Something has changed in America, and pretending otherwise is no longer safe. If a sitting president can deny, delay, or obfuscate the outcome of an election, then democracy itself is in jeopardy. And if one political team claims the right to question or refuse legitimate election results, then the opposing side logically inherits the same right. That is not a threat —it is a consequence. Just like in a football game, there has to be an level playing field with the same rules for both teams in order for the true winner to gain the moral highground to take the reigns of government in a democracy.
If Team Trump were to deny, delay, or obfuscate the procedures or results of the 2026 midterm elections, then Team Democracy would face a choice: accept a broken democracy, or prepare a constitutional, collective response. The publishing of said constitutional, collective response should be created now, well ahead of the midterms, so there is no chance of getting caught flat-footed in November.
One possibility is for the Democratic Governors Association — or a similar alliance of state leaders — to announce today that they are standing together to defend free and fair American elections. An Article Five–style pledge — “you come for one, you come for all” — would signal unity and strength. The purpose would be to prevent foul play and its resulting mayhem in November.
Let me lay out the logic plainly. Many Americans believe the country is already in a political war — a conflict not of weapons but of institutions, trust, and power. Democracy, once a radical idea, depends on citizens choosing representatives who argue and negotiate within agreed rules. Authoritarian systems do not operate that way.
The Founders wrote about “self-evident truths” for a reason. Evidence literally means from what is seen; video hides in the word evidence. And today’s polls reveal most Americans feel they have seen enough. With the midterms approaching, the question is not whether citizens should reject results they don’t like; they should not, of course. Elections carried out by longstanding rules, with broad participation and lawful procedures, must be accepted regardless of outcome. Americans have done this before. Many disliked prior results, but the system held because people respected the process.
The fear today is totally different: that elections may be contested not through law but through power. If attempts are made to delay or undermine the midterms, states should be prepared to respond lawfully and collectively. Governors could announce that, in the event of clear election interference, they would enact their emergency powers to protect their citizens and institutions — including reconsidering how and to whom federal tax dollars are paid and managed until constitutional order is restored.
This would not be a declaration of separation, nor the creation of a new country. It would be a conditional safeguard ; a contingency plan meant to preserve constitutional norms if they are threatened.
Such a stance might resonate with many Americans across the political spectrum. Distrust of federal power is not new; it has appeared in movements from the Tea Party to modern progressive coalitions. The idea of states asserting greater autonomy has deep roots in American history.
And here is the strategic point: if citizens know there is a peaceful, organized, constitutional backup plan, attempts to manipulate elections lose much of their power. Deterrence works when the consequences are clear and there is a feeling of reassurance. History shows that would-be strongmen respect strength. Institutions survive only when people are willing to defend them collectively.
This is not a call for chaos or refusal to accept legitimate outcomes. It is a call to prepare calmly, lawfully, and transparently ,so that no leader, from any party, can undermine the rules that make democracy possible.
Because if a sitting president can deny or delay the outcome of an election, then democracy itself is already in checkmate; and Americans of every political belief should refuse to accept that future.
Joseph Aronesty (2026) Inspired by Thomas Paine’s Common Sense (1776)
Introduction
In January of 1776, a short pamphlet began circulating through the American colonies. It was written not for scholars or statesmen, but for ordinary citizens. Its purpose was simple and radical: to explain, in plain language, why submission to concentrated power was neither natural nor necessary.
The pamphlet was Common Sense, and its author, Thomas Paine, did not argue that King George III was uniquely wicked. Instead, he made a far more unsettling claim—that monarchy itself was a flawed system, and that placing excessive authority in any single individual inevitably corrupted both ruler and ruled.
Nearly two and a half centuries later, the outward forms of power have changed, but the underlying dynamics have not. Titles evolve. Justifications adapt. The language of authority modernizes. Yet the temptation toward autocratic rule—and the willingness of people to accept it—remains a constant of political life.
What follows is not a historical reenactment, nor an argument about personalities. It is a modern restatement of Paine’s central insight: that free societies do not lose their liberty all at once, but by failing to recognize familiar dangers in unfamiliar forms.
Paine wrote to awaken his contemporaries to patterns they were already living through. The purpose here is the same.
On the Nature of Concentrated Power
There is a persistent belief among free people that power, once granted, will restrain itself. Human history offers no support for this belief.
Power does not seek balance. It seeks continuance, expansion, and ultimately immunity from challenge. Democracy dies not because of a moral failing of individuals so much as a predictable feature of absolute authority once it is detached from regular accountability. The problem is not that one person becomes all-powerful, but that many people slowly grow accustomed to absolute power.
The defenders of concentrated power often argue that a strong executive is necessary to protect the nation. Yet history repeatedly shows the opposite: such power rarely protects a people from danger, but very often protects the autocrats from the people.
Personal rule—whether it wears a crown, a uniform, or the language of popular mandate—rests on a simple inversion of responsibility. Citizens are told that judgment is a burden best surrendered. Loyalty is redefined as obedience. Dissent is reframed as weakness, or worse, betrayal.
This is how liberty erodes without being formally abolished. No proclamation announces it. No constitution need be rewritten at first. The shift occurs in tone, in expectation, in what citizens come to tolerate in the name of order. A free people does not wake one morning to discover itself unfree; it arrives there by degrees, persuaded that exceptional power is both necessary and temporary.
At this stage, the question is no longer whether power has overreached, but whether the public has forgotten why limits existed in the first place.
Those who argue that “this time is different” must answer a hard question: different from what? From human nature? From history? From every prior instance in which concentrated power promised stability and delivered submission?
A government of laws depends on citizens who understand that strength lies not in domination, but in restraint. When restraint is abandoned—when power is admired for its force rather than its limits—the transition away from self-government has already begun, whether it is acknowledged or not.
On Why Free People Surrender Their Judgment
The loss of liberty rarely begins with force. It begins with a sense of relief.
Democratic self-government is demanding. It requires attention, disagreement, patience, and the humility to accept that no single voice—including one’s own—is sufficient. In uncertain times, this burden feels heavy. When a confident figure offers certainty in place of complexity, many experience not alarm, but comfort.
This is the first seduction of personal rule within a democracy. People do not abandon freedom because they despise it, but because they are persuaded that freedom has become impractical. They are told that debate is weakness, that disagreement is disorder, and that unity requires obedience. The promise is simple: trust me, and you may rest.
What is surrendered first is not rights, but personal judgment.
Fear plays a central role, but not always in obvious ways. It is not merely fear of enemies, foreign or domestic, but fear of instability, fear of social conflict, fear of economic uncertainty. A population anxious about its footing becomes willing to trade liberty for reassurance, even when said reassurance is largely performative and offers no real relief.
Those who resist this trade are often caricatured as dangerous, radical, unrealistic and disloyal the leader’s cause. In this way, caution and protest are recast as cowardice, and submission as strength.
The most effective autocrats do not demand admiration; they cultivate dependency. They position themselves as indispensable solutions to problems they continuously emphasize and rarely resolve. Each new crisis reinforces the narrative that only extraordinary authority can preserve order, and that ordinary checks are luxuries of a calmer time.
None of this requires the suspension of elections or the abandonment of constitutional language. The words remain. The habits change.
The final psychological shift occurs when people come to believe that resistance is futile—that the trajectory is inevitable, and that adapting is wiser than objecting. At that moment, power no longer needs to coerce. It is sustained by resignation.
And so, a free society depends not on perfect leaders, but on citizens who retain the nerve to think, to question, and to withstand the discomfort of disagreement. When that nerve is lost—when convenience replaces vigilance—no external enemy is required. The erosion is complete from within.
On How Institutions Are Emptied Without Being Overthrown
Free societies often imagine that tyranny arrives by spectacle—tanks in streets, constitutions burned, courts shuttered. In reality, institutions are more commonly hollowed than destroyed.
The outward forms remain. Elections are held. Legislatures convene. Courts issue opinions. Yet their authority is gradually diminished, not by decree, but by disregard. When power is personalized, institutions are tolerated only so long as they comply. When they resist, they are portrayed as illegitimate, corrupt, or obstructive.
Another method of hollowing out a democracy is selective obedience. Rules are praised when they benefit the powerful and dismissed when they restrain them. Enforcement becomes inconsistent. Precedent is ignored. Over time, citizens learn that law is not a standard, but a tool—applied unevenly and explained afterward.
Once this lesson is absorbed, trust in government collapses. Faith in institutions declines, while faith in the authoritarian rises. The public, weary of complexity, begins to see institutions as theater and the individual leader as the only “real” actor.
At this point, institutional failure is not an accident; it becomes evidence used to justify further consolidation of power. The damage itself becomes the argument.
