ‘ratbag’ Trump ‘in his place’
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HjRNg8l7iMo
Hate makes us stupid and useless, also cruel. Do we need more proof…
I like the video line here that says "We're all immigrants," Sandra. Thanks.
I'm an 84-year-old white guy from WV, a veteran of the fight for equality in Chicago and in Cairo, IL. Like the great battles for Civil Rights in the '60s and '70s, in which I fought, we are now in an incredibly momentous point in our nation's history. This is a time when all hands must be on deck to the greatest of our capabilities. I recently read a new bio of John Lewis; we must meet the challenge of his bravery, being beaten to cross that bridge, and, most important, to stick America's nose in the stink of the injustice and brutality. We must all be in the fight. As I learned on the battlefield more than half a century ago, "if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem." Think, "what can I do besides subscribing to Substack and posting comment to the choir," to which the choir will compose long "Amens" but do nothing more than read more Substacks and post more "Amens."
My message is simple. Get off your ass and DO something. Most of us live within range of an election at the national, state, or local level where we could work to support a candidate in a competitive election, or where we can work to register voters, or get them out to the poles by knocking on doors. I've done a lot of that in three electoral cycles, and it was quite satisfying. I was working with a lot of great people, enjoying the relationships, and doing my part as a citizen.
Politics is not a spectator sport. In the years before the Obama campaign, there was a lot of talk about what "they, meaning the Democrats," should be doing, and I realized that "them" is really "us," including me. I travelled to an orientation session in San Jose for volunteers, and a week later I was in Carson City, NV, knocking on doors. I was retired, so there for a couple of months, but many folks joined us on weekends. That could be YOU!
Grant Gallop, my Episcopal priest in Chicago who later took a parish in El Salvador, once defined his Christianity by saying that "any priest who owns more than one suit is a piker." We live in the most challenging times possible without being in a war zone. We must be out there in the battle, not wringing our hands and preaching to the choir.
Hats off to you sir. The importance of the small -- the election monitor, the door-knocker, the guy/gal registering new voters, the sign-painters, the unseen who make the coffee, bake the cookies, greet new visitors. Some place for all of us in whatever capacity.
It's the boots on the ground that really counts for elections. That's how Hungary recently did it. It's when you talk one on one with neighbours that moves people. No one should discount their influence. If they're respected then they can influence a voter to HOTV in their 'hood.
HCR's quote of Johnson bears repeating. "On March 15, President Johnson addressed a nationally televised joint session of Congress to ask for the passage of a national voting rights act. “Their cause must be our cause too,” he said. “[A]ll of us…must overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry and injustice. And we shall overcome.”
Appalling that much of this history is within my lifetime despite all the efforts to eliminate racial injustice. I fervently hope the sleeping giant that has been awakened includes many white allies and is successful in settling this ugly racism issue for current and future generations.
Enough of this $#%@!
The racism continues because the corruption at the top worsens.
On his MSNOW broadcast today, Ali Velshi nabbed the worst effect of our elite corruption.
Yes, corruption atop many U.S. elites let many over many years rape the 1,200 underage girls and young women. It let tens of millions of Americans see their communities fall into abandonment and poverty due to mostly the same elites offshoring the millions of working-class jobs.
The corruption – led by the same networks of the similarly dehumanized – has also led to too many daily deaths by opioids, too many mass murders by typically loner young men with military-style assault rifles. It’s widened the wealth gap to the top 1% fantastically beyond the bottom 99%. More racism. More misogyny. More white supremacist hatreds.
But Ali Velshi proposes none of that is the worst – which is, as he sees it, now being how a stupefied U.S. during the ten years of chief-of-the-corrupt Donald lost the lead in almost everything positive to China.
Most costly: his scorn for the allies in every field we once shared with many other nations and groups of nations. Military strength. Technology. Health. The sciences. Ship building. Rail and highways. Green energy. Democracy itself.
It’s what happens (I say this, not Ali), for instance in schools, when all abandon the essaying arts and necessary humanities for seeing others. And embrace instead another of our deadening corruptions – the billionaire testers feasting on all their captives.
