Setting the stage for a government of overbearing arrogance, ignorance, and cruelty was the preceding decades of fawning obeisance in every burg to big business interests promising jobs, jobs, jobs in exchange for setting aside environmental law, worker rights, and tax fairness. Now we are suffering the consequences of putting avarice first.
Jeffery I agree with everything you said. What has me confused is our young people do not seem to be involved in any significant resistance ... where are the rebellious youth?
Thanks. I have seen some young people at the recent rallies, along with old people who date back to the '60's protests. What I've noticed is how women have taken over more of the leadership of protest movements. I hope the guys don't feel left out.
Seems that the "guys" feeling "left out" is the reason we ended up with Trump. I hope they are feeling the pain of their Trump vote the way the rest of us are!
A perfect description of the damage we are seeing and the damage we can expect. There is no language too strong. The proof is in the poison pudding.
Maybe we should be grateful that this vile crew of billionaires (16 in Trump's Administration) moved as fast as they could to wreck what is necessary for our everyday lives. Had they whittled it away, it would have made room for apathy and excuses.
There is NO room for apathy and excuses, my friends. Teach. Preach. Write. Everyone can do that. March if you can. These toxic rich sickos mean to own US just like the immigrants they sent to El Salvador.
Waiting to see the results of the schism, For instance there are predictions that Trump is going to fire Hegseth or that he will resign.
No chance. Trump never admits to mistakes or errors, For him to fire Hegseth, would be admitting a mistake, besides Hegseth is doing a great job of promoting racism and bigotry in the DOD, just like Trump wanted.
No. We haven't heard much about Ramaswamy but he's still at DOGE. The little geeks are still stealing all our data and probably selling it on the Dark Web.
All elected Repugnicans who assisted, or whose compliance enabled, donvict’s crimes must be held to account. They are as guilty as he. Like him, they swore an oath to support and defend the constitution. Their failure to do so is at best dereliction, at worst complicity. If Democrats fail to fully prosecute all those who are essentially co-conspirators, a critically important, fundamental lesson will be lost. If not an actual trial by jury, at least an indelible stain, loudly and repeatedly attached. No forgiveness, no “putting it all behind us”. No “moving on” and “looking to the future” until the criminals have received their due. And to be clear, they ARE criminals. All of them.
Are we awake yet? Maybe half of the population. I fear we are doomed, despite our best efforts.
For four years after I retired. I ran a Senior Transportation Program, and we share a building and boss with Food and Nutrition, which prepared and served meals (Meals on Wheels). The service is invaluable and it was keeping some very fragile people alive.
Stopping the program is murder. Trump is killing off the elderly and evidently that is part of the plan., the elderly, the disabled, the poor all of which Musk, DImon, Pete Peterson, Trump et all consider "useless eaters"
They (MAGAts) claim to be anti communist, yet Art 12, 1936 Soviet Constitution couldn't be more libertarian and MAGA. "If you don't work you don't eat"
Republicans never gave a shit...eliminating Chapter 1 of the Education Act, sending Medicaid and maybe SSI to the states..."sunsetting" all benefit programs..
I go back to Nixon's concept of federalism - block grants to the states for virtually all poverty programs.
This is one for the history books. It is prose bordering on poetry and more truth than we can process in one setting. It appears to be sinking in. Several "stories" or articles this morning refer to Trump's string of losses and humiliations and hint that some Republicans are finally giving him a little pushback. One shows hope that Mikey Johnson is headed for big trouble. Is it an illusion or is it false hope? Will he declare an emergency and impose martial law and get away with it? It isn't over until it's over, and the fat lady has laryngitis.
Thom I'm angry too. However, my anger is not just for Trump, its for the 77 million people who voted for him, a right wing media that cares nothing for the country, and for the 90 million eligible voters who didn't vote. Add in the wall street moguls, con men, working with the biggest con man of them all. Con man Don is back channeling information to them so they can buy the dips he creates and sell in the ups they control. Jaded, callused thinking, maybe, want to buy a Trump bible or a pair of golden tennis shoes? Nah, buy $Trump coin, he's pumping it and soon dumping it. He's transactional his niece told us, would he sell national secrets, nah, he wouldn't do that, not honest Don.