On the Myth That This Is Inevitable
Perhaps the most paralyzing belief in any republic is the belief that decline is unavoidable.
When citizens are repeatedly told that norms are obsolete, that restraint is naïve, and that past standards cannot survive modern pressures, they may come to accept erosion as adaptation. What was once alarming becomes familiar. What was once resisted becomes expected.
Yet history shows that inevitability is often an illusion created by momentum and fatigue. Systems do not collapse because collapse is natural, but because enough people conclude that resistance is useless. The belief that “nothing can be done” becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Those who benefit from concentrated power rely on resignation. It discourages participation without provoking opposition. It replaces outrage with detachment, and engagement with cynicism. A disengaged citizenry is far easier to manage than an angry one.
The most dangerous phrase in a free society is not “this must be done,” but “this cannot be stopped.”
On the Duty of the Citizen in a Free Society
Thomas Paine understood that liberty is not sustained by declarations alone. It is sustained by citizens willing to accept the inconvenience of freedom.
Self-government demands more than periodic consent and voting, It requires continuous attention, the courage to dissent, and the refusal to confuse comfort with stability. It asks citizens to tolerate disagreement and to defend principles even when doing so is socially costly.
Liberty does not depend on optimism, but on memory—the memory that concentrated power has always justified itself as necessary, temporary, and benevolent. A government of the people is a historical exception, not the rule. It survives only so long as citizens remember that order imposed without consent is not democracy, but quiet submission.
A free people need not be perfect. But they must remain awake.
The moment citizens surrender their judgment in exchange for reassurances, they trade a difficult freedom for an easy dependence. History offers many names for this arrangement. None of them describe a democratic republic.
By Joseph Aronesty (2026) Inspired by Thomas Paine’s Common Sense (1776)
Introduction
In January of 1776, a short pamphlet began circulating through the American colonies. It was written not for scholars or statesmen, but for ordinary citizens. Its purpose was simple and radical: to explain, in plain language, why submission to concentrated power was neither natural nor necessary.
The pamphlet was Common Sense, and its author, Thomas Paine, did not argue that King George III was uniquely wicked. Instead, he made a far more unsettling claim—that monarchy itself was a flawed system, and that placing excessive authority in any single individual inevitably corrupted both ruler and ruled.
Paine’s genius lay in his restraint. He did not rely on personal attacks or partisan loyalty. He appealed to reason, history, and human nature. His aim was not to inflame, but to prepare: to help Americans recognize patterns of power they might otherwise accept out of habit, fear, or fatigue.
The authority of the crown, Paine argued, depended less on force than on consent—consent given gradually, often unconsciously, in exchange for promises of stability and protection. Once citizens surrendered their judgment, resistance became not only difficult, but unthinkable.
Nearly two and a half centuries later, the outward forms of power have changed, but the underlying dynamics have not. Titles evolve. Justifications adapt. The language of authority modernizes. Yet the temptation toward personal rule—and the willingness of people to accept it—remains a constant of political life.
What follows is not a historical reenactment, nor an argument about personalities. It is a modern restatement of Paine’s central insight: that free societies do not lose their liberty all at once, but by failing to recognize familiar dangers in unfamiliar forms.
Paine wrote to awaken his contemporaries to patterns they were already living through. The purpose here is the same.
On the Nature of Concentrated Power
There is a persistent belief among free people that power, once granted, will restrain itself. Human history offers no support for this belief.
Power does not seek balance. It seeks continuance, expansion, and ultimately immunity from challenge. Power does not seek balance. It seeks continuance, expansion, and ultimately immunity from challenge. This eventuality is not so much a moral failing of individuals as a predictable feature of authority once it is detached from regular accountability. The problem is not that one person becomes all-powerful, but that many people slowly grow accustomed to the all-powerful.
In every age, those who seek extraordinary authority insist that the times demand it. Crisis becomes their justification. Disorder becomes their evidence. Conditions of instability are permitted—and sometimes encouraged—to argue that ordinary limits can no longer apply. What begins as a temporary measure soon hardens into habit, and habit, once accepted, becomes doctrine.
The defenders of concentrated power often argue that a strong executive is necessary to protect the nation. Yet history repeatedly shows the opposite: such power rarely protects a people from danger, but very often protects itself from the people.
Personal rule—whether it wears a crown, a uniform, or the language of popular mandate—rests on a simple inversion of responsibility. Citizens are told that judgment is a burden best surrendered. Loyalty is redefined as obedience. Dissent is reframed as weakness, or worse, betrayal.
This is how liberty erodes without being formally abolished. No proclamation announces it. No constitution need be rewritten at first. The shift occurs in tone, in expectation, in what citizens come to tolerate in the name of order. A free people does not wake one morning to discover itself unfree; it arrives there by degrees, persuaded that exceptional power is both necessary and temporary.
But power granted in exception is rarely surrendered voluntarily. Once a single figure becomes the symbol of national strength, any limit placed upon that figure is portrayed as a threat to the nation itself. Institutions designed to restrain authority are dismissed as obstacles. Laws are treated as inconveniences. Norms are mocked as naïve.
At this stage, the question is no longer whether power has overreached, but whether the public has forgotten why limits existed in the first place.
The great error is not trusting leaders, but trusting them too much—trusting them with powers that no individual, however well-intentioned, can safely hold. Free societies are not preserved by faith in men, but by suspicion of unchecked authority. That suspicion is not cynicism; it is civic maturity.
Those who argue that “this time is different” must answer a hard question: different from what? From human nature? From history? From every prior instance in which concentrated power promised stability and delivered submission?
A government of laws depends on citizens who understand that strength lies not in domination, but in restraint. When restraint is abandoned—when power is admired for its force rather than its limits—the transition away from self-government has already begun, whether it is acknowledged or not.
On Why Free People Surrender Their Judgment
The loss of liberty rarely begins with force. It begins with relief.
Democratic self-government is demanding. It requires attention, disagreement, patience, and the humility to accept that no single voice—including one’s own—is sufficient. In uncertain times, this burden feels heavy. When a confident figure offers certainty in place of complexity, many experience not alarm, but comfort.
This is the first seduction of personal rule within a democracy. People do not abandon freedom because they despise it, but because they are persuaded that freedom has become impractical. They are told that debate is weakness, that disagreement is disorder, and that unity requires obedience. The promise is simple: trust me, and you may rest.
What is surrendered first is not rights, but judgment.
Once citizens accept that independent thinking is divisive or dangerous, they begin to outsource discernment. Assertions are valued over evidence. Confidence is mistaken for competence. Repetition replaces proof. The language of strength becomes more persuasive than the substance of truth.
At this stage, loyalty undergoes a quiet transformation. It no longer means fidelity to shared principles or constitutional limits, but allegiance to a person who claims to embody them. To question the individual is presented as an attack on the nation itself. This confusion—between country and ruler—has undone republics before, always with popular consent.
Fear plays a central role, but not always in obvious ways. It is not merely fear of enemies, foreign or domestic, but fear of instability, fear of social conflict, fear of uncertainty. A population anxious about its footing becomes willing to trade liberty for reassurance, even when the reassurance is largely performative.
Those who resist this trade are often caricatured. They are labeled unrealistic, disloyal, or dangerous. In this way, caution is recast as cowardice, and submission as strength.
Another psychological comfort soon follows: identity. When political loyalty becomes personal, it also becomes tribal. Agreement signals belonging. Dissent risks exclusion. In such an environment, many suppress private doubts rather than endure public isolation. Silence multiplies, and the appearance of unanimity grows—not because conviction is universal, but because dissent has become costly.
The most effective autocrats do not demand admiration; they cultivate dependency. They position themselves as indispensable solutions to problems they continuously emphasize and rarely resolve. Each new crisis reinforces the narrative that only extraordinary authority can preserve order, and that ordinary checks are luxuries of a calmer time.
Over time, citizens who once insisted on limits begin to argue against them. Safeguards are dismissed as outdated. Independent institutions are accused of obstruction. The rule of law is reframed as an impediment to decisive action. What once protected liberty is now portrayed as its enemy.
None of this requires the suspension of elections or the abandonment of constitutional language. The words remain. The habits change.
The final psychological shift occurs when people come to believe that resistance is futile—that the trajectory is inevitable, and that adapting is wiser than objecting. At that moment, power no longer needs to coerce. It is sustained by resignation.
Yet history suggests a different lesson: that resignation, more than rebellion, is what entrenches personal rule.
A free society depends not on perfect leaders, but on citizens who retain the nerve to think, to question, and to withstand the discomfort of disagreement. When that nerve is lost—when convenience replaces vigilance—no external enemy is required. The erosion is complete from within.
On How Institutions Are Emptied Without Being Overthrown
Free societies often imagine that tyranny arrives by spectacle—tanks in streets, constitutions burned, courts shuttered. In reality, institutions are more commonly hollowed than destroyed.
