The Talks of the Town

Note: I had this post just about in the bag when the news of the shooting in Pennsylvania hit. I thought about trashing it, as it seemed just noise with everyone's time and attention focused elsewhere. I had already put in the time and effort, though, so here it is for what it's worth. My thoughts on the shooting coming soon.

JOE UPDATE

The first thing on everyone's mind: Will he or won't he? All the world's abuzz over Joe Biden's candidacy. Will he or won't he drop out? Will his strong showings in public quell the doubters' doubts?

His every move is being scrutinized. Besides some campaign stops, he has had an interview with George Stephanopoulos and a press conference after the NATO summit that he hosted in Washington. All eyes were on him, watching every single word, every movement. The first two events were unscripted, and we wondered if he could be cogent for them.

It kind of reminds me of when my dad had a massive stroke, which was the ultimate cause of his death. As his daughter and as a speech-language pathologist, I tried to elicit responses from him, hoping that he would respond, but more, hoping that he wouldn't. The family had to make the choice whether to let him go with dignity or be ready for a very long, hard recovery, which itself would not be a good situation for Dad. 

Watching Biden, each step and word that he makes, I hope Joe will be strong, but hoping more that he will fumble so badly that even he could see he needs to step aside.

Biden's showings after the debate were ok. His interview with George Stephanopoulos was ok. He didn't stumble. He was defiant, but some of his answers were troubling. Question: "And if you stay in and Trump is elected and everything you're warning about comes to pass, how will you feel in January?" Answer: "I'll feel as long as I gave it my all and I did the good as job as I know I can do, that's what this is about."

NO! Wrong answer! That is not what this is about! Your opponent is an autocrat set to destroy the country!!!

His press conference after NATO was pretty good. He illustrated again that he is a master at foreign policy, and he was able to speak deftly about it. That isn't to say that he didn't have gaffes. Shortly before the presser, at the end of the NATO conference, he had introduced Ukraine's President Zelenskyy as "President Putin," and in the opening moments of the press questions, he referred to Kamala Harris, his own V.P., as "Vice President Trump." Yikes. 

His campaign events have beens fiery. He has been able to make his points clearly and energetically. Remember, he has his teleprompter at those events. He won't have the teleprompter when he takes the 3am call.

Thought it all, Joe has been defiant. He has emphatically and repeatedly stated that he is running, and that he is the only one to beat T****. During his interview with George Stephanopoulos, he said he would only quit if "the Lord above" told him too.

Well.....

This week, Congress came back from their summer break and more voices have joined the chorus. Democrat House members who have publicly called for him to step down number 20. So far, one Senator has made the call, Peter Welch from Vermont. 

It's not about the President anymore. Members of Congress are terrified that they will lose their seats if Joe Biden runs. We face potentially losing the Presidency and both houses of Congress. Then where will we be?

Actor George Clooney, who has been a huge supporter and fundraiser for Biden, wrote an op-ed in the New York Times calling on him to exit the race, saying that the Biden he interacted with at the massive fundraiser in LA was a diminished version of the man he once was. 

Lalo Alcaraz

Nancy Pelosi was pointedly not to the point when she said this. (I'm showing you Stephen Colbert's take. I started it at the Pelosi part, but it's worth watching the whole monologue.)

What about Barack Obama? There is speculation that Obama is in the same camp as many concerned Dems and has been privately talking with Joe. Obama knew about George Clooney's piece and did not dissuade him from publishing it. Both Pelosi and Obama are considered the ones with the most clout to influence the President. 

And all the pundits. Oh my! If you open the newspaper or turn on a cable news show, everyone has an opinion, and most of them suggest that he should step aside. 

Of all the voices, the one from American philosopher and neuroscientist Sam Harris might be most pointed and powerful. He wrote:

We have watched the waves of conflicting emotion undulate for two weeks now—fear, patience, recrimination, compassion—I can’t recall a political storm quite like this one. But there is an outside set rolling in, clearly visible against a darkening sky. Very soon, contempt will be all that anyone feels for President Biden and his circle of advisors.

No need to search the man’s biography to discover the seeds of his self-absorption, because the mighty tree now stands before us. It is all about him: he wants; he needs; he can. One wonders which lunatic in his inner circle convinced the President that his personal story matters to anyone. “Joe, they’ve been counting you out all your life. Stay the course! You’ll show them.” Satan, if he existed, could do no better than to whisper such blandishments into the old man’s ear.

There might be still time for President Biden to resign his campaign with dignity, but he is already a cautionary tale. So is his wife, Jill. And so are the people they trust most in this world. There is more than enough opprobrium to go around.

Of course, most of us will never carry such responsibilities as the Biden’s have, nor would we want to. So it is hard to know how one would behave under such a dangerous load. But my first thought up on seeing Biden unravel at the debate was, “There is no way that Annaka [Harris's wife] would let me go out on stage if she thought I might perform like that.” This was a consoling thought. And looking in the mirror today, I know that I would never respond to such a failure with insouciance and bravado and glib dismissals of the obvious, unless I had brain damage—which, of course, may be the point.

But what is the excuse of Biden’s team? They are not merely courting disaster now—they are having tantric sex with it. By Monday, we’ll all want their names, so that we can know who should never work in politics again.

As Sister Resister Anne pointed out, one good thing about this kerfuffle is that the other guy is not getting press. All the attention is on Joe, and a lot about his accomplishments is being shared. Joe is also able to voice what evils lurk on the other side, including Project 2025. 

The other camp is scrambling to get air -- and to figure out the next steps if the candidate does change. T**** will have to retreat to his golden throne to come up with new nicknames for the next opponent.

LSR is trying not to be angry with the President and to ignore all the pundits. There is nothing we can do but wait and see. But at my heart, as painful as it is, I agree with those who want him to go. 

Though Biden handily won a strong majority in the popular vote in 2020, and a solid majority of electoral college votes, the reality was that due to our wonderful electoral college system, he won by a slim 44,000 votes in a handful of swing states. We cannot afford to lose a singe one of those voters. 