"Forgive them, for they know not what they do." cried out Jesus in his anguish. They are lied to and manipulated. Our anger will not heal this wound. Forming community in our neighborhoods might. We must rise above this anger or we will not find the glue to save America.
Trump is not destroying America. Capitalism and Consumerism have destroyed America. We are a people constructed with material desire. Fascism and tyranny are products of our behaviors. We, you and I, are the alcoholic who will not recognize who he/she is. These stories all end in death before any resurrection can follow. Plutus is laughing at us; Mammon is laughing at us. Dante told our story. Midas couldn't ingest his gold. I've grown sick of intellectuals not confronting and questioning the values we have adopted, the roots of our demise. We live in the ashes of our own home.
Not sure about awake. Congresspersons are not acting in any way bold except for the few. Having some form of protection they do not want to do anything to lose it. Krasnov using his grip of fear on the innocent legal green card resident and citizen because he knows like Putin that it is a short distance from immigrant legalized citizen to born citizens. What he does not know is God is not far from his fall. Krasnov is nearer to Hecate the Dark Divine feminine goddess than he knows. He fears the female goddess who haunts the Oval Office. She is coming and his day is near. The mad king is afraid and does not know why. She comes. The Chosen One has become a Cosmic Creator. The Dragons are here. They honor and surround the Chosen. Let the karmics look over their shoulder. Their day's of fear are over forever.
Powerful, powerful statement, Thom. Good to see it widely available,here and on the web.
My small bit is photographing the patriotic protestors and spreading their messages, by posting their pictures on Facebook, Instagram, X, BlueSky, and my own new Substack account. Don't know if this link will work, but if it does check in on the citizen heroes
Maybe this might explain the regular persistence of autocracy.
A Dialectic of History Based on Evolutionary Psychology and Mythology
The mandates of evolution are sustenance, safety and sex, requirements for survival and for genes to be passed to the next generation. Humans are members of the primate family, our closest cousins being chimpanzees who share over 98% of our genetic heritage. Chimpanzees are social creatures who live in troops that range in size from 15 to 80 individuals. Each group is ruled by an alpha male who has primary access to food and females, who rules by fear of his retribution against disloyalty and who forms a coalition of loyal subordinates who are enforcers of the alphas rule. In return subordinates get priorities over others for food and sex. Humans have existed in tribal hunters, gathering groups of similar sizes for over 90% of human existence on the planet. Tribal groups were typically ruled over by a chief or alpha male who like his chimpanzee cousins had sexual priority but also was expected to protect the tribe from outside dangers and rival groups. A chief who failed to provide sustenance and safety to the group would be ousted very quickly.
Where human tribal groups differ from primates is they had verbal communication that was used to pass tribal mythologies on to future generations. Tribal mythologies gave individuals in the tribe a unique identification as members of the group with a shared historical narrative and origin story. Beginning with the cultivation of agriculture, the engineering of irrigation networks and the formation of cities human tribes transformed into human cultures with multiple thousands of members. With the advent of writing complex ethnic mythologies proliferated. These mythologies took the form of religions which imbued residents with cultural origin stories, group identity and complex behavioral codes. Almost all of these societies were ruled by alpha males and subordinate loyal coalitions’ who controlled allocation of resources and were empowered with enhanced polygamous mating rights. As societies expanded to millions and then hundreds of millions, mythologies became increasingly important in holding societies together.