The outward forms remain. Elections are held. Legislatures convene. Courts issue opinions. Yet their authority is gradually diminished, not by decree, but by disregard. When power is personalized, institutions are tolerated only so long as they comply. When they resist, they are portrayed as illegitimate, corrupt, or obstructive.
This tactic is effective because it reframes accountability as interference. Laws are no longer the expression of collective will, but impediments imposed by distant or unaccountable forces. Independent judgment is recast as sabotage. Expertise is treated as arrogance. In this environment, the erosion of institutional authority appears not as an attack on democracy, but as its defense.
Another method of hollowing is selective obedience. Rules are praised when they benefit the powerful and dismissed when they restrain them. Enforcement becomes inconsistent. Precedent is ignored. Over time, citizens learn that law is not a standard, but a tool—applied unevenly and explained afterward.
Once this lesson is absorbed, trust collapses asymmetrically. Faith in institutions declines, while faith in personal authority rises. The public, weary of complexity, begins to see institutions as theater and the individual leader as the only “real” actor.
At this point, institutional failure is not an accident; it becomes evidence used to justify further consolidation of power. The damage itself becomes the argument.
On the Myth That This Is Inevitable
Perhaps the most paralyzing belief in any republic is the belief that decline is unavoidable.
When citizens are repeatedly told that norms are obsolete, that restraint is naïve, and that past standards cannot survive modern pressures, they may come to accept erosion as adaptation. What was once alarming becomes familiar. What was once resisted becomes expected.
This sense of inevitability is carefully cultivated. Each broken convention is framed as a necessary response to unprecedented conditions. Each expansion of power is justified as an exception. The accumulation of exceptions is rarely acknowledged, and their permanence quietly assumed.
Yet history shows that inevitability is often an illusion created by momentum and fatigue. Systems do not collapse because collapse is natural, but because enough people conclude that resistance is useless. The belief that “nothing can be done” becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Those who benefit from concentrated power rely on resignation. It discourages participation without provoking opposition. It replaces outrage with detachment, and engagement with cynicism. A disengaged citizenry is far easier to manage than an angry one.
The most dangerous phrase in a free society is not “this must be done,” but “this cannot be stopped.”
On the Duty of the Citizen in a Free Society
Thomas Paine understood that liberty is not sustained by declarations alone. It is sustained by citizens willing to accept the inconvenience of freedom.
Self-government demands more than periodic consent. It requires continuous attention, the courage to dissent, and the refusal to confuse comfort with stability. It asks citizens to tolerate disagreement and to defend principles even when doing so is socially costly.
The responsibility of the citizen is not to idolize institutions, but to insist that they function as intended. Nor is it to place faith in individuals who promise relief from democratic strain. The strain is the point. It is evidence that power remains contested and accountable.
Liberty does not depend on optimism, but on memory—the memory that concentrated power has always justified itself as necessary, temporary, and benevolent. A government of the people is a historical exception, not the rule. It survives only so long as citizens remember that order imposed without consent is not democracy, but quiet submission.
A free people need not be perfect. But they must remain awake.
The moment citizens surrender their judgment in exchange for reassurances, they trade a difficult freedom for an easy dependence. History offers many names for this arrangement. None of them describe a democratic republic.
Send this letter to Republicans in Goverment in your state.
Amplify this letter . Post it in editorial news. On social media. Any way you can.
Dear Congressman ___________,
I am writing as a deeply concerned constituent. Much of what I am seeing and hearing from President Trump in his second term has shaken my confidence that our government is acting in the best interests of American families.
The President speaks about tariffs as if Americans do not pay for them. But we do — through higher grocery prices, higher household costs, and increasing financial strain. He ran on making life better at home. For many of us, life is not better, either economically or in terms of community safety.
I support lawful immigration enforcement and the removal of individuals who pose a real danger. What I do not support is profiling people based on accent or appearance, or policies that undermine basic due process. I am a Republican, and I am not a racist. These actions do not reflect American values.
I am also deeply troubled by the continued lack of transparency around the Epstein matter, and by repeated statements from the President that contradict publicly available facts. Trust in leadership depends on honesty, and that trust is eroding rapidly.
Foreign policy statements and actions have added to my concern. Talk of acquiring Greenland, strained relations with NATO allies, and unexplained financial dealings abroad project instability rather than strength. America is less respected internationally than it was, and that has real consequences for our security.
I believe our country is heading toward either severe political backlash in the midterms or a broader constitutional crisis. Neither outcome is good for the Republican Party or for the nation.
One action I have imagined is to use the 25th Amendment and install JD Vance before midterm campaigning begins. Just say based on a year of what Trump has said and done in his first year of 2.0 we deem Donald Trump is no longer fit to lead our great nation, our military and be our commander-in-chief. Call it dementia if you must. As I see it, it comes down to finding a way to reign Trump in – or replacing him.
I am asking you to take seriously the constitutional responsibilities of checks and balances. The world is becoming more dangerous, not safer, and our leadership should be reducing risk, not amplifying it. I want a future where my children, my neighbors, and yours are safer and more secure.
If meaningful steps are not taken to rein in these actions, I cannot continue to support candidates who refuse to uphold constitutional norms. I believe many Americans — across party lines — feel the same way.
1/7/26 Today a citizen, Renee Nicole Good , was killed in Minnesota in her car, trying not to get detained by ICE. She was no danger to ICE. You can watch the clip. Of course, Trump is lying about it. Always this way, since college, where I first knew him. See clip at Trump’s Untruths Social site:
This will not stop until Trump is removed from office by popular demand. It does not have to wait for 2028. We won’t last that long. Below is the way out.
Once again, I plead with the governors of blue states and any red states that want to honor the true miracle of America – to form a union – and refuse to allow ICE agents in their states without warrants, and refuse to collect tariffs in their ports until Congress approves tariffs . Those two actions ( not words ) will end Trumpism in two weeks. How? Popular demand. We will all notice together the prices dropping by refusing to collect tariffs, and the peace in our streets, and no one will want to go back.
…..
In Des Moines, Iowa, on July 3, 2025, Donald Trump said “I hate them” in reference to Democrats. During his speech, he said Democrats did not vote for his “Big Beautiful Bill” because “they hate Trump” and added, “I hate them, too”.
For the record, Democrats did not vote for his bill because it does very little to help average working-class Americans, and favors the uber-wealthy. But with the words, “I hate Democrats” Donald Trump officially declared war on the Democratic Party which represents 53.5%* of the registered voters in the USA. (*Gallup poll June 2025) That means Trump has declared war on 53.5% of American citizens of voting age and more like 2 out of 3 if you count children.
Why we must now declare war vs. Trumpism, and strategies to keep it a cold war, is what follows. First some history.
Before 1776, ruling kings had been the standard way to govern countries for the previous 5000 years. Some kingdoms and autocracies autocracies have done well for its citizens, but they have been rare. Most exaggerate and perpetuate wealth gaps. They all create tiered societies wherein only those who are loyal to “the king” or dictator can move up the social ladder. For the vast majority living under autocratic rule, life becomes harder. The middle and lower classes are subjugated, thrown under. That’s why kings called their citizens, subjects.
Oligarchy is rule by one man and his chosen businessmen. Oligarchy is what Donald Trump is in the process of executing right in front of our own eyes. He admires men like Putin, MBS, and Xi because they get what they want. That has always been Donald Trump’s goal: to get what he wants. Whether it was women, money or power, that has been the life of Donald Trump since I knew him at age twenty at Wharton.
I chose the subject word executioner, because Donald Trump is not educated enough to be the architect of this plan to end American democracy. But, because he is heartless and willing to do or say anything to get his way, he is an ideal executioner of this plan, which began in foreign autocracies many years ago.
The road map to supplant democracy with autocracy in not new. It has been paved by other dictators in recent history. Germany was a democracy in 1932. More recently, Putin took Russia, a country that recently had become a democracy, back to an autocracy, which it had pre-1917 and back to the Middle Ages.
Look at this world map . If America succumbs turns red towards fascism, the rest of the world has no chance of staying democratic. The fascists will have the planet. That’s been the goal, especially since 1996, when the internet made instant communication between peoples across the planet much easier. Fascists don’t want their subjects aware how things fare a little better for citizens in democracies.
In 2016, before being chosen to be the GOP candidate, Donald Trump was just a businessman. But he had been in contact with Russia years before during his Miss World contests. In June of 2016, right after he was the Republican candidate, he said” Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you find the missing Hillary Clinton tapes.” That means he knew they were listening. There was no reason to bring up Russia at that point, unless he knew Russia was going to be a player in the election. And in the 2016 presidential election, Russia was, at the very least, a substantial player in social media campaigns designed to convince Americans that Hillary was evil, and a pedophile – of all things.
