This editorial is spot on in stating that "Donald Trump built his movement by licensing his followers to embrace bigotries that had been repressed, not reformed."
And let us take heart from a President who was worthy of the title [unlike the current one], FDR, who "proposed that Americans should be guaranteed useful employment, a living wage, decent housing, adequate medical care, and protection from the abuses of monopolists."
I believe the unsustainable level of income inequality in America right now is an issue that transcends political party, state, region, urban, or rural boundaries.
I hope Democrats capitalize on the extreme dissatisfaction felt by most Americans who see the American dream as out of reach.
75% of us want higher taxes on billionaires and corporations. The new Democratic congress of 2027 should begin writing legislation that will raise taxes on the highest income bracket (or create a new one for over $10 million in income), remove the payroll tax cap, tax capital gains, increase the corporate tax to 28%, and reform the inheritance tax, even though they may not be able to pass those laws till 2029.
The low-hanging fruits are: reinstating ACA subsidies, reversing the upcoming SNAP and Medicaid cuts, reversing Trump's tariff taxes, and of course, forcing the release of the full Epstein files.
Increasing healthcare access and lowering prices RIGHT AWAY should ensure a Democratic win in 2028.
See FDR's speech: ""Four Freedoms," it defines the universal human right to the basic necessities of life, including adequate food, shelter, clothing, and healthcare."
Thank you for stating so eloquently where we are now. We have to face these realities. In both 2016 and 2024 "the ugly face of misogyny won". Too many American voters are happy with the brutality of the GOP because it punishes POC, immigrants, women and LGBTQ people. Disabled folks were officially added to the hit list yesterday by the Department of Justice which decided that the disabled don't have any right to live in their communities and instead should be institutionalized. Mediocre White men claim affirmative action and DEI have displaced superior White men. Yet we witness the incompetency of Trump, Hegseth, RFK Jr, and their toxic masculine ilk every day who have brought the US to its knees domestically and internationally. Sorry, MAGA, this cannot be blamed on undocumented immigrants, women or POC. Your supposedly superior White men keep making bad decisions.
“Equality in the pursuit of happiness”? My happiness does not cost millions of dollars. And how does having billions make anyone happier than me? Which makes me wonder what is happiness to someone with $999,999,999,999.99? $.01? Obscene.
I have a twenty year head start on you, so I have watched the hopeful, optimistic years of the late sixties and early seventies devolve into this mess.
Above the sadness and dismay, my anger at what we are doing by allowing magarhoid dominance helps me cope.
The silence is deafening! Why aren’t we talking out loud and directly about this threat Trump is making to our country? Are we all afraid that we’ll look foolish or alarmists? What if we’re wrong? What are our representative in DC doing?
OK I’ll just come out and say it. I have serious concerns about the future of this country and by November it could be either too late of a much bigger fight.
I suggest we band together in developing an organized resistance now and get prepared.
I had ChatGPT to do a deep dive into Trumps actions which can be seen as a threat to our democracy. You can find the full results on My Substack.
It’s conclusion was:
Taken individually, many of President Trump’s actions can be defended as aggressive uses of presidential authority, efforts to make the executive branch accountable to an elected president, or attempts to combat alleged corruption, illegal immigration, antisemitism, bureaucratic resistance and election fraud.
Taken together, however, they form a coherent structure of presidential power consolidation. That structure could be used during a disputed election to pressure state officials, control federal law enforcement, remove resistant employees, weaken independent oversight, punish institutional opposition and deploy federal forces.
I see this as a way of saying that piece by piece fundamental checks and balances and internal governmental watchdogs are being chipped away or fired.
Listed below are some specific points noted:
- [ ] The 2020 attempt to overturn an election remains the most important evidence
- [ ] The January 6 pardons
- [ ] Attempting to bring election administration under presidential influence (and away from the states)
- [ ] Attempting to bring election administration under presidential influence (firing government employees who might stand in the way)
- [ ] Subordinating independent agencies to the White House
- [ ] Removing inspectors general and weakening internal oversight
- [ ] Politicization or selective use of the Justice Department
- [ ] Weakening Congress’s control of spending and government structure
- [ ] Retaliatory measures against law firms
- [ ] Pressure on the press and control of access
- [ ] Using federal funding to compel universities and civil society
- [ ] Broad emergency powers and uncertain compliance with courts
- [ ] Domestic deployment of the military and federal forces
- [ ] Reshaping military and intelligence leadership
- [ ] Centralizing government information and personal data
How these powers could operate together
The danger is not best understood as Trump issuing a single order declaring himself dictator. Modern democratic breakdown usually occurs through an accumulation of formally plausible actions.