The polls will have to be watched carefully. It's those battleground states we need to worry about. The numbers-crunchers will have to do their thing and Joe should listen. This is no ordinary race. The Dems have got to win. 

I, like all the others talking about this, think Biden has done a good job. He has given the nation stellar service since he entered politics in 1970. Just in his presidency he has accomplished big stuff like the infrastructure bill, lowering drug costs, and overseeing the country's economic recovery, but also a ton of things that you may have missed. It's not a referendum on those decades that we ask him to step aside. It's for the stark, scary future ahead of us. We must choose a person who can energize the voters on November 5. It's just that simple. 

I would love if the torch was passed to Kamala. I've always admired her. It would be so exciting to have a young woman candidate of color, one who can show the world that in this moment, we can pivot and do what is right for the country. Biden himself can pivot and do what's is right for the country and leave his legacy intact and dignified. 

Whether it is Biden, Harris, or a ham sandwich at the top of the Democratic ticket, I will still voting blue and will work tirelessly to get the sandwich elected. I hope you will, too. 

The Parkinson's Question

In a recent post, I posed the question that perhaps Joe Biden has Parkinson's disease. I should have caught it earlier, but his symptoms were quite evident at the debate. 

It has come to light since then that a movement disorder specialist has been making frequent visits to the White House. Nothing official has come out, but the speculation is rampant. If Joe Biden has PD, he needs to make it public. And he needs to step aside. PD is a progressive neurological condition, and though cognitive difficulty is not always a part of the disease, it can be. Fighting the disease should be his priority; let another do the work for the country.

The Other Talk of the Town is Project 2025

I gave a little intro about Project 2025 in my post "A Project 2025 Primer." But if you haven't read any of the manifesto for yourself, I encourage you to do so. Reading just a little of it will make your stomach churn. Its tone, style, and content are shocking. Here is the whole manifesto. If you read nothing else, at least read the Foreword for yourself. 

Below are some quotes from just a bit of it, from the "Department Health and Human Services" section, authored by Roger Severino, starting on page 449. This is just one small part of one section of the nearly-1000-page document.

Goal #1: Protecting Life, Conscience, and Bodily Integrity. The Secretary should pursue a robust agenda to protect the fundamental right to life, protect conscience rights, and uphold bodily integrity rooted in biological realities, not ideology. 

From the moment of conception, every human being possesses inherent dignity and worth, and our humanity does not depend on our age, stage of development, race, or abilities. The Secretary must ensure that all HHS programs and activities are rooted in a deep respect for innocent human life from day one until natural death: Abortion and euthanasia are not health care.

... 

Radical actors inside and outside government are promoting harmful identity politics that replaces biological sex with subjective notions of “gender identity” and bases a person’s worth on his or her race, sex, or other identities. This destructive dogma, under the guise of “equity,” threatens American’s fundamental liberties as well as the health and well-being of children and adults alike. 

The next Secretary must ensure that HHS programs protect children’s minds and bodies and that HHS programs respect parents’ basic right to direct the upbringing, education, and care of their children. 

...

Goal #3: Promoting Stable and Flourishing Married Families. Families comprised of a married mother, father, and their children are the foundation of a well-ordered nation and healthy society. Unfortunately, family policies and programs under President Biden’s HHS are fraught with agenda items focusing on “LGBTQ+ equity,” subsidizing single-motherhood, disincentivizing work, and penalizing marriage. These policies should be repealed and replaced by policies that support the formation of stable, married, nuclear families.

Working fathers are essential to the well-being and development of their children, but the United States is experiencing a crisis of fatherlessness that is ruining our children’s futures. In the overwhelming number of cases, fathers insulate children from physical and sexual abuse, financial difficulty or poverty, incarceration, teen pregnancy, poor educational outcomes, high school failure, and a host of behavioral and psychological problems. By contrast, homes with non-related “boyfriends” present are among the most dangerous place for a child to be. HHS should prioritize married father engagement in its messaging, health, and welfare policies. 

...

CDC should update its public messaging about the unsurpassed effectiveness of modern fertility awareness–based methods (FABMs) of family planning and stop publishing communications that conflate such methods with the long-eclipsed “rhythm” or “calendar” methods. 

...

Because liberal states have now become sanctuaries for abortion tourism, HHS should use every available tool, including the cutting of funds, to ensure that every state reports exactly how many abortions take place within its borders, at what gestational age of the child, for what reason, the mother’s state of residence, and by what method. It should also ensure that statistics are separated by category: spontaneous miscarriage; treatments that incidentally result in the death of a child (such as chemotherapy); stillbirths; and induced abortion. In addition, CDC should require monitoring and reporting for complications due to abortion and every instance of children being born alive after an abortion. 

...

Since its approval more than 20 years ago, mifepristone has been associated with 26 deaths of pregnant mothers, over a thousand hospitalizations, and thousands more adverse events, but that number does not account for all complications. Of course, this does not count the hundreds of thousands to millions of babies whose lives have been unjustly taken through chemical abortion. FDA should therefore:

Reverse its approval of chemical abortion drugs because the politicized approval process was illegal from the start. The FDA failed to abide by its legal obligations to protect the health, safety, and welfare of girls and women. It never studied the safety of the drugs under the labeled conditions of use, ignored the potential impacts of the hormone-blocking regimen on the developing bodies of adolescent girls, disregarded the substantial evidence that chemical abortion drugs cause more complications than surgical abortions, and eliminated necessary safeguards for pregnant girls and women who undergo this dangerous drug regimen. Furthermore, at no point in the past two decades has the FDA ever acknowledged or addressed federal laws that prohibit the distribution of abortion drugs by postal mail; to the contrary, the FDA has permitted and actively encouraged such activity.

Now that the Supreme Court has acknowledged that the Constitution contains no right to an abortion, the FDA is ethically and legally obliged to revisit and withdraw its initial approval, which was premised on pregnancy being an “illness” and abortion being “therapeutically” effective at treating this “illness.” The FDA is statutorily charged with guaranteeing the safety and efficacy of drugs and therefore should withdraw this drug that is proven to be dangerous to women and by definition fatally unsafe for unborn children.