OK, this might sound off the wall. But you notice how the billionaires moving to control the media. I dogsat for a friend the other day who had two recently purchased smart TVs. I’m a proud left leaning democrat with a PhD in history. Added that detail to just let y’all know. I’m not prey to conspiracy theories and I’m just putting this out there for all of you to contemplate. I sat there with the remote in my hand, shifting through apps trying to find a station that would provide me fact based news content. Got lots of ways to connect to. I think it’s OAN but whatever, found a gazillion apps that led to Fox and other right wing networks. I noticed that left tLeaning networks weren’t represented. My TVs were low budget TV, but I couldn’t even find a way to add networks and MS Now, was actually willing to pay for a subscription to DIRECTV so I could watch my peeps. Just saying folks - and y’all wonder why the billionaires are buying up the media. Wonder wonder wonder 1984 me thinks.
Soon I will be watching PBS Nova reruns. Just looking at options on Discovery. It’s reality bullschittery, food fights, housewives of hell and such tripe. The Ellison’s have schitt taste, or is that just for us idiots. About to cancel the crap and watch old DVDs
I hear you JD. When is the last time you watched a real documentary?
I just quit watching most TV.
Frightening! I called my Spectrum Cable Company to ask if FOX News could be removed from my station menu. They said no.
Nope. Fox pays to be part of our "bundle" of stations.
That may be true but you don’t have to ever watch it.
True, although sometimes I have to gather intel...
Heather’s reflection on Brown v. Board of Education reminds us that the fight for civil rights is far from over. That 1954 ruling outlawed legal segregation, yet equality remained elusive. Activists faced intimidation, violence, and systemic obstruction, proving that progress demands both courage and enforcement. The Civil Rights Acts and Voting Rights Act were not gifts—they were earned through relentless struggle.
Her account makes clear that today’s debates over voting rights, school equity, and systemic discrimination are part of the same long struggle. Legal guarantees alone cannot produce real equality. History shows that protecting rights requires vigilance, advocacy, and moral commitment. Her piece is a call to action: to honor the sacrifices of those who fought before us, resist efforts to roll back progress, and ensure the promise of equality under the law becomes reality in everyday life. Recognizing this history strengthens our resolve and reminds us that justice is not automatic—it must be defended and expanded continuously.
You have it backwards, Phil. The corruption boils over because the Christian Aryan Male Supremacists demand corruption as the shortest road to their Neu Reich.
Fish rot, Loren, from the head down.
That's another way of saying normal people look up to those above them. That persons in public view more likely model behavior for others. And that those with money and power are in positions to control, manipulate, manage, blind, anesthetize, lie to, and hurt others.
That wannabe king in the White House is going to try to build that tasteless monstrosity between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington Cemetery. Is there nothing we can do to stop him? He tore down the east wing of the people’s house, his hideous portraits hang from government buildings in DC. With regard to the arch I’d like to see people massed on that site every day saying no you will not do this. He could tear down the East wing overnight but he can’t build the monstrosity he’s contemplating overnight.
It’s hard I know, but I’m tired of everybody blaming democrats. Why doesn’t anybody look - blame the Republican members of the Congress and Senate and ask why don’t y’all have spines. They control all the branches of government and people keep blaming Democrats for what’s happening. Why don’t you blame the 70 million plus American idiots who empowered the corruption. That psychopath Trump is the epitome of corruption. I just said all the time and wonder what the hell is wrong with this country who in the world was reelect Republicans who’ve done nothing except allow a president to make your life for the most of us anyway much more costly and miserable. Pogo and I’m probably not getting it right but we have seen the enemy and it is us. Sorry to end like this but dumb ass Americans who voted for him they got what they deserve, but I’ll be damned if I deserved it.
Exactlly. Meanwhile the very rich are getting what they bought. Greed. Corrupt. Soulless.
Valerie: Yup.
His record as incorrigible racist has been as long and virulent as you note, JBR.
Then there're his records involving rape, fraud, tax evasion, and stochastic violence before he won public office, and since then further records in public building desecration, more racism, more fraud, violent insurrection, emoluments clause violations, and murder and mass murder involving his use of the U.S. military voters gave him.
The lest of venal inhumane conduct is endless. How its tolerated is shocking.
$$$$
I am particularly saddened by the dismantling of USAID! This program helped our farmer’s fiscal bottom line, but even more importantly, the poorest people on earth, many of them children, are now dying from hunger, and the lack of life-saving medical care like HIV protection.
Well said, Phil; truly.
We might want to pay attention to what monuments actually memorialize. The Lincoln Memorial. Arlington Cemetery? Arc d' Trump?