A hypothetical disputed transfer could proceed as follows:
1. Trump declares that the result is fraudulent, relying on mailed ballots, noncitizen voting or irregularities.
2. Federal databases produce lists questioning voter eligibility, while the Justice Department investigates election officials.
3. State officials are pressured through subpoenas, grant threats, criminal investigations or public attacks.
4. Career employees who reject unsupported claims are removed or bypassed.
5. Inspectors general and independent agencies have reduced ability to expose internal misconduct.
6. Federal forces are deployed around protests or government facilities, officially for public safety or federal protection.
7. Law firms, media organizations and universities face financial or regulatory pressure, reducing organized resistance.
8. Emergency appeals allow contested measures to remain temporarily effective, delaying a final judicial resolution.
9. Congress is asked to reject, delay or reinterpret state certifications amid manufactured uncertainty.
All of the above are meant to quash oversight and allow unfettered corruption on the part of a corrupt executive branch of government and could not have been accomplished and implemented without the compliance of Republicans in Congress and on the Supreme Court.
We blame voters for the second coming of the one who squats at what's left of our White House, but there are millions of U.S., in fact the overwhelming majority of U.S. who didn't vote for Trump 05nov2024 -- that is almost 166.7 million. 77.3m voted for him (49.8%), 75m for Kamala, and about 2.9m for "other"(total 50.2%). 88.8m didn't vote or couldn't vote, or otherwise experienced some kind of voter suppression -- BUT, they didn't vote for him. (And today, the vast majority of U.S. do not support him, nor his regime, and the number who don't is growing with each proceeding day, each new outrage, embarrassment, cruel action, or inanity.) Simply blaming the U.S. electorate for the results of 05nov2024 ignores the factors and efforts involved that were effectively used to flummox, stymie, confuse or otherwise influence that election's disastrous outcomes. The decades long assault on U.S. education chief among those influences. We are a step away from minority rule, and those who know how to stop us from voting, have been, and are now working overtime to either steal our rights to vote, or make it as goddamned hard as possible to exercise that right. The SAVE Act is designed only to save the regime's ability to gain minority rule.
Tim, a very insightful analysis, especially your thought that American voters would rather have a felonious , narcissistic idiot be president rather than a woman of color--or any woman. Trump lost to a mediocre man.
"FDR proposed that Americans should be guaranteed useful employment, a living wage, decent housing, adequate medical care, and protection from the abuses of monopolists."
The views of our Founders and their writing of the Constitution made it pretty clear that "guaranteeing" things like employment, wages, and so on, was not to be the responsibility of the federal government. As for the "abuses of monopolists", there's more of a case for the government to prevent excesses - it's just difficult at times to determine how far regulation should go. But I believe less power in Washington overall is a good thing.
In psychology there’s a saying- people only change their behavior when the pain of not changing is greater than the pain of changing.
I think we all agree it’s that time, Trump has taken this country so far down that I think the pain of reevaluating the way things are run in this country will be easy now.
I’m not talking about starting all over but closing loopholes, passing new laws for the government, maybe even amendments to the constitution.
This editorial is spot on in stating that "Donald Trump built his movement by licensing his followers to embrace bigotries that had been repressed, not reformed."
And let us take heart from a President who was worthy of the title [unlike the current one], FDR, who "proposed that Americans should be guaranteed useful employment, a living wage, decent housing, adequate medical care, and protection from the abuses of monopolists."
I believe the unsustainable level of income inequality in America right now is an issue that transcends political party, state, region, urban, or rural boundaries.
I hope Democrats capitalize on the extreme dissatisfaction felt by most Americans who see the American dream as out of reach.
75% of us want higher taxes on billionaires and corporations. The new Democratic congress of 2027 should begin writing legislation that will raise taxes on the highest income bracket (or create a new one for over $10 million in income), remove the payroll tax cap, tax capital gains, increase the corporate tax to 28%, and reform the inheritance tax, even though they may not be able to pass those laws till 2029.