The people at the Heritage Foundation have been busy over the last few years drawing big circles in the Authoritarian-edition Sears Wish Book. Let it soak in that if T**** gains power, he will install the people who will implement the wish-list. The Heritage Foundation has already impacted our government. T****'s picks for Supreme Court justices came from lists that The Heritage Foundation provided to him, funded by dark money from the far right. It's one back scratching the other. 

We have the power to stop it.

We have checks and balances for a reason. The Heritage Foundation and T**** are the reason. Please share information about Project 2025 with your friends. Point them to my post A Project 2025 Primer or one of the numerous news articles about the plan.

Now, memes and 'toons.

Lalo Alcaraz

John Darkow

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Adam Zyglis

Michael de Adder

Ann Telnaes

Michael Ramirez

Pat Bagley

Dave Granlund

Kevin Kallaugher

Ann Telnaes

Clay Bennett

Jen Sorensen

Finally, if you want to support an unabashedly lefty business, buy your spices and seasonings from Penzeys. They are some of the best dang spices you will cook with! Sign up for their email and get cheeky, left-leaning entreaties on the regular. They are ready for the GOP Convention in their home-base city of Milwaukee. And they have some yummy popcorn seasonings for your convention-watching pleasure!

BTW, I'm sure it's obvious, but LSR does not get any advertising money, from Penzeys or anyone else.

Now go, RESIST!

A breather: Take some inspiration

LSR has been hitting you hard with dire news. If you had been on a vacation overseas for a week, the U.S.A. would have looked like this when you flew over on your way home.

LSR again enlisted AI's "help" in making a drawing

We need a breather! Let us pause for some inspiration. 

First, an essay. Anne Lamott shared this after the Dobbs decision, and before that, she wrote similarly about the impending war on Iraq. Her words remain no less relevant today.

We’re all doomed. Resistance is futile.

Oh wait, never mind. What I meant to say was, Could somebody please send me the operating instructions?

Oh wait, never mind. Our marching orders are all over the Internet, with links on how to donate to the cause of women’s reproductive rights, how to aid and abet abortions on the grassroots level, links to where the marches and rallies will be, how to help keep control of the House and Senate.

In the meantime, filled with rage, fear and despair, I remembered a piece I wrote for Salon twenty years ago, on the brink of war on Iraq, so I dug it out, and have retooled it here for the current nightmare. It was called Hard Rain: 

Everyone has had a hard time with life lately; not with all of it, just the waking hours. Being awake is the one real fly in the ointment -- but it is also when solutions come to us. So many precious friends died or got horribly sick this year, so many schoolchildren died in shootings, the world burned. One out of seven women in my county is getting breast cancer -- I can't even wrap my mind around that -- and our animals died, but on top of it all, like a dental X-ray apron, is the depression of life with this freak show of Trump’s Supreme Court.

"It's all hopeless," a friend muttered, which I kind of like in a person, and which I almost believe to be true: Nearly every time I remind myself of Friday’s ruling, I think of the old New Yorker cartoon of the two prisoners chained high above the walls of a prison cell, one saying to the other, "Okay, here's my plan." But it’s not hopeless, not by a long shot. Resistance is not futile. I think it's only one of the hardest things we’ve ever done, and I'll take that over futile any day.

My friend, who is usually a crabby optimist like me, is terrorized. He’s worried about Russian nuclear bombs, the permafrost, and life as we now know it under an endless, paranoid misogynistic right-wing conspiracy. He also sometimes talks about life in shelters, and caves. Now, this would not work for me. Shelters would be bad enough -- a dinner party is a real stretch for me -- but I don't even remotely have the right personality for cave dwelling. I need privacy and silence most of the time. Also, I hate stalactites. It's like Damocles goes cave-camping. (Luckily, I am old and will not live long enough to see that.)

In the days since Roe v Wade was overturned, I have stepped up my do-good efforts, a dependable counterforce to the dread. I went to demonstrations, sent money to Planned Parenthood and UNICEF, and signed petitions. (Always always always, when you don’t know what to do, help take care of the poor.) I prayed like a mother, an auntie, a grandmother. And I bought some flowers to plant, which is a form of prayer.

God only knows how this will all shake down. But in any case, us left wing religious people should try to stay on Her good side. It's not hard. God has extremely low standards. Pray, take care of people, be actively grateful for your blessings, give away your money -- you're cool. You're in. Nice room in heaven, near the dessert table, flossing no longer required -- which is what will make it heaven for me. Oh, and Jesus.

During the build up to the war on Iraq, I rented the movie "Independence Day." I wanted to see what it takes to mount an effective resistance against an alien takeover. This is what the current SCOTUS feels like to me. And according to the movie, it turns out that we have everything we already need. We have a great cause, protecting the lives, health and equality of women. We'll get a break or two in the next few months if we work like hell to hold onto the Senate and House, And we caught one alien -- Clarence Thomas. He handed over the insanity codes when he announced his conviction that overturning Roe v Wade is just the beginning; he took the lid off the stew pot so we could all peek in at how the aliens think. It was a big catch, and I started to feel hope again, that because we had all these things in place -- a cause, impending breaks, a big catch -- now all we needed was to get back to work. Maybe goodness would prevail, maybe not, but probably, and as Molly Ivins wrote years ago, freedom fighters don't always win, but they are always right."

John Lennon said, "Everything will be okay in the end. If it is not okay, it's not the end.” And I do believe this; I just do. I believe that love is sovereign here, and goodness. I just do. So we push back our sleeves, and fight back: left foot, right foot, left foot, breathe. And I believe we can do it, Cinderelli, Cinderelli. I just do.

Next, an essay by Dan Piraro and his Bizarro, usually on the comix pages but touching and needful in these days: How to Worry Less About the World.

It’s a politically scary time on planet Earth. But it’s important to note that this is neither the first, nor the scariest time our species has experienced, by a long shot.

You could fill a volume the size of the Manhattan phonebook (trust me, they were huge and the type was tiny) with a list of the catastrophes humans have caused and/or endured in our brief time here, but I won’t attempt to cite them. Just know that there have been a lot, drop that knowledge into a box, and leave it on the back porch of your mind for the moment.