2500 years ago, humans undertook the first experiments in creating societies not ruled by individual alpha male rulers but ruled by mass coalitions of the societies’ members. The mythologies of these societies emphasized the individual rights of the citizen versus the divine rights of emperors, kings or pharaohs. Eventually as alpha males accumulated wealth and power as was there genetic inclination, emperors and kings returned to power for the next 1700 years until the revolutions of the eighteenth century where the rights of citizens were reasserted with the mythological mandates of fraternity, equality, liberty in the case of the French revolution or life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness and equal justice for all in the American revolution. These mythologies of giving the power of government to a country’s ordinary citizens have precariously persisted over the last two centuries but always alongside other autocratic alpha male ruled societies.
Recently it has become very evident to most of us that the mythology of democracy and rule by the citizens is not self-sustaining and is always under threat by the genetic evolutionary mandate of alpha males who always quest for individual wealth and power. As a small faction accumulates ever more proportions of a society’s wealth it usually comes at the expense of the ordinary citizen. It is then the mythology of democracy crumbles and autocracy takes back control of a society. This has happened before in recent history, but we now witness it anew in an administration elected by a disgruntled population not only revert to autocratic behavior but almost revert to the politics of alpha chimpanzees with the installation of a coalition of followers who pledge absolute loyalty to the leader and where the leader proceeds to flaunt and dismantle all the institutions of democracy designed to constrain his power. The richest man in the world, an unelected proponent of the President, wields tremendous power over the fate of thousands of government employees and tens of millions of citizens. We witness his display of power as he struts around a stage waving a huge chainsaw in a demonstration which is probably equivalent to an alpha chimp beating his chest. To reinforce this analog, he has used and continues to use his wealth and power to gain access to and impregnate dozens of females. Have we returned to the very evolutionary beginnings of primate politics?
What does history tell us about this dialectic between evolutionary psychology and mythology? History tells us that this struggle between the mythologies of democracy and egalitarianism and the evolutionary mandate of alpha males to seek power has been in play for thousands of years. The mythology of Christianity itself at its very beginnings was about recognizing and helping the underclass, the least among us until it was suborned by the emperors, the kings, the rich and powerful and power-seeking politicians. Democracy in all its forms has always been venerable to swinging towards autocracy when it is seen by the citizenry as ineffective and taken over by the elites. When the wealth of a society is shunted towards the very powerful as it is wont to do, then democracy is in a perilous position. Then the autocrats can use the very levers of democratic power, elections, to exploit the resentments of the citizenry to take back control. But when the autocrats overstep, when they become totally corrupt, when they endanger the livelihoods and lives of ordinary citizens, in some cases they are run out by popular uprising or sometimes end up on the guillotine and democracy returns in some form. It is a dialectic that has been happening for the last 2000 years and will probably continue for the next. JRH 4/23/25
Excellent summary of human and non-human group behavior. Another way human alphas take advantage of primate behavior is the natural aversion to "others," like chimpanzees have, to manipulate the masses. You believe, as I do, that in order to understand ourselves, we need to investigate and examine non-human primates and animals in general.
Jack Hicks, I'm copying your summary to refer to because I see the same pattern you do from what I know of history. Thom Hartmann's "Hidden History of American Democracy" is fascinating. I can't remember where I read it, but one of his daily reports from a couple of years ago refers to research concerning democracy among animals.
The first time I thought about the cycle of people taking back their authority over autocrats was many years ago, when I read Pearl S. Buck's The Good Earth. The movie is good but doesn't do the book justice, as usual.
You are absolutely correct. We need people to fight. I wrote about that late last night on my Substack. It tells the story of Stephen A. Douglas’s epic showdown with James Buchanan during the Lecompton Constitution crisis. It is a tale of one courageous Senator standing against a President of his own party for the law and the Constitution. https://dundas.substack.com/p/needed-one-courageous-republican
All the best. As always, keep speaking the truth and watch your six.
I just finished reading your essay on Douglas. Well done, and I learned a lot. Especially the more things change the more they stay the same.
Our technology changes the world, but human needs and fears, dicate human behavior, and those don't change reqardless of technology.
I didn't know that the antebellum Democratic party was split. Because, it is still split, but along a different axis, although the split is still between classes.