In 2016, Putin sold Trump on the idea of becoming the first king of America. Donald had no clue where to begin that potentially very dangerous journey. But Vladimir Putin had done it before, and in the largest country on Earth.
Putin was a disciple of Khrushchev. In the fifties Cold War Era, Nikita Khrushchev said, “we will defeat the United States without firing a single bullet.” When Obama did not indict Trump for asking for foreign help in our most sacred institution, our elections, foreign interference in elections became normalized. Obama, like Biden, grossly underestimated how determined Russia was to defeat the USA.
Donald Trump openly admired Putin and indeed got Russian election help. He owes Putin for life now. Putin makes sure Trump knows he would never have become president without his help. You’ll never see Trump cross Putin on Ukraine, or anything. Connect the dots. Trump is the side of the dictators for life now, whether he likes it or not. This all sums to the undeniable conclusion that we have a traitor in the White House who must do Putin’s bidding.
Take a good lo0k at that map again. The dictators and monarchs have the majority of the land and the majority of the people. Those in power can change the laws of democracy and we have a traitor to democracy as commander-in-chief. In effect, we have already lost this war. If we proceed as if all is normal, our democracy will be pronounced dead after midterms 2026. Democracy is not the favorite to survive this disease.
So now we must commit to a war against the Trump “regime” to regain our democracy. If we are afraid to fight back, if we are afraid to die for this cause, the planet’s five-thousand years of autocratic rule will resume.
I’d like you to listen to this YouTube from 2017, which you may have seen on the news. Putin is at a hockey game, about to go on the ice. A reporter asks why Trump fired James Comey. Putin answers in effect, “he is just following the laws of his country”. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T1NKWYepioA
That’s how fascists pull it off when they are successful at taking over a country. It’s not done with guns. Certainly not at first. They say they are “following the laws”. Once they get enoough laws on their side, they can and will proceed a little further down the military autocratic road.
Being a traitor to democracy is worse than being a traitor in a war. In a war, democracy is what we are fighting to preserve. Trump is already dismantling the agencies that keep our citizens and children safe from human predators and nature’s wrath. Germany banned their fascists from holding office post WW2, and they cited the American constitution, while doing so. The blue states should do the same now.
The fascist goal is to make life harder for every citizen in America who is not part of the oligarchy. If people who are not okay with that don’t speak up and practice peaceful civil disobedience, democracy’s demise is inevitable. If our state governors do not band together and declare we are at war with this iteration of Republican Party and protect its citizens from unconstitutional executive orders, Trumpism will prevail. Waiting or hoping for elections is a fool’s game.
Today Pritzker seemed disappointed he did not get all fifty state governors to support Illinois over Trumpism. He needs to start thinking in terms of creating a second sovereign power until these MAGA nationalists are removed, en masse, from their seats, as per the 14th sec 3. We need a new temporary union of states that refuse to blindly follow Trump’s orders.
These fascists will never willingly surrender power. Their crimes are too large now. They fear reprisal if they lose power now, and rightly so. Citizens cannot challenge this power alone. It’s too easy for them to be whisked away, or sued, like you see happening to Adam Schiff, Leticia James and many others.
State governors have sovereign power. If governors will declare we at war with the fascists in our government, they can declare an emergency, and order, for example, that Trump’s tariffs not be collected in their ports until such time that the Congress votes on the tariffs, in accordance with the Constitution. They could declare the fourteenth renders the entire Republican side of our government unconstitutional and set up a union of states and a temporary new government to run our agencies the way they are supposed to run, and even divert enough taxes that their citizens pay to the federal government to fund such agencies.
And that union has begun. The West Coast Health Alliance formed by California, Oregon, Washington, and Hawaii was just created to issue unified health guidance that is grounded in science. I’d rename it the American Health Alliance and get Pritzker, Hochul and any other states that want health care run by scientists. not politicians, on board.
Then the only step left would be to ask their citizens, who are nationally 80% of board with scientists to run health care, to reduce their tax payments to the federal government by the percentage of the federal budget we spend on health, and also state they will defend their citizens from any suits or actions from the federal government regarding that underpayment. If 80% of Americans want scientists in charge of health care, not politicians, and Trump continues to place non-doctors like RFK Jr. as the stewards of their health care, that is not democratic representational government. That is funding the enemy.
Are governors beginning to talk quietly about a corruption-free new government? The talk of it alone, would be healthy. Maybe some on the fringes of the right would begin to think they don’t like how Trump is steering our government if they see states willing to financially divorce from the union.
Then, agency by agency, we can claw back our government until we can vote out the insurrectionists and traitors aligned with the dictators in the world who want Americans dead, without firing a single bullet.
Trump’s Tariffs Create The Seminal Event to Unify the Country
Campaigning for elections and waiting for election results is fine, but it’s not a war plan. We need to create a seminal event that unifies the country. It’s not Epstein. The country is united on justice for Epstein, but it’s not a pocketbook issue. Tariffs act like a sales tax on everyone. It affects the uber-wealthy the least. The first battle cry of American democracy was “taxation without representation is tyranny”. The desire to get government to serve us as a reward for being taxed is in the American DNA.
People will soon be feeling what I call tarifflation. It is inflation made worse by Trump’s tariffs. I am paying them myself in my own business. I believe the other proper strategy is for governors of CA, IL and NY to declare their ports will not collect these unconstitutionally enacted tariffs until such time as they are voted on in Congress.
If this were to happen, play out Trump’s predictable reaction in your mind. You will conclude, this action would create a seminal event, “the day Trump’s tariffs ended in blue states“, that logically ends with all the people unified against Trumpism. Trump will kneejerk respond and try to use ICE agents to collect tariffs. When the 80% of Americans see him trying that, even once, he is done, and so is Trumpism nation-wide.
Trump will take this bait and quickly. I cannot claim to know what tariffs are doing for Trump personally. He’s probably getting paid off left and right by countries and businesses. That is his style of being. So not collecting tariffs hits him in his Achilles Heel, his wallet. He won’t wait a day to send in his goons to collect tariffs. We need all Americans to see the specter of Trump using troops to raise their grocery prices.
We are in a war without bombs. We have been in that space since 2016. When Putin sent emissaries to the GOP Convention in 2016, an alliance was formed based on mutual interests, the Russo-Republican Alliance of 2016 . That is democracy’s real enemy. Donald Trump is not its architect; he is its executioner. This enemy’s weapons are words, executive orders and actions; not guns and bombs. We’d best get into that game now, as we are losing the funds and muscle to defeat this alliance every day we sit on the sidelines and pretend the demise of America is not unwinding in front of our eyes.
It’s not as if this is new. Trump has been trying to end democracy, as per his boss, Vladimir Putin, since “Russia if you’re listening.” When Trump took election help from a fascist, he became a fascist for life. There is no going back on that.
For nine years, I’ve been speaking out—loudly and consistently—about the threat Donald Trump poses to American democracy and the free world.
But credit should be given where it’s due. Iran has never demonstrated the responsibility required to possess nuclear weapons, and firm action was needed. A significant portion of global instability stems from Iran-backed terrorism. So in this case—good job. Good decoy. Good on listening to your generals. And good on not making it all about yourself, Donnie.
We now find ourselves in a new world, much like the one after 9/11. If Trump plays this moment wisely, he’ll pull ICE agents off the streets, stop manufacturing domestic enemies, and begin preparing the homeland for real threats—such as potential attacks from Iranian-backed terrorist networks, possibly even on U.S. soil.
If he can pivot away from his anti-democratic, anti-immigrant, anti-classic-American rhetoric and adopt a “one nation, working together” message, Americans will notice. Only then can the political divide that’s been paralyzing our country begin to heal. And only then can the greatness he so often speaks of emerge organically—because true national greatness can’t be forced. It grows from unity and shared purpose.
Donald Trump has a chance—this very week—to evolve. But if he starts taking personal credit for this mission, as though he masterminded it himself, and keeps belittling Joe Biden (who likely would have listened to the same generals), it will be clear he’s still more interested in division than unity. That mindset only makes it easier for our enemies to succeed—and pushes America closer to a dangerous precipice.
So the question remains: Can Donald Trump evolve as a president, or even as an actor playing the role of a president—into a unifier? Maybe. Maybe he’s tired of being the Divider-in-Chief. Maybe he’s starting to think about his legacy, as any mature mortal should.
I sincerely hope so. We all want to get back to our lives and feel confident that our democracy—and our country—are in steady, caring hands.