Whether you believe in other dimensions or not, it is a fact that the one our entire universe inhabits exists on the “tension of opposites”: light and dark, hot and cold, pleasure and pain, life and death. Our planet orbits around the sun because of the tension between motion and gravity, as all celestial bodies do, etcetera, ad infinitum. Get rid of your least favorite half of any of those opposites listed above—or any others—and you remove the other half, too. Each exists in tension with and as a result of the other.

Put that in a box on the back porch for now, too.

***

Now let’s talk about “bad” people: They lie, they dominate, they cheat, they trick you into believing in them and a host of other falsehoods, then they betray you. We call them “con men”—short for “confidence” men—because they gain our confidence before cheating us. Damn, that hurts. When authority figures who have power over our lives do this, it can be dangerous, damaging, and even deadly. It is understandable if you to want to rid the world of these kinds of people.

Now consider this: People of this sort and the calamities they engender are a major driving force of our evolution. You could even say they are the reason our species has been successful, innovative, and progressive.

I thought that sounded crazy at first too, but give me a couple more paragraphs and you may see the logic.

I recently came across this concept in a book by Lewis Hyde called Trickster Makes This World: Mischief, Myth, and Art. He uses the history of mythology to make his point, but we’ll skip that and cut to the basic concept, which is simple: Every animal on earth is a predator or prey, and many are both. The game of predator and prey is one of advancing intelligence: Predators must outsmart their prey, prey gets outsmarted and loses some members of its ranks, but it makes them smarter as they learn to avoid the ruse. The predators then must get smarter once again and develop new tricks, and the cycle repeats. It is a function of “survival of the fittest” that doesn’t get mentioned much—not only the fastest and strongest survive, but the smartest.

Leaving wild animals behind for the moment, we see that this pattern is most obvious in human culture because we are so much more intellectually gifted than the average beast of the field; our tricks and deceptions are more complex than those in the wild, and materialize ever more rapidly. And as a result, our responses must be more rapid and complex, too.

Quick aside: This is not a review of that book and is by no means all Hyde has to say on the topic. I only mean to call attention to the fact that this cat-and-mouse game is a major and natural part of how our species drives itself forward. Terrible people and horrible things are not the end of the world, they are a means to a better world.

***

Think about how much you learn when you are comfortable and happy as compared to hungry, victimized, or desperate. There’s no competition. We learn as a result of discomfort, not contentment. Necessity is the mother of invention and all that.

Now let’s focus on the United States. Anyone of any political stripe can list things terribly wrong and gloriously right about the U.S. Each side attempts to force its view on the other and fine-tune the government to its preferences. But the other side objects and obstructs, resulting in, at best, a compromise. When compromise stops, so does progress in either direction. The U.S. is currently in this kind of stalemate, but it isn’t the first time.

Here’s where the role of contentment comes in. The Great Depression of the 1930s was horrific, lasted for more than a decade, and only a tiny percentage of Americans who were tremendously rich were content. The rest were living on a knife’s edge. This society-wide discomfort led to great change in the form of a government that stopped doting exclusively on the wealthy and powerful and began to care for a much wider section of the public, which led to the contentment of a much larger percentage of the people. Americans could have made these changes sooner and avoided the Great Depression entirely, but they weren’t uncomfortable enough to demand it. It took a dozen years of a national tragedy to inspire this kind of change. But once it did, it led to more than half a century of prosperity and innovation.

(Going back much further, the U.S. and its radically progressive, liberal philosophy of democracy and equality before the law exists as a result of the abuses of the British monarchy: King George III was the trickster responsible for inspiring our Founding Fathers to birth our nation.)

***

So here we are, about a hundred years after the Great Depression, on the verge of national calamity yet again. We are facing challenges most Americans have not seen in their lifetimes, and most of us are anywhere from anxious to terrified. So how can we see this upheaval not as the end of the world, but as the necessary discomfort of creating a better one?

There is an ancient Asian parable that may help:

A poor farmer’s only financial asset is a horse. One day, it runs away. His neighbor hears the news and offers his condolences. “What bad luck,” he says. The farmer replies, “Is it?”

The next day the horse returns with four other horses. “What great luck!” his neighbor says. “Is it?” the farmer replies.

The next day the farmer’s son is riding one of the horses, falls off and breaks his leg. The neighbor and the farmer repeat the call and response. “Terrible luck!” “Is it?”

The next day the army comes marching through, looking for young men to conscript. They reject the farmer’s son because his leg is broken. Once again, bad luck turns to good.

This pattern can go on indefinitely in a world of opposites in tension, and it has, for as long as we have existed.

When we fear political dark clouds on the horizon, we can take a quick peek at those boxes we put on the back porch of our minds and remind ourselves that whatever challenges arise, our kind has successfully endured worse, and that in a universe fundamentally made up of opposites in tension, we’re going to experience some tension from time to time.

Not knowing what the future will bring can be either unsettling or reason for hope. The choice is ours.

Next, find hope in the recent elections across the sea. Great Britain, France, and Iran all pivoted left. If they can do it, resilient Americans can do it! This isn't our first shove-pie-in-the-face-of-authoritarianism rodeo!

And take inspiration from strong women of the world:

"The most difficult thing is the decision to act; the rest is merely tenacity." —Amelia Earhart

 “You must never be fearful about what you are doing when it’s right.” — Rosa Parks

“I am no longer accepting the things I cannot change. I am changing the things I cannot accept.” — Angela Davis

“In politics, If you want anything said, ask a man. If you want anything done, ask a woman.” — Margaret Thatcher

"It was we, the people, not we, the white male citizens; nor yet we, the male citizens; but we, the whole people, who formed the Union…Men, their rights and nothing more; women, their rights and nothing less." –– Susan B. Anthony

“I long to hear that you have declared an independency. And, by the way, in the new code of laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to make, I desire you would remember the ladies and be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the husbands. Remember, all men would be tyrants if they could. If particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies, we are determined to foment a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice or representation.” –– Abigail Adams

Remember, these problems do not prevent you from experiencing and sharing joy in your day-to-day. Push thoughts out of your mind and dive into that that romance novel, dip your feetsies into the cool water, grab those pencils and start drawing, put on your dancing shoes and get to the floor, boop that puppy nose, find awe on a walk through nature, finesse that pie crust into a perfect lattice, snuggle those baby toes.