A goddamn black hole of ugliness and depravity is exactly right. He will absolutely turn this country into an authoritarian nightmare if we don’t stop him. He will not stop himself. The courts don’t seem to have much impact on his conduct. The laws don’t faze him. He is a dirty crooked carnival barker with hate instead of a soul.
What a great opening paragraph to an excellent article.
..............."Donald Trump didn’t just “disrupt” America; he detonated it. Like a political Chernobyl, he poisoned the very soil of our democratic republic, leaving behind a toxic cloud of cruelty, corruption, and chaos that will radiate through generations if we don’t contain it now.
He didn’t merely bring darkness; he cultivated it. He made it fashionable. He turned cruelty into currency and made ignorance a political virtue.
This man, a grotesque cocktail of malignant narcissism and petty vengeance, ripped the mask off American decency and showed the world our ugliest face. He caged children. Caged. Children. He laughed off their cries while his ghoulish acolytes used “Where are the children?” as a punchline for their next QAnon rally".
Setting the stage for a government of overbearing arrogance, ignorance, and cruelty was the preceding decades of fawning obeisance in every burg to big business interests promising jobs, jobs, jobs in exchange for setting aside environmental law, worker rights, and tax fairness. Now we are suffering the consequences of putting avarice first.
Jeffery I agree with everything you said. What has me confused is our young people do not seem to be involved in any significant resistance ... where are the rebellious youth?
Thanks. I have seen some young people at the recent rallies, along with old people who date back to the '60's protests. What I've noticed is how women have taken over more of the leadership of protest movements. I hope the guys don't feel left out.
Seems that the "guys" feeling "left out" is the reason we ended up with Trump. I hope they are feeling the pain of their Trump vote the way the rest of us are!
Yes, some young, along with a major revival of late ‘60's survivors! I think many youth are more active in the Free Palestine area.
Agree. Would add US populace ignoring the war atrocities our tax $$ have been perpetrating - our complicity in genocide(s).
Trump and his inner circle are the epitome of evil and must be stopped before the death of millions is the result.
Who owns us?
A perfect description of the damage we are seeing and the damage we can expect. There is no language too strong. The proof is in the poison pudding.
Maybe we should be grateful that this vile crew of billionaires (16 in Trump's Administration) moved as fast as they could to wreck what is necessary for our everyday lives. Had they whittled it away, it would have made room for apathy and excuses.
There is NO room for apathy and excuses, my friends. Teach. Preach. Write. Everyone can do that. March if you can. These toxic rich sickos mean to own US just like the immigrants they sent to El Salvador.
Thanks Thom. Power to the People!
Apparently there is a schism within Trumpland and Musk has worn out his welcome.
I guess $288 million doesn't buy you "forever". Some evil geniuses are so damn stupid.
Thanks for bringing it up, Daniel. It's nice to have something sweet for breakfast.
Waiting to see the results of the schism, For instance there are predictions that Trump is going to fire Hegseth or that he will resign.
No chance. Trump never admits to mistakes or errors, For him to fire Hegseth, would be admitting a mistake, besides Hegseth is doing a great job of promoting racism and bigotry in the DOD, just like Trump wanted.
It's Trump's Achilles Heel -- national security. To keep Hegseth and Gabbard, Congressional Republicans salute the axis of evil.
Haven't they already saluted the axis of evil. First when the approved their nomination, second by keeping silent
They had just run and were elected as loyal Republicans. Now it's different, Trump was given rope and has put his head in the noose.
They will never agree with us on immigration, trickle down economics, etc. Those who represent Dem majorities, like Bacon are especially vulnerable.
It couldn’t have happened to a more deserving billionaire. Good riddance. Are his teen hackers gone too?
No. We haven't heard much about Ramaswamy but he's still at DOGE. The little geeks are still stealing all our data and probably selling it on the Dark Web.