Protecting small fish from big fish was the big idea of democracy
In 1776, almost all the world’s people were ruled by either kings or tyrants. It had been that way since Ancient Egypt. The big new idea behind American democracy was protecting the small fish from the big fish. The small fish were the citizens in Colonial America. The big fish was King George and his armies.
It’s been 258 years. There are still dictators and kings that prevail over more than 50% of the world’s land area. And, in the countries that have democracies, the uber-wealthy have been allowed to find ways ( primarily by buying influence with lawmakers ) to widen their wealth gaps. More than anything else, this is the change that needs to be undone in the next administration. Income inequality has created a new form of economic slavery.
Kamala Harris seems to be a potential agent for that change, but she’s staying relatively quiet on her policies. It is a change that will be good for “both sides” in America. I hold that’s smart for right now. Protecting the rights of ordinary citizens is going to meet a powerful resistance from the uber-wealthy, the new ruling class in many so-called democracies. And we have foreign dictators who want American democracy to fail as well. One party has clearly been allied with Russia since 2016 in this effort to destroy democracy. Why should Harris broadcast the details of her intentions?
Dean Obeidallah wrote today: “Where is the media outrage on Trump asking a rogue foreign nation to interfere in our election?!!” ?? To which I say:
Where was the outrage in 2016, when Trump asked for a foreign enemy’s election help on live a TV: “Russia, if you’re listening”? Obama and Holder were in charge then. They let that be okay, and the doors opened for Trumpism and what we have witnessed for the last eight years. It was not okay then, and it is not okay now.
Keep in mind, protecting the small fish from the big fish is still the big idea behind democracy. The Supreme Court is now essentially serving as a traitor the Constitution they take an oath to protect. But most people do not understand the Founders intentions when they created the 1st and 2nd Amendments.
FIRST AMENDMENT RIGHTS ARE FOR CITIZENS
Total freedom of speech was created for citizens, not corporations, media, or politicians. We, the people, can say some pretty nasty things in the privacy of a conversation. We can lie knowingly, if we choose to. There is no penalty for lying in a conversation. But no one, neither a citizen or a corporation, can yell fire in a theater, if they know there is no fire. Speech cannot endanger lives. There are also laws that prohibit inciting violence. And today, the “theaters” are on our TV’s and cell phones. So regulation of speech on media and TV is built in to our laws.
There even also laws that allow citizens a to burn a political figure in effigy or even pirate a candidate’s name on a T-shirt without paying “royalties” to the candidate. Those laws exist for underlying reasons: Citizens (small fish ) and political figures (big fish) were placed in different classes by the Founders because of the difference in overall power these two classes inherently possess.
I hold that media, corporations or politicians in Congress that are big enough to broadcast are also a big fish. There are those in media, big businesses and in Congress that don’t have a stake in protecting citizens from the tyranny of the new ruling class, the uber-wealthy. Why? Perhaps they have been paid by those alliances to do their bidding. But the small fish must be protected from the big fish. That is why a government for the people, of the people, by the people was created. It is everything.
The 1st Amendment protects freedom of speech for citizens – one-at-a-time, individual people – small fish. When the Alito SCOTUS gave corporations the same rights as citizens in 2014, it gave political figures and their allies like FOX News, ( clearly an arm of the GOP ), the right to broadcast lies to the public. Right now that includes asking rogue nations, like Russia, for election help. Russia is trying to subvert our elections, and try to get their people into power and end our democracy. This was not intended by the Founders. Not at all.
The 1st amendment was written as a right for citizens to protect them from a potential rogue government or regime. That must be protected. The first thing dictators do is take over the media and shut down resistance. Trump has even hinted that he will take away broadcast licenses of stations he does not like.
Words are the weapons that decide elections because citizen’s votes keep the score in a democracy.
Our foreign enemies know they can’t beat us with bombs, so they are trying with words. That’s why the words of Goebbels’s, the Murdoch of WW2, remain timeless. “It will always remain one of democracy’s best jokes that it provides its deadly enemies with the means to destroy it.”
Those asking Kamala Harris to say more about the policies she might deploy as POTUS, have it wrong. Harris can not say a lot of what we hope she will try to do. There is so much change that needs to happen after she gains power, that if Harris were to express what I think are her truest desires, it would lower her chances of winning and put a target on her head.
Addressing the real issues facing people everywhere requires that people in power actually care about the small fish. The future of the human race and civilization as we know it is at stake this November. The American Democracy must evolve quickly now. It’s not only income inequality that needs fixing. There is a very real climate crisis, and the powers that control our energy sources are invested in the old ways, and exploiting the small fish.
THE NET WORTH OF THE CANDIDATES IS TELLING
Trump is estimated to have a net worth of four billion. Harris is estimated to have a net worth of four million, if you do not count her four million dollar Brentwood home, shared with her lawyer husband, Doug Emhoff. And for those not in Los Angeles, four million is not an expensive or super large estate in Brentwood. It’s a simple small home. Harris, if she wins, would be one of the least wealthy presidents in recent US history. This Wikipedia chart of US President’s net worth is super interesting. Trump is ten times richer than the second richest president. I’d bet no one can guess who was the second richest president. I was shocked. SEE HERE
THE ONE-TWO-THREE PUNCH AMERICA NEEDS
To increase the chances of long-term survival of America and the planet, these three changes should happen within a few years after 2025. They are so huge, that if Kamala, or anyone in government dares say them now, they will be branded as “communists” and more. Who really knows how far the right and billionaires will go to keep their stronghold over the citizenry?
First, the SCOTUS must be re-balanced to reflect the consensus of public opinion.
Second, the 14th Amendment must be enforced, and those who have comforted insurrectionists must be summarily removed from office, with new special elections to follow to replace them. Traitorous alliances with those who would undo our democracy cannot be allowed access to Congress. This can only happen after the SCOTUS is re-balanced, so it is second for a reason.
Third, the electoral college has to be rebalanced or undone. We have a representative democracy. It has to work mathematically for that to be true. Majority rules.
That’s the one-two-three punch we need to make the American Democracy great again. We can do it. Stay focused citizens. We are all in this together. Divided by party, gender, race or income – we fail. Together, we are unbeatable.
Make Tuesdays Embrace Your Fellow Citizen Day
Embrace a member of the opposite party today. We all have friends and family that see things differently. Lets make the next six Tuesdays “national embrace a member of the opposite party” day.
The prosecutor in Harris likely knows what I have written above. If she does, she cannot reveal her true intentions right now.
I don’t think Harris is the same as the many other Democratic presidents we have seen that did little to undo the unfair advantages the big fish have enjoyed over the little fish. I think she intends to rectify things.
This simple plan, put into action, can save the United States from what is now projected as a risk of falling prey to fascism should Trumpism prevail. This race will be women vs men, in a way Barbie vs Oppenehimer. But there are plenty of men who identify with saving our democracy. The question is will there be more women standing by their “man” who are sold on to taking America backwards in time, than men who are brave and smart enough to embrace the future.
So here we are, fellow Americans. We are in a domestic war, but there are no bombs. It’s a cyber war. Putin’s genius really. He knew he could never beat the USA with bombs. The weapons of his cyber war arewords.
And with three weeks left it is coming down to a few states and therein – their men versus their women. Sad, but very true. It’s coming out in the press now. Obama spoke of it today. I called this Barbie vs Oppenheimer months ago.
This post was a lot longer a year ago, but I am paring it down to its bare structure because there is no time left for complicated processes. Women are the largest class of people that are polling for Harris now.
The newest Pew Research poll found found 51% of male registered voters supporting Trump, and 43% supporting Harris. Among female registered voters, that is effectively reversed: 52% of female registered voters support Harris, while 43% support Trump.
Why Women United?
Women United starts with women because they have a natural bond this election season due to the GOP removing women’s rights constitutionally guaranteed for fifty years by the Roe v Wade SCOTUS decision. But we are open to dedicated men as well, of course. *Men Welcome is a super important part of the brand. We want to unite all Americans, men and women, of course. Women United is not racist or sexist. It is a place for real patriotism to awaken from its long slumber here in America.
There are women’s groups in most cities of a decent size. College towns are also ideal. I have reached out to a few of these groups and gotten positive feedback. Indivisible is a perfect nationwide organization to deploy this strategy by next Tuesday nationwide. I will make my efforts here in Los Angeles. Swing state reader, reach out to your local Indivisible chapter with this idea.
SAVE DEMOCRACY TUESDAY NIGHT MIXERS
That’s right. Throw a party. Strewn the walls with pictures of Trump and Putin and some of his worst quotes. Sparsely add some Kamala ads on the walls. The idea is to scare people. Kid you not. That’s what they are doing for the wrong reasons. But – it is a party. Hire a band. Alcohol is a good idea if its legal. If not cater it lightly with sexy food. We need men to align with women and nothing does that like a mixer.