I was a 22-year-old college grad when I began one year at South Post Ft. Myer, J L.
This was 1969. Daytimes, and for three hours every night, I was studying Vietnamese, southern dialect (Saigon).
Those barracks (now long since gone) had been built for women soldiers of WWII, and used again in the Korean war. Then abandoned till Nam.
I spent hours many weekends walking over those hillside memorial grounds. Perfectly clear that Arlington Cemetery memorialized those who gave their lives for democracy, for the republic, for each other, for the U.S. enslaved, for others in other lands who might be free (including my father in WWII, and a great-great grandfather -- among many who also fought against the types who rule the U.S. now.
Yes, as to the other U.S. history. It sorrowfully happened. Is still happening.
But if you walk those grounds, stand on the hill upon which the Custis-Lee mansion still sits, you won't need to ask of this, at least, "what monuments actually memorialize."
J L, arc d’Trump, heresy, blasphemy, and poignant. My heart weeps.
Thanks Heather for your incessant reporting on the unfolding reality in your country. From the Netherlands
I’ve been thinking a lot about atonement lately. Seems that as a flawed human, I have made mistakes that resurrect in my memory about 3 am as I get older. I have never been deliberately cruel nor have I been able to “sanewash” very much as I see this as a currently popular way to rationalize cruelty disguised in myriad ways. But still some memories haunt. I keep waiting for a national reckoning. As WW2 drew to a close, Gen. Eisenhower made sure that the German people knew what was done in their names. Some were held to account, some accepted the truth and atoned. It was a national effort.
It is long past time for this country, which pretends to espouse righteousness, fairness, justice, and, at times, Godliness. To say that we, as a citizenry, have fallen short is etched in our history. HCR knows all for which we need to atone. Many of us do too. Many reject that premise because cruelty is a human characteristic that seeps in to a society , seemingly by osmosis. Along with greed, envy, wrath, pride and other traits that lead to actions that harm either by omission or commission. A little self-reflection need not wait until one is old, but that seems to happen, ready or not.
At our celebration of being an old country (250 years), maybe it’s time for some serious atonement.
Our “president” seems to think that we need fights, races, idols, and other such tripe. I vehemently disagree. It is the time for atonement, for the United States of America, the love of my life, to recognize the mistakes (well recorded) and seek to atone. It is so far past time that the recognition is denied by many. But that atones not. Check it out…
Well said and I understand. 250 is not a magic number. It will be difficult to celebrate this year, because, as you put it, atonement seems due. We have elected a so-called leader who is addicted to revenge and protects nothing other than his bank account, and it has put the whole world on a slippery slope. The whole world is watching.
Well said. We all individually and as a nation need to reflect. I’m afraid this president has taken reflection out of not only the pool but out of our soul.
Let's not forget that love is a human characteristic as well. Yes, let's atone for allowing slavery to be a horrible part of our culture, but please let's recognize that it is our history.
Let us stop thinking that we are better than that, and accept that we are not better than that, and that it was a central part of the formation of our country, as it is obviously now!
So, with love for the failure that we are as humans, let us love those who were enslaved and whose rights and families we trampled. Let us love ourselves as we are, and let us feel the pain of being alive as we feel the "10,000 joys and 10,000 sorrows" of being human. Let us choose the joy that comes with every day and forgive those who enslave in thought and deed.
How about we make a 400-year plan to atone for the 400 years of slavery in the USA? It is folly to think that another short-term plan or vow to change will actually be sustainable. But we could plan to create a "more just union" if we dedicated ourselves to it. Yes, I know it sounds as if I am just another Polly Andy, but these types of plans have been implemented in several Asian countries and met with success.
I find "loving kindness" meditation to be an effective way to deal with the 3 am wake-up guilt thoughts
Well said, it is a time for serious atonement. It's never been done in America
I was born two weeks after Brown v Board of Education, and I was shaped by the liberalism of my family, followers of FDR and his New Deal. I will die a liberal, and will never stop resisting the incipient fascism and racism of "conservatives".
The bigoted white minority keeps doing these shameful things to attempt to stay in control and all they do is shine a light on their intolerance and speed up and strengthen the resistance in the rest of us.
Rage and sorrow choke me, reading this. What would Eisenhower do now? What Johnson did, I guess. Unfortunately, there's no President. The people must prevail.