All elected Repugnicans who assisted, or whose compliance enabled, donvict’s crimes must be held to account. They are as guilty as he. Like him, they swore an oath to support and defend the constitution. Their failure to do so is at best dereliction, at worst complicity. If Democrats fail to fully prosecute all those who are essentially co-conspirators, a critically important, fundamental lesson will be lost. If not an actual trial by jury, at least an indelible stain, loudly and repeatedly attached. No forgiveness, no “putting it all behind us”. No “moving on” and “looking to the future” until the criminals have received their due. And to be clear, they ARE criminals. All of them.
If they repent and come to Jesus, good enough.
😂
🤣
Are we awake yet? Maybe half of the population. I fear we are doomed, despite our best efforts.
For four years after I retired. I ran a Senior Transportation Program, and we share a building and boss with Food and Nutrition, which prepared and served meals (Meals on Wheels). The service is invaluable and it was keeping some very fragile people alive.
Stopping the program is murder. Trump is killing off the elderly and evidently that is part of the plan., the elderly, the disabled, the poor all of which Musk, DImon, Pete Peterson, Trump et all consider "useless eaters"
They (MAGAts) claim to be anti communist, yet Art 12, 1936 Soviet Constitution couldn't be more libertarian and MAGA. "If you don't work you don't eat"
Republicans never gave a shit...eliminating Chapter 1 of the Education Act, sending Medicaid and maybe SSI to the states..."sunsetting" all benefit programs..
I go back to Nixon's concept of federalism - block grants to the states for virtually all poverty programs.
Thank you, Thom.
This is one for the history books. It is prose bordering on poetry and more truth than we can process in one setting. It appears to be sinking in. Several "stories" or articles this morning refer to Trump's string of losses and humiliations and hint that some Republicans are finally giving him a little pushback. One shows hope that Mikey Johnson is headed for big trouble. Is it an illusion or is it false hope? Will he declare an emergency and impose martial law and get away with it? It isn't over until it's over, and the fat lady has laryngitis.
"Fat lady has laryngitis. A keeper Robert. This comment is laudable.
Thom I'm angry too. However, my anger is not just for Trump, its for the 77 million people who voted for him, a right wing media that cares nothing for the country, and for the 90 million eligible voters who didn't vote. Add in the wall street moguls, con men, working with the biggest con man of them all. Con man Don is back channeling information to them so they can buy the dips he creates and sell in the ups they control. Jaded, callused thinking, maybe, want to buy a Trump bible or a pair of golden tennis shoes? Nah, buy $Trump coin, he's pumping it and soon dumping it. He's transactional his niece told us, would he sell national secrets, nah, he wouldn't do that, not honest Don.
"Forgive them, for they know not what they do." cried out Jesus in his anguish. They are lied to and manipulated. Our anger will not heal this wound. Forming community in our neighborhoods might. We must rise above this anger or we will not find the glue to save America.
Trump is not destroying America. Capitalism and Consumerism have destroyed America. We are a people constructed with material desire. Fascism and tyranny are products of our behaviors. We, you and I, are the alcoholic who will not recognize who he/she is. These stories all end in death before any resurrection can follow. Plutus is laughing at us; Mammon is laughing at us. Dante told our story. Midas couldn't ingest his gold. I've grown sick of intellectuals not confronting and questioning the values we have adopted, the roots of our demise. We live in the ashes of our own home.
Not sure about awake. Congresspersons are not acting in any way bold except for the few. Having some form of protection they do not want to do anything to lose it. Krasnov using his grip of fear on the innocent legal green card resident and citizen because he knows like Putin that it is a short distance from immigrant legalized citizen to born citizens. What he does not know is God is not far from his fall. Krasnov is nearer to Hecate the Dark Divine feminine goddess than he knows. He fears the female goddess who haunts the Oval Office. She is coming and his day is near. The mad king is afraid and does not know why. She comes. The Chosen One has become a Cosmic Creator. The Dragons are here. They honor and surround the Chosen. Let the karmics look over their shoulder. Their day's of fear are over forever.