Do self care. Be sure to eat right, drink fluids, exercise, and get plenty of rest. You know, place your oxygen mask first before assisting others. 

And lastly, because we gotta laugh to keep from crying, enjoy some cartoons and memes. I tried to choose the most lighthearted ones today – not sure I succeeded on that point! I have many more hard-hitting ones for a future post. Anyway, here ya go. 

A real sign outside Flagstaff, AZ

Scott Stantis

Made out of 100% horse shit!

And when you are refreshed...

When you are ready, revisit the ideas on What you can do? and start by doing just one thing. 

"People say, what is the sense of our small effort? They cannot see that we must lay one brick at a time. A pebble cast into a pond causes ripples that spread in all directions. Each one of thoughts, words, and deeds is like that. No one has a right to sit down and feel hopeless. There is too much work to do." –– Dorothy Day

We got this! RESIST!

Thanks to my sister resisters Pagrs, BobBIE!, Karenone, and Ploddy Mule for many of these memes 'n toons. Keep going, sisters!

A Project 2025 Primer

What's all this about Project 2025? Why should we care?

We should care a lot, because if Hair Hitler gains power in the Whitewash House, what follows would be a swift and sure downward spiral of our country to the trash heap of history. It's dire.

The Basics

Project 2025 is a blueprint for a coup. Plain and simple. The nearly-1000-page plan aims to dismantle our systems throughly and re-form the government toward a right-wing, Christian-nationalist, authoritarian regime.

Their plan is extreme. They want to consolidate power to the president and completely undo our system of checks and balances. What they aim to do, in part, is outlined below: 

• Drastically change the government by dismantling most government agencies, firing thousands of government employees and replacing them with political appointees. This includes eliminating the Department of Justice, the FBI, and the Department of Education, and the overhaul or outright elimination of most other governmental agencies, re-working them into a cog in the machine that the New Republic describes as a, "Christian nationalist vision of the United States, one in which married heterosexuality is the only valid form of sexual expression and identity; all pregnancies would be carried to term, even if that requires coercion or death; and transgender and gender-nonconforming people do not exist."

• Crack down hard on immigration, by implementing mass deportation, by funding the goddam wall and expanding the powers of immigration agencies. They plan to implement a pay-to-play program, where immigrants with money can expedite their applications. Rich, white Europeans? Ok, Jack. Poor, brown Latin Americans? Send them back!

• Gut environmental protections by doing away with environmental agencies and eliminating funds for research and development of renewable energy. 

• Upend our education system by eliminating the Department of Education, implementing school choice and parental control over schools, with eyes on demonizing and eliminating what they call "woke propaganda." They want to public education as we know it.

• Repeal parts of the Affordable Care Act.

• Ban pornography completely and shut down tech companies who facilitate access to porn.

• Make abortion even more difficult by removing mifepristone, medication used in 63% of abortions, from the market. Work toward a nationwide ban on abortion.

• Eliminate equal protections by removing language from laws that include such terms as “sexual orientation," “diversity, equity, and inclusion,” “gender equality," "abortion," and “reproductive rights." 

• Dismantle LGBTQ rights by attacking "radical gender ideology" and call for legislation to prohibit school personnel from using a student's preferred gender pronouns and names without written parental permission. 

• Capsize American families by attempting to "maintain a biblically based, social science-reinforced definition of marriage and family," i.e., "marriage is defined as one man and one woman" bullshit. And no more same-sex adoptions.

• Implement a Christian Nationalist ideology as the mainstream, with centralized, unlimited power to the president.

• And though it's not spelled out in their manifesto, they now have the power of the Supreme Court behind them with the recent ruling on presidential immunity. Legal challenges to their lunacy will be knocked down.

You can read about Project 2025 at the following sources:

BBC

Clarion Ledger

The New Republic

Democracy Docket

Red Wine & Blue

Pat Bagley

The Machinations

The Heritage Foundation is the central organizing force, bringing together almost 100 right-wing groups to finance and man this "army" (their word, not mine). They have gathered many former T**** yes-men into the organization.

They have developed a detailed plan for taking us on a complete and utter collision course with totalitarianism. One of the organizers is actually helping to write the Republican Party Platform in advance of this month's GOP National Convention. 

The group has not only provided the blueprint, but they are gearing up for literal war, given the rhetoric they are using. For example, Heritage Foundation president Kevin Roberts openly called for political violence when he said in a recent War Room (convict Steve Bannon's project) podcast: “We are in the process of the second American revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be."

If the left allows it to be. In other words, go down gently and no one gets hurt. 

LSR has two words for Kevin Roberts:  Fuck. You.

Bruce MacKinnon

The Machinators

The Heritage Foundation is the umbrella organizing body. It has amalgamated almost 100 conservative groups including some you may recognize as stains on our American fabric, such as Family Research Council (founded by James Dobson), America First Legal (headed by the absolute fungus of a human, Steven Miller), and Moms for Liberty, recently named "extremist" by the Southern Poverty Law Center, who have been gunning for LGBTQ students' rights in Florida schools.

Some of the directors of the Heritage Foundation who are instrumental in bringing about Project 2025 are:

• Former T**** Acting Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller
• Former T**** Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security Ken Cuccinelli 
• Paul Dans, chief of staff at the Office of Personnel Management under T****
• Spencer Chretien, a former special assistant to the Mango Mussolini and associate director of Presidential Personnel
• Former T**** Office of Management and Budget official Russell Vought. Vought is currently helping draft the GOP policy platform for the 2024 Republican Convention
• Peter Navarro, former top trade advisor to T****  and convict, currently in jail. He was convicted for contempt of Congress regarding the January 6 investigation.