The low-hanging fruits are: reinstating ACA subsidies, reversing the upcoming SNAP and Medicaid cuts, reversing Trump's tariff taxes, and of course, forcing the release of the full Epstein files.
Increasing healthcare access and lowering prices RIGHT AWAY should ensure a Democratic win in 2028.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPKKQnijnsM&t=102s
As long as tax "shelters" are unregulated I believe raising taxes will be ineffective.
Well, we'd have to modernize and fully staff the IRS. Trump has neutered it for now.
That's why Republicans will oppose I these things and Trump will veto them.
See FDR's speech: ""Four Freedoms," it defines the universal human right to the basic necessities of life, including adequate food, shelter, clothing, and healthcare."
In NYC we have Franklin D. Roosevelt Four Freedoms State Park on Roosevelt Island.
I remember it well from when I worked there.
Where did you work?
Thank you for stating so eloquently where we are now. We have to face these realities. In both 2016 and 2024 "the ugly face of misogyny won". Too many American voters are happy with the brutality of the GOP because it punishes POC, immigrants, women and LGBTQ people. Disabled folks were officially added to the hit list yesterday by the Department of Justice which decided that the disabled don't have any right to live in their communities and instead should be institutionalized. Mediocre White men claim affirmative action and DEI have displaced superior White men. Yet we witness the incompetency of Trump, Hegseth, RFK Jr, and their toxic masculine ilk every day who have brought the US to its knees domestically and internationally. Sorry, MAGA, this cannot be blamed on undocumented immigrants, women or POC. Your supposedly superior White men keep making bad decisions.
FDR was on to something all those years ago! It’s time for dramatic changes to implement his “2nd Bill of Rights “!!!
FDR also put Japanese-Americans in internment camps. So much for rights.
And it was a terrible stain on his legacy and the entire US government that allowed it to happen. Fear is an extremely powerful emotion.
I will bet Eleanor was outraged at the internment though. She was a strong advocate for civil/human rights much more than her husband ever was.
InteRment
So was slavery and the putting down of POC. That last is still going on today. It has gotten worse recently.
“Equality in the pursuit of happiness”? My happiness does not cost millions of dollars. And how does having billions make anyone happier than me? Which makes me wonder what is happiness to someone with $999,999,999,999.99? $.01? Obscene.
His happiness is clearly making life as miserable and deadly as possible for non-white people.
EDITED PRIOR POST. I SCREWED PREMISE SEVERELY.
Excellent writing.
I have a twenty year head start on you, so I have watched the hopeful, optimistic years of the late sixties and early seventies devolve into this mess.
Above the sadness and dismay, my anger at what we are doing by allowing magarhoid dominance helps me cope.
NOBODY IS COMING TO SAVE US.
STAND UP.
RESIST.
The elephant in the country!
Or where were you when democracy died.
The silence is deafening! Why aren’t we talking out loud and directly about this threat Trump is making to our country? Are we all afraid that we’ll look foolish or alarmists? What if we’re wrong? What are our representative in DC doing?
OK I’ll just come out and say it. I have serious concerns about the future of this country and by November it could be either too late of a much bigger fight.
I suggest we band together in developing an organized resistance now and get prepared.
I had ChatGPT to do a deep dive into Trumps actions which can be seen as a threat to our democracy. You can find the full results on My Substack.
It’s conclusion was:
Taken individually, many of President Trump’s actions can be defended as aggressive uses of presidential authority, efforts to make the executive branch accountable to an elected president, or attempts to combat alleged corruption, illegal immigration, antisemitism, bureaucratic resistance and election fraud.
Taken together, however, they form a coherent structure of presidential power consolidation. That structure could be used during a disputed election to pressure state officials, control federal law enforcement, remove resistant employees, weaken independent oversight, punish institutional opposition and deploy federal forces.
I see this as a way of saying that piece by piece fundamental checks and balances and internal governmental watchdogs are being chipped away or fired.
