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Well, Now That The Election Bombs Have Stopped...
a year ago
Well, I was hoping that this wouldn’t happen, but I kinda had it in the back of my mind that it probably would.
Not going to be a journal of supposing blame here or there, nor encouraging it. There’s no point in going back and figuring out what happened at the moment, not with only two months before some major potential changes begin. Figuring out what went wrong should happen, but for now?
Brace.
Breathe.
Prepare.
Those of you in blue states, like me, take advantage of that. Use the natural leanings there to connect with those that are safe and are going to keep you safe. Build up connections. Build up community. We are lucky enough to be in a place where we can be a bit safer, a bit more relaxed, but don’t expect it to keep everything at bay.
Those of you in red states, find what safety you can. Connect with each other where possible. Know what is and isn’t safe for you.
But remember. This is preparation. It may not be needed; we may get lucky and the worst of Project 2025 doesn’t come to pass. But never, ever, ever rely on luck.
That said.
Know that this is not the end. Trump winning was a gut-punch. What he wants to do is well beyond the pale of our modern day. It will affect a lot of people going forward.
But we are not there yet.
He has the Senate and the House and the Supreme Court, yes. But no matter how many yes men there are in there, he still has to get them to work together. The current Speaker has been absolutely useless in so many ways. The Republicans have, and continue to be, the party of ‘No’ in government. Even with Project 2025, he will have his hands full trying to wrangle them all to go in the same direction. This will buy us some time. Not a lot, but some.
Even without going to the supreme court, there will be other courts that can be used. Challenging everything will slow it down. It will not stop everything, but it will slow it down.
And don’t forget. For everyone saying that he wants to drag us back to the 50s or 40s or even the 20s, we’ve been spending decades dragging ourselves out of there. Everything he wants to do has to push back against what we’ve built over that time. Yes, he will be a bull in a china shop, but there’s a LOT of metaphorical china for him to smash before he takes us all the way there.
I know it feels like doomsday. I know it feels like the world has ended.
That’s what they want it to feel like, because they have so much more work ahead of them.
So, after you’ve got your breath back, after you’ve settled to what’s happened, after you have your balance back, don’t give in.
Brace.
Breathe.
Prepare.
And act.
We can do this. And we will do this.
Not going to be a journal of supposing blame here or there, nor encouraging it. There’s no point in going back and figuring out what happened at the moment, not with only two months before some major potential changes begin. Figuring out what went wrong should happen, but for now?
Brace.
Breathe.
Prepare.
Those of you in blue states, like me, take advantage of that. Use the natural leanings there to connect with those that are safe and are going to keep you safe. Build up connections. Build up community. We are lucky enough to be in a place where we can be a bit safer, a bit more relaxed, but don’t expect it to keep everything at bay.
Those of you in red states, find what safety you can. Connect with each other where possible. Know what is and isn’t safe for you.
But remember. This is preparation. It may not be needed; we may get lucky and the worst of Project 2025 doesn’t come to pass. But never, ever, ever rely on luck.
That said.
Know that this is not the end. Trump winning was a gut-punch. What he wants to do is well beyond the pale of our modern day. It will affect a lot of people going forward.
But we are not there yet.
He has the Senate and the House and the Supreme Court, yes. But no matter how many yes men there are in there, he still has to get them to work together. The current Speaker has been absolutely useless in so many ways. The Republicans have, and continue to be, the party of ‘No’ in government. Even with Project 2025, he will have his hands full trying to wrangle them all to go in the same direction. This will buy us some time. Not a lot, but some.
Even without going to the supreme court, there will be other courts that can be used. Challenging everything will slow it down. It will not stop everything, but it will slow it down.
And don’t forget. For everyone saying that he wants to drag us back to the 50s or 40s or even the 20s, we’ve been spending decades dragging ourselves out of there. Everything he wants to do has to push back against what we’ve built over that time. Yes, he will be a bull in a china shop, but there’s a LOT of metaphorical china for him to smash before he takes us all the way there.
I know it feels like doomsday. I know it feels like the world has ended.
That’s what they want it to feel like, because they have so much more work ahead of them.
So, after you’ve got your breath back, after you’ve settled to what’s happened, after you have your balance back, don’t give in.
Brace.
Breathe.
Prepare.
And act.