At some point a speaker reads for no more that two minutes. Maybe once an hour. A three to four hour event. And then invite them to come back next Tuesday. On that Tuesday you can give them some chores or assignments but still have a band or DJ and make it fun. The banner reads Women United to Save American Democracy – men welcome. The women will be the honey that attracts men voters to see the light about Trumpism. I don’t think you have to tell them what to say. They know. But they are encouraged to talk to men about why they want to preserve their bodily autonomy. Men, especially young men, could stand the education. But, keep it fun. Be joyous warriors.
nd in line.
Our Potential Allies in this War
The people we need to reach in this war of words are Republican centrists, independents, and Democratic voters who may lost their enthusiasm for Biden.
The main focus of “Women United” is to find ways to convince men, regardless of their past party affiliation, that this time they need to vote to support their local women. Since the GOP alliance can always brand truth as “fake news”, the re-orientation program must come from the mouths of their own people.
And yes, we’ll have to show the MAGA and centrist GOP voters that we are not vermin. We’ll have to be likeable to them. Is that so hard? I don’t think so. It certainly beats what the WW2 generation had to do to save this democracy.
Women* United to Save American Democracy – *Men Welcome is designed as a cannot lose project. It should function as a Green Bay sweep in its own right. Our enemies can see it coming, but they can do nothing to stop it.
Supporting Logic: All Politics is Local
We recommend the tools be created on about an 8th grade level. A historical synopsis of the miracle of American democracy in posters on the walls is a good idea too. Start with the Boston Tea Party.
Why Women United?
Women United starts with women because they have a natural bond this election season due to the GOP removing women’s rights constitutionally guaranteed for fifty years by the Roe v Wade SCOTUS decision. But we are open to dedicated men as well, of course. *Men Welcome is a super important part of the brand. We want to unite all Americans, men and women, of course. Women United is not racist or sexist. It is a place for real patriotism to awaken from its long slumber here in America.
There are women’s groups in most cities of a decent size. College towns are also ideal. We have reached out to a few of these groups and gotten positive feedback. We’d like to see if we can get a commitment from a few groups in each of the swing states.
There are 438 womens’s groups that just marched, January of 2024. They need to be contacted and asked to see if they would be okay for advocating for small d democracy this year by having three Save Democracy Mixers. The fourth one is voting day, and then those groups are united on November 5th and can do much good. Focus should be on swing states first, then red states, then purple cities in blue states.
Why the Reorientation Must Come from Local Influencers
The line between truth lies has been blurred for media. The fake news meme may have started with Russian propaganda during the 2016 election, but is still with us … and growing. AI is not making this any easier. However, it will be harder for husbands, sons, boyfriends, associates, and friends to categorize words as “fake news” when those words are coming from people they know and respect in their own towns. MAGA people are by nature followers – sycophants. They were easily influenced by right-wing media and Trump’s lies. That means they are more malleable than Democrats. We can take advantage of that.
Trump was caught on a hot mic saying “they only know what we tell them”. Finding a way to tell Republican voters something else to know or believe in may be more effective on Republican voters than Democrats and Independents.
Qualifications For Holding Office Must Be Part of the Education
A majority of GOP voters still believe Trump won the 2020 election. For that reason, Women United cannot be a Democratic or Republican endeavor. Kamala is framed as pro-Democracy , pro people first, pro country over party – even over the Democratic party.
The enemies of democracy don’t expect such creativity and energy this election season. But if this project evolves from written words and thoughts into action and it spreads through red states, they are checkmated. The fake news meme that has worked so well for “trumpism” for the last seven years will have met its match via love, education, and reorientation. It’s time teach old-fashioned civics and history to rural America and spread some real truth and light.
Branding the Struggle
*Build That Wall was nothing more than selling or branding. Branding seeks to create a vision fused with a few words that are hard to forget. Branding works like a song – words and music together are easy to remember. Words and tunes alone? They are soon forgotten. Strategic branding is something the enemies of democracy do very well. We can do better at this. Sales has been my life’s work.
Deployment Strategy – Seven Swing States
In the ideal version of democracy, the majority should have their collective will represented in Congress. We do have to contend with the Electoral College which does not function as a true democracy, and creates the space for a few key “swing states” have more power than the rest of the country. Women United can fix inequity, and many other pressing issues, but first we must save the functioning of our democracy. Without a functioning democracy nothing good will get done for any of us.
Seven states that need Women United chapters the most are in purple
Wilkes-Barre 44,000, Altoona 44,000, State College 41,000
My sense is that this list can be refocused and shortened a bit by using a filter based on preaching less to the choir. We’ll need to focus more in cities where the anticipated margin of loss to Trump is currently is between 1% and 10% and where the anticipated margin of victory by Biden is between 1% and 5%. The most important groups to enroll with be the first in each of the swing states.
The Tutorial Installation – rough draft
The walls of Women United field offices all tell the story of democracy. That story starts with the causes of the Revolutionary War, some words on King George, (who has been compared to Donald Trump) and the colonists resistance to King George’s taxes and tyranny.
The Boston Tea Party
The Boston Tea Party was the culmination of a resistance movement throughout British America against the Tea Act, a tax passed by the British Parliament in 1773. Colonists objected to the Tea Act believing it violated their right as Englishmen to “no taxation without representation”, that is, to be taxed only by their own elected representatives and not by a foreign parliament in which they were not represented.
The lesson of the Boston Tea Party will engage middle-of-the-road Republicans as well as Democrats. America was born with proud intentions. Ironically, Americans today still lack a Congress that truly represents their needs and not the needs of big business. The parallel to today’s times is there and worth pointing out. Women’s United seeks to restore pride in American democracy.
The next installation can be about the Constitution as it was formed and the amendments that evolved over time, highlighting the Bill of Rights and specific amendments. The National Constitution Center covers the US Constitution nicely. We can select the amendments to focus on. I think we start with the first amendment, and focus on the 14th after the Civil War. But we leave the constitution all out there for the curious. People need education on US history to become free thinkers able to recognize how poor a choice Donald Trump would be for president. Women’s United does not tell people who to vote for or against. We seek to make the right path become self-evident.
Since this is about saving democracy, focusing on amendments that concern voting rights seems proper. Since the Civil War, many constitutional amendments address voting, but there are specific amendments written to prohibit denying the vote to some people once the vote is extended to others.
Field Offices Must Remain Bipartisan
It is also important to declare this effort is neither Democratic nor Republican; it must be American. The division between the parties is what keeps the people of America feeling like we are in a cyber war with our brothers and sisters in other states. If we can undo the undercurrent of national division – fear of the other – and restore pride in American democracy there will be no inner space for Trumpism to exist within the hearts of our citizenry. Older people remember fascisim had not quarter in the American soul until the 80s. Is not that feeling of division and fear of others really the cause of our fascist Trumpism problem?
Right now, a large percentage of Republicans are okay with what Trump did on January 6th including hanging Mike Pence for not “doing his job” to end the peaceful transfer of power, according to Trump’s speech that day. The qualification for holding office in the USA 14th Amendment is that no elected official can be in an insurrection or aid or comfort those that are. So Women United is okay with Republicans as long as they renounce January 6th, the Big Lie and Stop the Steal. If that comes off as partisan, so be it.
The belief in many GOP voters that “the left” is their enemy, is what needs to change. But we can’t do it by using distant media. It’s not going to penetrate those who live in information silos. We should know this after eight years of right wing media chanting fake news. We need to re-orient Americans attitude to its government up close and personal, one person at a time, and start a sort of chain reaction – a reverse metastatic cancer -a metatstatic healing!
The idea is to help our Republican friends and neighbors find new candidates in their midst who are conservative but not insurrectionists. There are plenty. They just have no place to convene and air their thoughts because Trump, the salesaman, leaves no oxygen for their transformations. Enroll Republican centrists to convene with Women United. They will become America’s best allies in the effort to save democracy.
“It will always remain one of democracy’s best jokes that it provided its deadly enemies with the means by which it was destroyed.”
Joseph Goebbels, Hitler’s Propaganda Minister
The First Fascist
We are fighting a fascist organization but most people don’t know fascism’s history. A brief history of fascism is actually necessary. Mussolini is historically referred to as the first fascist. Mussolini Trailer on this page is worth a watch. Rachel Maddow’s new book, Prequel, relays some interesting American history on our US industrialists aligning with the Europe’s fascist movements. It’s worth making sure people know what Mussolini did to his own people if they protested any part of his agenda. I’d like to have movie night. There are some great WW2 movies worth group watch. The new movie Amsterdam was panned butit depicted the danger we are in today very well.
Long before Putin posed bare-chested in snow, Mussolini created this “look”.