We only need a few Congressional Republicans. Feathers of Hope. https://jerryweiss.substack.com/
I stil have hope... https://www.ketv.com/article/nebraska-protestors-praise-don-bacon-for-criticism-of-defense-secretary/64556879. Note the reaction of the protestors ..we need a full court press...and I'm grateful that Bacon speaks out....so does Turner to a lesser extent.
Hegseth and Gabbard are gifts.....
The Earth Is A Woman and SHE will have the Last Word.
Powerful, powerful statement, Thom. Good to see it widely available,here and on the web.
My small bit is photographing the patriotic protestors and spreading their messages, by posting their pictures on Facebook, Instagram, X, BlueSky, and my own new Substack account. Don't know if this link will work, but if it does check in on the citizen heroes
.
https://substack.com/@richardbehan919955
Woops. Substack cropped the images severely. Please click on them to see full frame.
Maybe this might explain the regular persistence of autocracy.
A Dialectic of History Based on Evolutionary Psychology and Mythology
The mandates of evolution are sustenance, safety and sex, requirements for survival and for genes to be passed to the next generation. Humans are members of the primate family, our closest cousins being chimpanzees who share over 98% of our genetic heritage. Chimpanzees are social creatures who live in troops that range in size from 15 to 80 individuals. Each group is ruled by an alpha male who has primary access to food and females, who rules by fear of his retribution against disloyalty and who forms a coalition of loyal subordinates who are enforcers of the alphas rule. In return subordinates get priorities over others for food and sex. Humans have existed in tribal hunters, gathering groups of similar sizes for over 90% of human existence on the planet. Tribal groups were typically ruled over by a chief or alpha male who like his chimpanzee cousins had sexual priority but also was expected to protect the tribe from outside dangers and rival groups. A chief who failed to provide sustenance and safety to the group would be ousted very quickly.
Where human tribal groups differ from primates is they had verbal communication that was used to pass tribal mythologies on to future generations. Tribal mythologies gave individuals in the tribe a unique identification as members of the group with a shared historical narrative and origin story. Beginning with the cultivation of agriculture, the engineering of irrigation networks and the formation of cities human tribes transformed into human cultures with multiple thousands of members. With the advent of writing complex ethnic mythologies proliferated. These mythologies took the form of religions which imbued residents with cultural origin stories, group identity and complex behavioral codes. Almost all of these societies were ruled by alpha males and subordinate loyal coalitions’ who controlled allocation of resources and were empowered with enhanced polygamous mating rights. As societies expanded to millions and then hundreds of millions, mythologies became increasingly important in holding societies together.
2500 years ago, humans undertook the first experiments in creating societies not ruled by individual alpha male rulers but ruled by mass coalitions of the societies’ members. The mythologies of these societies emphasized the individual rights of the citizen versus the divine rights of emperors, kings or pharaohs. Eventually as alpha males accumulated wealth and power as was there genetic inclination, emperors and kings returned to power for the next 1700 years until the revolutions of the eighteenth century where the rights of citizens were reasserted with the mythological mandates of fraternity, equality, liberty in the case of the French revolution or life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness and equal justice for all in the American revolution. These mythologies of giving the power of government to a country’s ordinary citizens have precariously persisted over the last two centuries but always alongside other autocratic alpha male ruled societies.
Recently it has become very evident to most of us that the mythology of democracy and rule by the citizens is not self-sustaining and is always under threat by the genetic evolutionary mandate of alpha males who always quest for individual wealth and power. As a small faction accumulates ever more proportions of a society’s wealth it usually comes at the expense of the ordinary citizen. It is then the mythology of democracy crumbles and autocracy takes back control of a society. This has happened before in recent history, but we now witness it anew in an administration elected by a disgruntled population not only revert to autocratic behavior but almost revert to the politics of alpha chimpanzees with the installation of a coalition of followers who pledge absolute loyalty to the leader and where the leader proceeds to flaunt and dismantle all the institutions of democracy designed to constrain his power. The richest man in the world, an unelected proponent of the President, wields tremendous power over the fate of thousands of government employees and tens of millions of citizens. We witness his display of power as he struts around a stage waving a huge chainsaw in a demonstration which is probably equivalent to an alpha chimp beating his chest. To reinforce this analog, he has used and continues to use his wealth and power to gain access to and impregnate dozens of females. Have we returned to the very evolutionary beginnings of primate politics?