The Denial

Last week, King Minus truth-socialed a denial of any knowledge of Project 2025. Weird, since in the same post, he admitted knowledge of Project 2025. He wrote: 

“I know nothing about Project 2025. I have no idea who is behind it. I disagree with some of the things they're saying and some of the things they're saying are absolutely ridiculous and abysmal. Anything they do, I wish them luck, but I have nothing to do with them.”

Oh, come on! This denial is complete claptrap, given the top schemers are people that were in his inner circle during his last stint. We're not falling for it.

The Ramifications

One thing that went against Diaper Don in the last administration was that no one, not even he, expected him to win. He was a petulant, disorganized mess, and by that grace of fate he failed in large part from realizing his twisted vision of America. He had competent, truly patriotic people in his cabinet for a large part of his stay in Washington, and the "adults in the room" kept him from truly becoming a dictator. 

But with Project 2025's plan in place, the Supreme Court firmly in his pocket, and the "right" people behind him and beside him, this incompetent, lying, cheap, uneducated, egotistical, bone-spurred, petulant child felon will be just the right puppet for them to implement this plan. He will have their pen; they will have their sword-wielding tyrant. 

The Call to Action

We cannot allow this to happen. We must fight back! Rep. Jasmine Crockett of Texas gave an impassioned condemnation of Project 2025 in a Congressional hearing a couple months ago. You might remember Rep. Crockett when she recently clapped-back on Empty Gee for her racist comments. Here is this strong woman exposing Project 2025. I am loving Rep. Crockett. 

Resisters, I call on you. Now that you understand Project 2025 better, talk to others. Find a way to educate your friends and family about the threat of Project 2025. It might be a conversation, a meme, or posting a sign or a flyers like Sister Resister Anne did recently.

Keep up your work on defeating T**** from gaining power. Work on electing blue candidates, from president on down. Grassroots activism works. Be part of the solution. We can do this!

P.S. Remember, Resisters, take care of yourselves too. Nourish your body and spirit as we tackle these challenges. It's rule #1 of Resistance! Now, let's do this!

Shit, shit, shit. We are in deep shit. It's bad. But still: have hope.

Clay Bennett

When I started this blog in January, 2017, I wanted to chronicle the chaotic times which I knew that the T**** years would be. I thought maybe someday my grandchildren would be able to get a version of a history lesson when they would read my words and my thoughts on each day's events. Though it got worse and worse, I kept up the hope and the faith that our democracy would survive. It did for a bit, with Joe Biden's election.

Now, though, I feel that LSR is chronicling the end of America. She is dying.

Remember in my last post where I said watching Biden's awful debate performance was like watching our Great Experiment die?

Well, today we are preparing her grave.

The Supremely Corrupt Court of the United States has again made shit up. Without any legal standing or Constitutional justification, they continued their march through the boneyard of our democracy. This time, they took our 248-year Rule of Law, the very basis of our form of government, and officially made a King of DJT. 

Read the decision here. 

This decision is blatantly unconstitutional. Remember the oath of office that each president must utter? The words are spelled out in the Constitution: 

Article II, Section 1, Clause 8:

Before he enter on the Execution of his Office, he shall take the following Oath or Affirmation:–I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.

Any violation of the law is going against this very oath. No one can give the president the power to break the law with impunity. He has sworn to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States: the document of laws. It can't be both ways.

The Supreme Court has more than "weaponized" the Department of Justice. They have literally weaponized the presidency. 

This goes against everything we believe in. 

No one can express our outrage better than Justice Sonia Sotomayor, joined by Justices Ketanji Brown Jackson and Elena Kagan, who wrote in her dissent:

“A President’s use of any official power for any purpose, even the most corrupt, is immune from prosecution. That is just as bad as it sounds. ... In every use of official power, the President is now a king above the law. ... Today’s decision to grant former Presidents criminal immunity reshapes the institution of the Presidency. It makes a mockery of the principle, foundational to our Constitution and system of Government, that no man is above the law."

"With fear for our democracy, I dissent."

Make no mistake. This is not hyperbole. Our democracy is under attack.

Gone is the refrain, "No one is above the law." It's gone. Poof. Just like that, the former president can do whatever he wants, with immunity.

Gone is Thomas Paine's warning in 1776, writing in Common Sense: "Where…is the King of America? I’ll tell you Friend…so far as we approve of monarchy…in America the law is king. For as in absolute governments the King is law, so in free countries the law ought to be King; and there ought to be no other."

Gone is our modern common sense, verified by several judges making the decision before SCOTUS took it up that, "DUH! The president is not above the law!"

Gone are checks and balances that the Supreme Court was supposed to be. Now, they are blatantly acting on behalf of Trump, but more than that, on behalf of a very dark right-wing ideology. Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.

You may have had thoughts like I did that, "Well, the president may have immunity from prosecution, but military members are required not to follow illegal orders, and besides that any underling could be still be prosecuted." Did we forget that the president also has the power of pardon? No one below him who actually commits "official" acts on his behalf will be punished either. 

The January 6 Case

This specific case considers the January 6 charges against the 45th president of the United States, which was the precipitating case that brought about this decision. In their decision, SCOTUS sent it back to the trial judge, Judge Tanya Chutkin. Judge Chutkin will "decide" which acts are official and which are personal. I put decide in quotes because what she will do is just busywork. Once she makes her ruling that a certain act is personal, and not official, what happens? Why, it goes up the appeals chain again, straight back to "his" Supreme Court to decide. And how do you think they'll decide which is a personal act and not official (hint: it's not stiffing the local Domino's for the 10 pizzas they delivered to the Oval Office)?

Judge Chutkin should just save everyone time and cut to the chase. Yanno, Judge, just deem them all personal, so that SCOTUS can wreak their havoc all on their own. They are going to do it anyway. 

The Problem is This.

Here's the problem, my sister and brother resisters. Though they are in name giving any president this unlimited power and immunity from committing illegal acts, the reality is, it is only to protect and serve one guy. That is the evil guy. 

There have been calls for Dark Brandon to come out with guns blazing. To borrow from Duke and Debbi in Repo Man, "Let's do do some crimes!" "Yeah. Let's go order Seal Team 6 and not pay!" 