German fascism began with Hitler trying to adapt what Mussolini had created. Hitler was a huge fan of Mussolini, even trying to get an autographed picture.
Civil Rights Era and the 1960s. It wiil be wise to cover the freedoms that were gained during the Civil Rights movement during Johnson’s presidency – and here is very okay to mention Roe v Wade. The right to vote was also very clearly defined and Jim Crow was officially a crminal action after the Civil Rights Act. . The Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibited discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin, as well as, race in hiring, promoting, and firing.
an example of news on the walls of the installations
The Trump Era
Even though we are non-partisan, we do recognize the criminal and treasonous activity of Donald Trump. Trump is why we need to save democracy. So our stance is not that we don’t want Republicans, we just don’t want Republicans who align with a coup to overturn the will of the majority and install a fascist back into the White House.
Trump is about to make his announcement that Mexicans are bringing rapists
The installation can have snippets from videos of Trump’s campaign speeches: the Mexicans are bring rapists ( ironic advise from a known convicted serial rapist ) and including Russia if you’re listening and other gems from his rallies. There’s no shortage of material:Trump’s inauguration speech, the firing of Comey, Helsinki, two impechments and the obstruction by Bill Barr during his impeachments, the firing of Secretary of Defense, Mark Esper, Helsinki, Trump’s covid vaccine success derailing when he learned covid was killing more people in Blue states. The installation culminates with January 6th, and current campaign snippets about poisoning the blood of our country and Project 2025.
Activity at the Field Offices – The Original Gripe of Conservative America
Being part of a democracy has to evolve to become more than just showing up to vote. Women’s United field offices need to be engaging and/or a bit fun to attend. Field office managers need to report to a central core group. We need to get people to start believing they can affect their governments decisions and laws. Honestly, this is the original gripe of people in flyover country, is it not? They feel abandoned by their government. Spoiler alert, so do many on the left. It does feel like nothing we can do will change how government treats us. Many Americans are resigned to sub-par treatment in many arenas of life, including quality of food and air, housing, education, healthcare, decent pay, cost of living and paying more taxes percentage-wise than billionaire overlords.( I don’t like that billionaires pay less tax percentagewise than I do. )
We have eight months to make a dent. Besides the get out the vote effort which amplifes in the last 60 days, we have six months to discuss and I think mock vote on the issues that concern all Americans. People should walk away from these reorientation courses masked as Women United For Democracy * Men Welcome feeling empowered and enthusaistic about making real changes in the next presidential term. The changes needed most are on what can be called out top ten issues.
Income Inequality and Tax Fairness. The Border. Health Care Affordability. Right to Choose. Gun Violence. Education Affordablity. Climate Science. The Electoral College. Corruption in Government, including legal corruption like corporate lobbying, voter discrimination and Gerrymandering, the Supreme Court. There’s ten right there. This list can be amended of course.
Suppose we invite experts to lecture – perhaps from a single source – like a huge zoom. The Big Zoom seems like an idea. A set time, and we all watch a 20 minute lecture or debate on any of the top subjects. Then we talk about what we heard for an hour. Then we mock vote for the solutions the way we see them on the first Tuesday of every month. Chapters record their voting as indelible records for how each chapter saw best to solve the issues facing America.
Finally, field offices ask their reps in Congress to come to a meeting and ask that they vote in Congress the way the majority in their field office ask them to vote. They present the results of their mock voting; they ask that their representatives re-present their ideas to Congress. That seems to be what represent means, to re-present what has already been presented. So let’s do some solution presenting ourselves Americans, and stop relying of representatives to tell us how to think or vote.
This way the local chapters get a feeling when their representative is in politics just for their own self interests. They can shop for a better candidate for their needs if they sense that. All politics is local underpins this entire strategy.
Maybe there has to be some music, movies and guest speakers at these field office some nights.We may be able to get some really top iconic people, like Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce to address the field office members across the nation in one fell swoop.
Sounds like a dream. But this can all happen in 2024 if we just start. We need to literally enlist in this cyber war and be soldiers in this cyber war. And if we make this happen, we will have saved our democracy by ourselves, without politcians, and a great new era of American pride and acheivement will begin.
end post …
PS.
Once one allies with Putin, they must remain loyal for life. If you think otherwise, ask Prigozhin on that. Oh yeah, you can’t.
Joseph Aronesty
PPS. PS. Some new improved version of this autocracy vs democracy map, which has been at my blog since Helsinki, should be part of the “kit”. Many people don’t know what autocracy really means. But a ten-year-old with no prior knoweledge of world geography gets the struggle when they first see a RISK board.
About the author:
Joseph Aronesty is the 75-year-old son of a WW2 vet, an ecom pioneer with passion for songwriting and word history and author of a book on the history of language. “I’ve had a blessed life due to the sacrifices of those WW2 vets and I’ll be damned ( actually, we all will be damned ) if we just give it all away to con artists.”
Mr. Aronesty was classmate to Donnie Trump in 1968 at Wharton , worked in Trump’s business associate orbit from 86-99 in AC NJ. He has wriiten over 1100 pages on Trumpism starting at “Russia, if you’re listening” which he still feels should disqualify a candidate to run for president because it asks an enemy state to take a part in our sacred American elections.
I got to thinking about the most notorious leaders in today’s dictatorships: Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong Un, King and Mohammed bin Salmon of Saudi Arabia, Bashar al-Assad of Syria, Ayatollah Khomeini of Iran, and China’s Xi Jinping. Not one of them are stupid enough to be caught saying I grab women by the p*ssy because I’m a star and they let me do it. Trump’s total lack of class or dignity stands alone, even among despots. Sometimes his immature verbal potty mouth is touted by media as an attribute for his “fans”.
Access Hollywood was arguably the biggest gaff in presidential election history and it bounced off Trump like water off a duck’s back. People began to say in flyover over country they liked this locker room talk stuff – so it was a good thing for Trump. But that’s too easy. There is more to understand. Sloughing it off on Trump’s garish style truly misses the mark.
Americans have endured eight years of Republicans fighting with Democrats during our first not-pure-white president’s terms; then four years of a president who never thought a day in his life about serving anyone but his own self; then covid; then inflation, finally leaving us with high interest rates in a nation with too many debtors. Americans have gripes. Both sides. And to make matters worse, all of these crises are left to be dealt with by a seemingly intentional do-nothing Congress.
This is why the flyover country developed an appetite for a guy like Trump in the first place. It was not about trash talk and Trump’s divisive American vs. American hate speech. Many people were just weary and sick of the people in Washington DC for years of ignoring their needs and taxing them in so many ways, while giving back the bare minimum.
The vampires in DC are skimming our common wealth. It is corruption. That was the first gripe of middle America. It is still a valid gripe. The meme is: all politicians are corrupt so what is the difference? We hear of the Big Lie. Well this is the Big Gripe. It stretches back to the Reagan meme that the government is the enemy. It is why Biden does not get credit for being a better man and president than Trump.
And the corruption exists on both sides. We all know politicians – no need to mention names – whose family members reap benefits from advance knowledge of government dealings. That is corruption, and to make it legal is to day its is okay to be corrupt and that fuels an appetite for a new kind of politician – which Biden is not. Trump, in many ways, just does the quiet part of corruption out loud. In some ways, it’s less sneaky than what Biden does.
We have endured about forty years of government officials governing by the greed is good mantra. MAGA folks were unified in one thing; hating the people in our government, and the way government treats them. They wanted something that felt like change. Trump gave them that hope. But he had four years to drain the swamp, and instead it just got swampier.
Polls tell us the Democrats want change too. I do.I was one of the first to recognize Trump was allied with Russia because I knew him from AC NJ, and there was a Russian mob component active there in that “carney” town in the 80s. He fell in love with Putin during the Miss World pageants in Moscow. Everyone who knew him knew that. Atlantic City is a small town. Everyone knew what Donnie was up to.
2024 presents voters with the starkest contrast between two agendas since the Civil War. Biden is trying to preserve the functioning of the institution of free and fair elections – of people deciding who should make the laws we all must agree to live by. Trump is fighting for his life to stay out of jail, and says he will create an agenda to run America a new way. But most Americans know he is running to keep himself and his family out of jail for life.
I stand with the MAGA people on their complaint that we need a change. Most Americans do. My big gripe against the “establishment” is interest rates. Contrary to the FED, high rates will not curb inflation this time around. This is not the 70s. In the 70s people had almost no credit card debt. Credit cards were relatively new back then. Many owned their homes with VA loans post WW2.
This time, higher rates are raising financial pressure on working people by causing higher prices. The price of money, in a nation that is living week to week, causes the inflation high rates are advertised to curb. High rates favor those that have the money to lend. Landlords must raise rents to pay off their loans; and mortgages and college loan costs take up much more of a family’s income these days. It feels like a plot to destroy the middle class to me. Same thing the new American oligarchs will do if we elect Trump. Soon, banks will be foreclosing on properties due to these high rates.
