I rarely post anymore. It's depressing shout-writing the same things over and over again. And I've only been doing it for a couple of years. My stomach aches and my heart breaks for writers like Sarah Kendzior, Driftglass, Elie Mystal, and so many others who have been telling the truth to a deaf world for decades.
So, because all the years are running together and it's (almost?) too late, and because I can't face the prospect of coming up with a new way to say we're dying, and because I'm too craven to admit it, I'm re-posting this from 2024 which includes a warning from A.R. Moxon from 2022 (emphasis mine):
Either they get their way, and society is no longer accessible to most of us, or they don't, and everyone including them gets to access society. Therefore, I think they shouldn't get their way or be treated as if they should. These are people who intend to destroy whatever they need to in order to rule over our lives to secure their own personal enrichment and comfort, and are so confident in their success that they announce their intent. They do not care about you, and they certainly do not care about your good faith efforts beyond the extent to which they make it easier for them to seize control. They will never give you credit for working to find their rationales reasonable. They will never return the benefit of the doubt you extend. Our mission is not finding ways to work with them. Our mission is finding ways to sabotage their efforts and to keep their targets as safe from them as we can.
Almost. Too. Late. Of course it is too late for thousands of people fired for preposterous reasons or no reason at all, and it is too late for perhaps thousands ripped from their homes and families and sent to secret prisons here and abroad, and it is too late for the kids who have died because their food and medicine was withdrawn. It is too late for many, many people.
But it is not to late for lots of others who are not yet imprisoned, or prosecuted for speech, or thrown off Medicaid or had their Medicare reduced or their Social Security "impounded." It's not too late for the communities whose hospitals have not yet closed. It's not too late for those about to lose their jobs because of tariffs or for those who will be forced to feed their kids or pay the rent because of inflation.
And even though it's too late for more than 65,000 Palestinians in Gaza, and pressuring Israel to stop the destruction of Gaza and the ongoing assault on the West Bank will no doubt require regime change in the U.S., it's not too late to stop further funding of genocide there.
Defund the government. The pain we feel will be real, not like the synthetic discomfort of those who refuse to act on our behalf as they protect their privilege and serve their biggest donors. We can be sure that the regime will divert resources, preserving favored programs and policies at our expense. They will punish us for as long as they can, as long as they can afford to. But it cannot last forever, unlike the punishment and shame that accompanies capitulation.
The future looks bleak but it isn't yet written. We can still do one thing if we can get the witless, gutless Democrats in what used to be called "Congress" to do it: We can stop the money. By which I mean, they can stop the money. If only.
We are, all of us, now divided not left from right or conservative from progressive, but those who will act to save the country from those who, for whatever reason, will not.
"Until we do the good things the Republicans fascists want to stop and stop the bad things Republicans fascists want to do, the existence of the Democratic Party United States is purely theoretical. If we don't do them soon now, that existence will be merely allegorical."
Or "historical," and we all know what they are doing to history.
Fight or flight? Where you gonna go?