First of all, Joe Biden is a principled, moral man. He would not go there. But further, any illegal act by Biden, or any other president that the SCOTUS doesn't agree with, will be deemed by them as a "personal act," not an "official act" for which they say a president can not be prosecuted. See, they wove in some cute little loopholes in their decision. One, that only "personal" acts can be prosecuted, and two, that the courts (i.e., the Supreme Court, because that is the only court that matters) will be the Decider of the Official Acts. As long as this corrupt body is in power, then they rule. 

It isn't a triumvirate balance of power anymore, my friends. It is unfettered power by six whack jobs, driven by ideology and whatever dark money is coming their way.

The Dark Money

Among our other myriad tasks, we need to follow the money. It is getting really stinky up in the Courthouse. What dark money is propping these puppets? We know of some, such as the secretive money to state supreme courts that the Brennan Center for Justice outlined in 2017, dark money in the federal justice system as outlined by The Washington Post in 2019, and Harlan Crow's blatant bribes to Clarence Thomas, uncovered by ProPublica last year. There's got to be more out there. Ideology is not enough to upend our complete system of government, is it? Maybe it is, but seriously.... we need to follow the money.

This decision "could embolden Trump"

Uh, yeah. Duh. Could embolden? Honey, you are a little late. Within hours, it has emboldened him! Within hours of the decision, he both threatened a political rival and thrown his hush-money conviction off the rails. 

On Tuesday he asked Judge Merchan to review the case for which he was convicted and postpone the sentencing. The problem with even this behavior of the pre-King, supposedly prosecutable private citizen, any evidence that is tainted by his kingship years of 2017-2020 will be subject to being tossed. And thusly, the whole conviction may be tossed. The new sentencing date is September 18, provided the case hasn't gone to an appeals court on its way back up to "his Supreme Court." This legal analyst speaking with MSNBC, indicates that no amount of substantive evidence will be thrown out. Let's hope against hope that Trump's kingship isn't deemed to be retroactive.

Within hours of the Court's decision, Trump also called for a "military tribunal" to prosecute former Republican Representative from Wyoming Liz Cheney. Skip the court system altogether. You're Commander in Chief! You are a king! Order your military minions to prosecute her, and for heavens sake, they have rifles! Go ahead and execute her, too!

It goes beyond that one menacing individual, too. Learn about Project 2025, a disturbing plan for a right-wing Christian-nationalist takeover of America. Read about it and why it is so alarming at Democracy Docket.

The Inspirational Heather Cox Richardson

And yet! There is hope. We are the People who can save us. Historian and author Heather Cox Richardson has inspired millions with her columns on her Substack and Facebook. Recently she held a live event on Facebook and laid the facts our plainly. Here is the powerful video, which both terrifies and inspires in one fell swoop. Please watch. Once you get past the terror, get inspired by the power of We the People. Put on your thinking caps and make a plan. And keep reading for ideas on what you can do to help.

What we can do. And must do.

We must mobilize and organize. We must work fervently for the next four months to make sure that the madman is thwarted at the polls.

Not only that, we must work to elect Democrats up and down every ticket in every state and local level. We must work to take back both houses of Congress. Only then may we:

• Impeach the baddies and remove them from office. I'm looking at you, Justices Thomas, Alito, and Kavanaugh! AOC has already made movements toward that end. 

• Expand the Supreme Court.

• Challenge this decision to the newly expanded Supreme Court or codify the rule of law to mean The Rule of Law for everyone. EVERY ONE!

• Reinstate reproductive rights to women from coast to coast. 

• Further the perfecting of the Union. There is much more to do.

But that is in the future. What can you do today?

Like Heather Cox Richardson said, do what you do best.

Do you like to write? Write letters to the editor. Write to your Members of Congress. Resistbot can help with both. Write postcards; Postcards to Voters can get addresses and messages in your hands. You provide the postcard and the stamp. 

Are you artistic? Make art! Draw a cartoon; make your ideas known through your craft. Volunteer your skill to a group that needs you.

Are you musical? Write a new song or sing an old protest song. 

Are you on TikTok? Post that song or skit – engage your audience. Spread the word. Share others' work. 

Are you on social media? Speak up. Share things. Get the word out. Share this post that you are reading, or this one: What Can You Do? which contains just this information about action. Share articles, art, music, information.

Are you an organizer? Organize a rally or a protest march. Get a group together to brainstorm and mobilize. Join Indivisible. They'll help you take action.

Attend your member of Congress's town hall meetings. Talk to other voters. Talk with your representative how you can help. Find out about your representative's town hall meetings by finding your representatives and visiting their websites. 

Do you have a printer? Print out leaflets, cartoons, handbills, or posters and put them around town (shout out to chief mischief maker Sister Resister Anne for this old idea whose time has come again!). Let people know the situation and share information about what they can do. 

Do you have time or money? Volunteer or donate to a candidate or another organization helping to get the vote out and spread information. Here are some ideas for that:

• Learn about your local races and ballot measures at The League of Women Voters's Vote411.com. Volunteer or donate.

• Volunteer to be a poll worker. Vote411 can also help you find out how.

• Help people get registered to vote. Rock the Vote can help you learn how. So can the League of Women Voters.

• Find the candidates running in your area, learn about them and their stand on the issues. Help one of them get elected. Vote Smart can help you find that information. So can Ballotpedia or Vote.org.

Read Indivisible's Action Guide to get more ideas!

Comment below in the comments section and share your ideas. 

But most of all - don't despair. Don't be paralyzed. Be kind to yourself and give yourself grace if you can't do that one thing today. Recognize what you cannot control and just do what you can, when you can. Even if it's one small little act. Small acts together become a movement.