The President we have has full-on dementia. And it's getting worse. Trump picked this group of incompetent sycophants because he knows they are cowards who will support him no matter what. One admission the 2020 election wasn't stolen and they're back on the street.
That's why I said there is no President.
I agree with you 100%!
An even higher authority.
Very clearly named in the Constitution.
Explicitly in the name of "We the People" and as Lincoln pointed out:
"It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."
Lincoln! There'd better be a cheap way of obliterating that blue paint in the reflecting pool.
I imaging that Trump will leave us hold the bill for a @#$%-ton of repair, but yeah, clear out all the pool floaties, and spray it with some more natural shade. Erase the all the geopedofiti.
When I was out pruning in the sunshine, a memory floated up of my sixth grade teacher waxing poetic on the irony of Lincoln's claim that "The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here," and while I was not particularly fond of that teacher, I think she "got it" and we "got it" that Lincoln's modesty was part of what made him so great.
No claim about how HE was winning the war. Nothing about how HIS words were the greatest that anyone has ever heard. It is certainly a stark contrast on many levels.
Tall, gaunt, wise.
A QUESTION FOR HEATHER: In your “What the heck just happened” of 5/16/26 you and historian Joanne Freeman discussed that the original 13 colonies were populated by a mixture of people who immigrated for reasons of economic opportunity, land ownership, religious freedom and trade. And that religious freedom was an academic debate between the founding fathers. My U.S. history classes in a big ten university taught a slightly different picture:
“Many of the British North American colonies that eventually formed the United States of America were settled in the seventeenth century by men and women, who, in the face of European persecution, refused to compromise passionately held religious convictions and fled Europe. The New England colonies, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Maryland were conceived and established "as plantations of religion." Some settlers who arrived in these areas came for secular motives--"to catch fish" as one New Englander put it--but the great majority left Europe to worship God in the way they believed to be correct. They enthusiastically supported the efforts of their leaders to create "a city on a hill" or a "holy experiment," whose success would prove that God's plan for his churches could be successfully realized in the American wilderness. Even colonies like Virginia, which were planned as commercial ventures, were led by entrepreneurs who considered themselves "militant Protestants" and who worked diligently to promote the prosperity of the church.” “The religious persecution that drove settlers from Europe to the British North American colonies sprang from the conviction, held by Protestants and Catholics alike, that uniformity of religion must exist in any given society. This conviction rested on the belief that there was one true religion and that it was the duty of the civil authorities to impose it, forcibly if necessary, in the interest of saving the souls of all citizens. Nonconformists could expect no mercy and might be executed as heretics. The dominance of the concept, denounced by Roger Williams as "inforced uniformity of religion," meant majority religious groups who controlled political power punished dissenters in their midst. In some areas Catholics persecuted Protestants, in others Protestants persecuted Catholics, and in still others Catholics and Protestants persecuted wayward coreligionists. Although England renounced religious persecution in 1689, it persisted on the European continent. Religious persecution, as observers in every century have commented, is often bloody and implacable and is remembered and resented for generations.”. “America as a Religious Refuge: The Seventeenth Century, Part 1 - Religion and the Founding of the American Republic | Exhibitions (Library of Congress)”. https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/religion/rel01.html
This became an issue when many of the colonies in the Confederation refused to ratify the Constitution unless their rights including religious freedom were guaranteed. Thus the “Bill of Rights” was written and included in the Constitution.
Since you are both highly esteemed historians of American history, can you comment on this schism between the northern colonies being populated with more religious immigrants and the southern colonies being populated with immigrants who were primarily motivated by the promise of land, cash crops like tobacco and cotton, commerce and economic advancement? Was the die cast for a civil war over slavery right from the beginning?
Don’t forget rice and indigo. Cotton wasn’t as predominant until Mr. Whitney’s invention.
When and by whom each colony was established/populated is an important element. Kevin Phillips book "The Cousins Wars" provides an enlightening explanation. It's a long slog but his thesis, in broad strokes, is roughly that the cultural differences brought over by the puritans in New England, settlers in royal chartered land, and loyal monarchists fleeing Cromwell carried the idealogical and philosophical seeds of the civil war.
Thank you for the reply. Yes, I agree.
Addendum: rice and indigo were major crops in the southern colonies.
Thank you for the reply and added information.