Listed below are some specific points noted:
- [ ] The 2020 attempt to overturn an election remains the most important evidence
- [ ] The January 6 pardons
- [ ] Attempting to bring election administration under presidential influence (and away from the states)
- [ ] Attempting to bring election administration under presidential influence (firing government employees who might stand in the way)
- [ ] Subordinating independent agencies to the White House
- [ ] Removing inspectors general and weakening internal oversight
- [ ] Politicization or selective use of the Justice Department
- [ ] Weakening Congress’s control of spending and government structure
- [ ] Retaliatory measures against law firms
- [ ] Pressure on the press and control of access
- [ ] Using federal funding to compel universities and civil society
- [ ] Broad emergency powers and uncertain compliance with courts
- [ ] Domestic deployment of the military and federal forces
- [ ] Reshaping military and intelligence leadership
- [ ] Centralizing government information and personal data
How these powers could operate together
The danger is not best understood as Trump issuing a single order declaring himself dictator. Modern democratic breakdown usually occurs through an accumulation of formally plausible actions.
A hypothetical disputed transfer could proceed as follows:
1. Trump declares that the result is fraudulent, relying on mailed ballots, noncitizen voting or irregularities.
2. Federal databases produce lists questioning voter eligibility, while the Justice Department investigates election officials.
3. State officials are pressured through subpoenas, grant threats, criminal investigations or public attacks.
4. Career employees who reject unsupported claims are removed or bypassed.
5. Inspectors general and independent agencies have reduced ability to expose internal misconduct.
6. Federal forces are deployed around protests or government facilities, officially for public safety or federal protection.
7. Law firms, media organizations and universities face financial or regulatory pressure, reducing organized resistance.
8. Emergency appeals allow contested measures to remain temporarily effective, delaying a final judicial resolution.
9. Congress is asked to reject, delay or reinterpret state certifications amid manufactured uncertainty.
It does state that all is not lost yet.
He’s a link to the full report.
https://2tuttlechris.substack.com/p/the-elephant-in-the-country-128
@Critical Thinking
All of the above are meant to quash oversight and allow unfettered corruption on the part of a corrupt executive branch of government and could not have been accomplished and implemented without the compliance of Republicans in Congress and on the Supreme Court.
Absolutely! Check out “The greatest game ever” pr “A nation divided” on my Substack
It's good to hear your perspective, Tim. It's sad that so many are afraid to speak out despite the proof we have.
We blame voters for the second coming of the one who squats at what's left of our White House, but there are millions of U.S., in fact the overwhelming majority of U.S. who didn't vote for Trump 05nov2024 -- that is almost 166.7 million. 77.3m voted for him (49.8%), 75m for Kamala, and about 2.9m for "other"(total 50.2%). 88.8m didn't vote or couldn't vote, or otherwise experienced some kind of voter suppression -- BUT, they didn't vote for him. (And today, the vast majority of U.S. do not support him, nor his regime, and the number who don't is growing with each proceeding day, each new outrage, embarrassment, cruel action, or inanity.) Simply blaming the U.S. electorate for the results of 05nov2024 ignores the factors and efforts involved that were effectively used to flummox, stymie, confuse or otherwise influence that election's disastrous outcomes. The decades long assault on U.S. education chief among those influences. We are a step away from minority rule, and those who know how to stop us from voting, have been, and are now working overtime to either steal our rights to vote, or make it as goddamned hard as possible to exercise that right. The SAVE Act is designed only to save the regime's ability to gain minority rule.
Well done!
Tim, a very insightful analysis, especially your thought that American voters would rather have a felonious , narcissistic idiot be president rather than a woman of color--or any woman. Trump lost to a mediocre man.
It's also a worthwhile expenditure of time to read or reread FDR's "Fireside Chats." He "connected."
Trump isn't a leader. He's a ringleader.
Sick to my stomach.
"FDR proposed that Americans should be guaranteed useful employment, a living wage, decent housing, adequate medical care, and protection from the abuses of monopolists."
The views of our Founders and their writing of the Constitution made it pretty clear that "guaranteeing" things like employment, wages, and so on, was not to be the responsibility of the federal government. As for the "abuses of monopolists", there's more of a case for the government to prevent excesses - it's just difficult at times to determine how far regulation should go. But I believe less power in Washington overall is a good thing.
Ronald Reagan was in his 70s. His generation had a hard time accepting gay people, unfortunately.
Change is hard
In psychology there’s a saying- people only change their behavior when the pain of not changing is greater than the pain of changing.
I think we all agree it’s that time, Trump has taken this country so far down that I think the pain of reevaluating the way things are run in this country will be easy now.
I’m not talking about starting all over but closing loopholes, passing new laws for the government, maybe even amendments to the constitution.