“A people fired ... with love of their country and of liberty, a zeal for the public good, and a noble emulation of glory, will not be disheartened or dispirited by a succession of unfortunate events. But like them, may we learn by defeat the power of becoming invincible.”  ― Abigail Adams

Thomas Paine again:

“A government of our own is our natural right: And when a man seriously reflects on the precariousness of human affairs, he will become convinced, that it is infinitely wiser and safer, to form a constitution of our own in a cool deliberate manner, while we have it in our power, than to trust such an interesting event to time and chance. If we omit it now, some Massanello [an Italian dictator that rose quickly to power in 1647] may hereafter arise, who laying hold of popular disquietudes, may collect together the desperate and the discontented, and by assuming to themselves the powers of government, may sweep away the liberties of the continent like a deluge.... We have it in our power to begin the world over again."

***

The Joe Biden Factor
The fallout from Joe Biden's excruciating debate performance continues. Democrats have started coming out publicly to urge him to step aside, with Lloyd Doggett, representative from Texas, being the first. Leaks abound about what others are thinking.

There are increasing reports that his frailty has been shielded from the public and from others. 

There are reports that even Barack Obama has been in close contact with Biden and sharing his concerns, though publicly he has maintained his support.

And polling isn't great. Here are the latest:

• New York Times Poll: Trump has widened his lead, and polls 49% to Biden's 43%.
• A FiveThirtyEight polling average shows Biden's disapproval rating is growing and his approval rating is shrinking.
• And the election polling average on FiveThirtyEight shows Trump's lead growing.
• A CNN Poll finds Vice President Kamala Harris in a statistical tie with Trump in a hypothetical contest, with 47% for Trump and 45% for Harris.

There is nothing we can do, save maybe contacting our Members of Congress to express your opinion and urge them to urge Biden in that direction. Whether Joe Biden continues the race or not is up to one person, and one person only, and that is Joe Biden.

There are plans to rehabilitate his image, but he better do it quickly. He has already fettered away one whole week of the handful of weeks that we have left. Possible events to show he can still do it:

• A live interview tomorrow (Friday, July 5) with ABC News's George Stephanopoulos
• More press conferences and "walking to the helicopter" type media chats
• Another debate (this one terrifies me)

Time is running out, and many have concerns. The voiced concerns are becoming a bigger noise.

What do you think, dear resisters? I know that if he is the eventual candidate, those of us on the left will continue to support him. But those in the middle? We risk them not voting or voting for Trump. Either would be dire for the election. And for the future of our country.

Who are names being floated for a replacement? Gretchen Whitmer, governor of Michigan; Gavin Newsom, governor of California; Department of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg; or Vice President Kamala Harris. It makes most sense to choose Kamala. She's the Vice President, for lordt's sake! It's her job to be ready to take over the office. She can handily take over the candidacy. Plus, she is polling better than the others (and frankly, better than Joe Biden). Sources in the Democratic machinery agree.

I think it's exciting to think about having a new candidate, especially a woman. It heartens me to imagine a woman president, especially a woman of color, taking the oath on January 20, 2025. 

So, what can you do to help make that happen? Let's get to work, Resisters!

What can you do?

Mike Mozart on Flikr

Dear Fellow American,

I fear for our democratic republic! We're facing a crisis in the United States. The recent Supreme Court decision allowing immunity for "official acts" gave essentially unfettered power to Donald Trump. 

That, with the authoritarian bent of Project 2025 makes it a perilous time.

Trump must be prevented from taking power again, because our very democracy is in peril. This is way beyond policy. Policy can be debated and changed. We will not be able to come back from the death of our democracy.

Will you help me? Together, we can be heroes!

We must all mobilize and use our individual skills to help defeat Donald Trump and right our country's ship. Do what you do best!

First of all, learn about Project 2025. This manifesto closely aligns with both Trump's "Agenda 47" and the official GOP platform. 

Be ready to talk to your friends, neighbors, and family about the dangers of Project 2025. What they want goes against many of the foundations of our nation. Their ideas set our progress back decades.

Do you like to write? Write letters to the editor. Write to your Members of Congress. Resistbot can help with both. Write postcards; Postcards to Voters can get addresses and messages in your hands. You provide the postcard and the stamp. 

Are you artistic? Make art! Draw a cartoon; make your ideas known through your craft. Volunteer your skill to a group that needs you.

Are you musical? Write a new song or sing an old protest song. 

Are you on TikTok? Post that song or skit – engage your audience. Spread the word. Share others' work. The key to educating young people is bite-size videos. Go make them!

Are you on social media? Speak up. Share things. Get the word out. Share this post that you are reading. Share articles, art, music, information.

Are you an organizer? Organize a rally or a protest march. Get a group together to brainstorm and mobilize. Indivisible, Move On, or Red Wine & Blue can point you to ways to take action. Make good trouble!

Attend your member of Congress's town hall meetings. Talk to other voters. Talk with your representative how you can help. Find out about your representative's town hall meetings by finding your representatives and visiting their websites. 

Do you have a printer? Print out leaflets, cartoons, handbills, or posters and put them around town (shout out to chief mischief maker Sister Resister Anne for this old idea whose time has come again!). Let people know the situation and share information about what they can do. 

Do you have time or money? Volunteer or donate to a candidate or another organization helping to get the vote out and spread information. Here are some ideas for that:

• Learn about your local races and ballot measures at The League of Women Voters's Vote411.com. Volunteer or donate.

• Volunteer to be a poll worker. Vote411 can also help you find out how.

• Help people get registered to vote. Rock the Vote can help you learn how. So can the League of Women Voters.

• Find the candidates running in your area, learn about them and their stand on the issues. Help one of them get elected. Vote Smart can help you find that information. So can Ballotpedia or Vote.org.

Read Indivisible's Action Guide to get more ideas!

Comment below in the comments section and share your ideas. 

But most of all - don't despair. Don't be paralyzed. Be kind to yourself and give yourself grace if you can't do that one thing today. Recognize what you cannot control and just do what you can, when you can. Even if it's one small little act. Small acts together become a movement.

“A people fired ... with love of their country and of liberty, a zeal for the public good, and a noble emulation of glory, will not be disheartened or dispirited by a succession of unfortunate events. But like them, may we learn by defeat the power of becoming invincible.”  ― Abigail Adams

Thanks for reading! 

With respect and admiration,

Little Sister Resister