SO yea, I have my gripes against the way the US government favors corporations over working people. That however does not cloud my assessment of Donald Trump. I know him too well to believe he cares about anyone but himself.
Economic justice should count as much as criminal justice; in fact more so because criminal behavior involves a small percentage of Americans, while economic justice involves us all. So, equal justice under the law is basically a lie. The word tax is a form of the word take. If a billionaire pays a lower tax rate than a working person, how is that equal justice under the law?
It’s not the institutions themselves that Americans disrespect. No one is going around saying free and fair elections is a bad idea. What we are all saying is that the people in government don’t work for us much anymore. And the the voices of the fully honest politicans are drowned out by the chorus of corruption that has existed in DC since anyone living can remember.
We know there is a better way. It starts with ending corruption. It does not start with making a president immune from criminal prosecution. The way out of this mess is to make Americans proud of the people in their government again. That begins with qualifications for holding office being upped and careful vetting of any candidates financial ties and past work ethics and experience. That cannot begin with a more authoritarian government.
We must never forget one of Trump’s first acts as president was to lower corporate taxes, which forces working people to shoulder a larger percentage of the expense to run a government.
Biden can function fine as the gateway to a new America. Unlike Trump, he knows he is mortal and takes pride in trying to turn the wheels of government over to a new generation. Then it will be up to the new generation to fix what is broken for working people in this country.
I do think Biden needs to grow a pair, as they say. Leaving Merrick Garland in as AG is something no real Americans respect. He’s done a lousy job prosecuting government corruption. Trump will not be tried for the crimes against this country before Novemeber. The biggest crime in US history was filmed live on January 6th. If the man Biden has in the position to see justice done for that crime cannot bring about a trial in three years, he needed to be fired. I ask all people who love this country to find a way to complian loudly about Merricak Garland staying on as our AG.
Trump knew how to fire people at least. Yes, for the wrong reasons, but he knew how to do it. Biden seems not to be able to fire anybody for the right reasons. All we can do now is hope the sheer unchristian ugliness of the Trump, his alies – domestic and foreign, and the spewing of their hateful, vengeful, divisive words will get Americans to wake up when it counts the most, in November.
The violent attack on the Pelosi’s has made a declaration from our president an immediate necessity. Joe Biden must make a speech about the attack on Paul Pelosi and segway towards the voices that are instigating these attacks on politcians. He should make sure that Fox carries this “important speech” and hide his true intent ahead of the speech.
Biden can use his presidential war powers to declare war on hateful rhetoric and say these memes are radicalizing and harming Americans. Joe Biden is not only authorized to defend our democracy, he has a duty to do so. The legal precedent goes back to 1863, during the during the Civil War. https://www.fcnl.org/warpowers
The Supreme Court confirmed this executive war power in the Prize Cases of 1863. The Court held that President Lincoln’s establishment of a blockade following the attack on Fort Sumter, without prior congressional authorization, was a lawful exercise of his Commander in Chief power.
According to Justice Grier, speaking for the majority: “If a war be made by invasion of a foreign nation, the President is not only authorized but bound to resist force by force. He does not initiate the war, but is bound to accept the challenge without waiting for any special legislative (Congressional ) authority. And whether the hostile party be a foreign invader, or States organized in rebellion, it is none the less a war ….”
We are seeing our states organized in a rebellion every day now through the words and actions of the Republican representatives in Congress, the former president and his allies. They’ve even called for fake electors and it was quite an organized effort. A war on our elections must be declared as tantamount to a war on our founding institutions and those involved must have their words and actions arrested.
If those that spread these messages in government or media will not immediately cease using hate of Democrats as a meme, and also publicly reverse their statements as an attempt to undo the damage they have already done, then their bodies must be arrested as well. I believe house arrest and the monitoring of communciations is warranted at a time of war. We are in a war – a cyber war – and have been since 2016. Putin was the leader of this war vs democracy in 2016. He still is the man with the most power in the autocracy game, and that is the logical reason Trump never said a bad word about him.
Ads, posts, and words spoken must stop charaterizing people in government service as political enemies worthy of being attacked or as enemies of Americans. If politicians continue to incite such hate, they must be deemed as attempting to radicalize Americans. Such memes have consistently shown they result in people acting out violently.
Hateful and/or violent ads (like the above), posts or words spoken by elected official must result in the instant loss of their seats. If they continue after they are out of office, it must result in jailing or house arrest with communications monitored. It is the communications of these traitors to democracy that are most dangerous. If Tucker Carlson continues he too must be arrested.
People have freedom of speech, but during a war, those siding with enemy forces that want to end democracy can be silenced via statutes that say you cannot yell fire in a theater. The danger to the public overrules freedom of speech and the largeness of the microphone weighs in on the danger level of words and images. We are all in that theater now through our social media. So yes, media must be constrained so that hateful violent memes are considered terrorist propaganda. The violence will trend worse unless and until the voices and images that spark such violence are silenced.
How to Save American Democracy
If we do want to reach the undecided, there is one last easy way. It works for people who don’t read and even those who might not like the sound of your voice. We must learn to use fear to motivate Fox’s viewers and respect that Fox uses fear because they know 100% how it works on their listeners.
The only way to stop the hate speaking versus public servants – which includes poll workers – is for our president to loudly declare: that such hateful words, images and posts are hateful propaganda that have been shown time and time again to be harmful to the good people of these United States.
STEP 1. Joe Biden needs to declare war on anyone in government or media that posts threats to members of Congress, their staff and family members. The attack on the Pelosi’s makes this an immediate necessity.
We all know about freedom of speech, but we can’t allow people to yell fire in a theater knowing it is not true because of the danger it poses to people. The entire idea of government is to protect people from danger and make life better for them. Right now, the we are not doing neither of those two things very well.
The airwaves and internet highway belong to the commonwealth of the United States. They are leased to corporations but they cannot use their structures to harm the citizens of the United States. We should not tolerate one more threat to congressmembers, judges, poll workers, government executives and their staff and family members. A hot line for such threats needs to be announced stat and all media instructed to post said hot line or lose their licenses to broadcast.
We would do this if it were Bin Laden. When the words of hate come from the GOP it is much worse because 70 million people are listening. And like a cancer, it won’t stop by itself, even if Dems win both houses, which is a long shot. It must be forcibly stopped. Such memes must be defined as a crime versus the common good with fast penalties enforced as if at war. That is why Biden needs to declare war on this sort of thing right away.
This will not work if Biden is scared and waits until after midterms. It will look too obvious and weak. It needs to be said loudly and right away or people will think it is still okay.
The New York Times , Chicago Tribune, LA Times , all major stations need to show this map, or one like it, for the next few days and up until election day.
Do you remember the first time you saw a RISK board? You got the idea of a global struggle without reading about history. You just got it. We need people who can’t or don’t read to get this right now. Fear of our true enemies, those that have a stake in ending democracy, is the motivator that will work best in these last days to reach undecided voters.
No one here wants what is coming. GOP voters don’t want it either, but I’ve heard the joke many MAGA people think autocracy means cars rule. They will get the above image which can be made into an interactive map like Steve Kornacki does. Truth is, if we lose democracy here, democracy is done for the planet. That is easy to conclude by obserbing this map. One does not need words to get it. And if that happens, climate change will take care of humanity soon enough. The earth has patience.
In a world with social media, dictators and democracies are like cats and dogs. Because dictators can no longer hide all the truth from their citizens with social media so readilt available, dictators cannot just coexist with free states so easily any more. This war was destined just as it was eighty years ago. But the autocrats know it is their destiny and are being pro-active. Democracies must be pro-active too or we are doomed to be reactive. It’s that simple.
And never forget, above and beyond all else, Putin and Trump are simply financial criminals – gangsters that have ascended to the top of the chain in their governments. And they can’t get caught because of their past crimes. So they cannot quit and must be forcibly stopped.
They must be stopped, which is what arrested means. The 14th amendment allows us to deny to seat insurrection supporters to any government post. Use it or lose it. Joe Biden – arrest Trump please. Think of arrest in its classical meaning: to stop the progress of something. You know. Like ” The doctor arrested the metastasis by using chemotherapy. “
Thank you for doing something today, before it is too late.
How to Save Democracy in 8 days. Post the attack on Paul #Pelosi the violence will get worse … unless . STEP 1. Joe #Biden needs to declare war on anyone in government or media that posts threats to members of #Congress. THIS NEEDS TO HAPPEN MONDAY. Delay is normalization. pic.twitter.com/bu6cR5CgGt
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