What does history tell us about this dialectic between evolutionary psychology and mythology? History tells us that this struggle between the mythologies of democracy and egalitarianism and the evolutionary mandate of alpha males to seek power has been in play for thousands of years. The mythology of Christianity itself at its very beginnings was about recognizing and helping the underclass, the least among us until it was suborned by the emperors, the kings, the rich and powerful and power-seeking politicians. Democracy in all its forms has always been venerable to swinging towards autocracy when it is seen by the citizenry as ineffective and taken over by the elites. When the wealth of a society is shunted towards the very powerful as it is wont to do, then democracy is in a perilous position. Then the autocrats can use the very levers of democratic power, elections, to exploit the resentments of the citizenry to take back control. But when the autocrats overstep, when they become totally corrupt, when they endanger the livelihoods and lives of ordinary citizens, in some cases they are run out by popular uprising or sometimes end up on the guillotine and democracy returns in some form. It is a dialectic that has been happening for the last 2000 years and will probably continue for the next. JRH 4/23/25
Excellent summary of human and non-human group behavior. Another way human alphas take advantage of primate behavior is the natural aversion to "others," like chimpanzees have, to manipulate the masses. You believe, as I do, that in order to understand ourselves, we need to investigate and examine non-human primates and animals in general.
Jack Hicks, I'm copying your summary to refer to because I see the same pattern you do from what I know of history. Thom Hartmann's "Hidden History of American Democracy" is fascinating. I can't remember where I read it, but one of his daily reports from a couple of years ago refers to research concerning democracy among animals.
The first time I thought about the cycle of people taking back their authority over autocrats was many years ago, when I read Pearl S. Buck's The Good Earth. The movie is good but doesn't do the book justice, as usual.
Thom,
You are absolutely correct. We need people to fight. I wrote about that late last night on my Substack. It tells the story of Stephen A. Douglas’s epic showdown with James Buchanan during the Lecompton Constitution crisis. It is a tale of one courageous Senator standing against a President of his own party for the law and the Constitution. https://dundas.substack.com/p/needed-one-courageous-republican
All the best. As always, keep speaking the truth and watch your six.
Steve Dundas
I just finished reading your essay on Douglas. Well done, and I learned a lot. Especially the more things change the more they stay the same.
Our technology changes the world, but human needs and fears, dicate human behavior, and those don't change reqardless of technology.
I didn't know that the antebellum Democratic party was split. Because, it is still split, but along a different axis, although the split is still between classes.
We, the people, must take what belongs to us only: the power over this land and Constitution.
https://hotbuttons.substack.com/p/equitable-equality?r=3m1bs
A goddamn black hole of ugliness and depravity is exactly right. He will absolutely turn this country into an authoritarian nightmare if we don’t stop him. He will not stop himself. The courts don’t seem to have much impact on his conduct. The laws don’t faze him. He is a dirty crooked carnival barker with hate instead of a soul.
Best not to forget Project 2025. His executive orders are straight out of the book.
What a great opening paragraph to an excellent article.
..............."Donald Trump didn’t just “disrupt” America; he detonated it. Like a political Chernobyl, he poisoned the very soil of our democratic republic, leaving behind a toxic cloud of cruelty, corruption, and chaos that will radiate through generations if we don’t contain it now.
He didn’t merely bring darkness; he cultivated it. He made it fashionable. He turned cruelty into currency and made ignorance a political virtue.
This man, a grotesque cocktail of malignant narcissism and petty vengeance, ripped the mask off American decency and showed the world our ugliest face. He caged children. Caged. Children. He laughed off their cries while his ghoulish acolytes used “Where are the children?” as a punchline for their next QAnon rally".