We can do this. And we will do this.
When a person can get elected to congress and become a millionaire overnight, there isn't a lot of hope, in any direction. Those in power are too easily bought, especially in today's climate, where companies are measured in the near-trillions, where before, they were measured in only the low to mid billions. In other words, the purchase of those in power has become chump change for those who want to hold onto those near-trillions, more than ever before.
We live in a dystopian oligarchy. We, us grass-roots folk, have been relegated to survival, and survival only, with little to no chance of pulling ourselves out of it. We are surfs and peasants among the equivalent of kings, dukes, barons and knights.
Moreover, it has become more than evident that the human race is unable to overcome its shortcomings. We have sayings like, "Those who forget history are destined to repeat it", which have been proven true time and time again throughout our history, but which fall on deafness when greed is in the equation. We are, apparently, as a species, just unable to escape our nature.
It's sad. It speaks poorly of us, but it is just what it is. Wash, rinse, repeat. Civilizations rise to their peak, then begin a rot from within, followed by collapse. It is just unfortunate for us, that we are the generation living in a time of collapse.
You may live without hope if you want, and call it seeing things clearly. I choose to live with hope, and get up after having it bashed to pieces, and try again, and again, and again. Because I am not giving up on making things as good for myself and others as I can, for as long as I can.
Maybe it comes to nothing. Maybe it does nothing to stop a darker time than ever.
But I'm still going to try.
Which brings me to the main takeaway. After collapse comes rebuilding. From every era of rubble we have emerged, stronger and more determined. We here, in the United States, are shining examples of it. We escaped tyranny. We built the strongest nation in the history of humankind.
And we'll do it again.
I may not live to see it. Many reading this journal may not live to see it. But I have faith in our species ability to do it. We have done it before. We will do it again.
In our current generation, yeah, we're basically screwed. Those in power are not going to give up their power. They will cling to it, tooth and nail, right to this nation's grave. It has happened over and over again in the history of our species. But we? What we have left us is what we have always had and always will have. Our hopes, our dreams, our imaginations and our will to keep going, no matter what is happening around us. We find enjoyment wherever it can be found.
Therefore, I choose to not let myself be distracted by what is happening. There is little I can do to change it, so I shrug and just live my life. I find my enjoyment.
And you're finding yours. Focus on it, delve into it and take the most from it that you can. It is something which can never be taken from us. That too, is something which has been proven down through our ages. Again and again and again.
But even if collapse is inevitable, I intend to do my part to keep the fall as survivable and with as little pain as we can manage. Regardless of the time it takes, I'll keep going.
Thank you for taking the time to write out the second part. I appreciate you taking the time to do that.
We need only look at the stuff that started passing during his previous term and what he wanted to get done, and how that had to be fought and stymied and was cut down by his own incompetence at the time to see that there's a lot of malice in him. This time, there's far less 'adults in the room' and more enablers. It might not be the end of the world, but it is going to be damaging as all hell. There's no denying that from a progressive standpoint.
And while I agree that Harris didn't reach out properly, and there were a number of issues with her campaign? When the choice is between a continuation of the status quo and the return of someone that stripped away science, broke the country with COVID misinformation, scuttled aid to Ukraine, enabled all the bullshit that is going on out there, made it more unsafe for Asian-Americans and LGBTQ+ ones? The people that chose to ignore it because it didn't 'connect' with them made their choice, and this time, it will affect them if he manages to implement even a quarter of the plans out there.
B: The border crisis is exacerbated and made worse every year by the right, and there were multiple attempts TO fix it that the right shut down again and again, specifically to campaign on that (which was confessed to and admitted by the other side). But total shut-down does not fix things. When people are desperate enough to come fleeing from that far off, a 'closed border' (which is basically impossible with the sheer length of it) is not going to stop them from trying to break through. If you mean the drugs from that, that's not coming from illegal immigrants nearly as much as it is from citizens going down and coming back.
The pressing issues are there, agreed, but they weren't nearly as unaddressed as people thought they were. And again, while Harris could have addressed them more and been more consistent about what the message the Democratic party offered was, she was still the better option compared to the person that wants to rip up what progress has been made and start off in a completely different direction that has been stated, by many high-level economists, to be far more dangerous to anyone outside of the six-figure income bracket and up.