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Cross the Courts Off the List: We have enough information to conclude that the law wonât save us.
The most significant remaining opportunity for course correction is the midterm elections. It is not so much that the elections (which if history is any guide should cause Republicans to lose control of Congress) are a magic wand that will fix our broken democracy, any more than, you know, Obamaâs election fixed America. It is instead the much more modest but vital hope that Republicans can still lose power in elections. The midterm elections will be a test not so much of whether the Democratic Party will finally become the heroic resistance heroes we needâthey wonâtâbut rather a test of whether Trump and Co. will have it together to suppress the vote to the degree that elections, also, need to be crossed off the list of fruitful avenues of opposition.
We are going to see ICE agents at polling places, and politically motivated government investigations of political opponents, and possibly a number of non-Republican politicians and activists arrested and put in jail. That will be the setting of the midterm elections. Trump is a man who does not believe in even the abstract concept of losing an election. He is surrounded by yes men top to bottom in the federal government, and he has armies of armed agents at his disposal. The midterm elections are going to be a very, very important gut check for our democracy, and the extent to which it still functions. We, all of us, all of civil society, must protect the integrity of those elections at all costs. If the Trump administration is able to suppress the vote so severely that the midterms cannot be seen as fair, we are in an even worse place than we are now.
Having given up on the possibility of a Supreme Court line in the sand, I am now looking at those elections as the next most important data point about how much hope is left to return to our traditional standard of ânormal.â Apart from the elections, the other meaningful source of opposition is: Us. People. I have hoped that organized labor could be the rallying point for popular opposition to dictatorship. So far, that hasnât happened. Institutionally, the long decline in union power has rendered organized labor extremely ineffective, disorganized in the face of a war on the existence of public sector unions, and unable to act in a powerful, concerted fashion on a nationwide scale. It is still possible, however, for unions to be one part of a grassroots coalition that forms to battle this out. The national protest movement we have seen ariseâmost recently the âNo Kingsâ protestsâshows me that the bulk of public opinion is on the right side here. The fascists are a minority. Stopping their advance, though, will require funneling the public opposition into organizations, into all facets of direct actions. What we have now is the sentiment, but not the organization. It can be built. The situation is not, in any sense, hopeless. There is much more to be said about the mechanics of all this, but for now, join an organization that is in the fight, and fight.
Itâs just that the path is narrower. We donât gain anything by telling ourselves fairy tales about what is coming. If the courts wonât do their ostensible job of saving us then it is time to think of the law not as the arena of our salvation but as a minefield to pick our way around carefully en route to a more promising destination.
Promises The âTrump Phoneâ Would Be âMade In USAâ Lasted 1/100th Of A Scaramucci. The Trump organization has scrubbed its website of claims that the phone would be made in America. Now the site has handwaving about how the phone will be infused with âAmerican values.â By Karl Bode at Techdirt.
Nations Are People. Do you deserve to die for your own bad government?
If you live in America, your government is run by Donald Trump. Ugh. You might despise that guy. You might have worked hard against him during campaign season. When you visit another country, and tell them that you are American, you might add, âBut donât judge me!â You would not want to be branded with the weight of the various stupid and despicable actions of your own government. You understand, first, that you do not agree with those things, and second, that you as a regular person have little power to affect those things. You are just living your life. You want to be respected as a human being.
âUnfortunately, this simple and intuitive understanding of the difference between the government and the people of your own country often evaporatesâor gets erasedâwhen the discussion turns to foreign countries. When someone says âRussia,â you probably think of Putin, not of the teenage girl dreaming of what she will do after graduation. When someone says âIran,â you probably think of something that is often referred to as âthe regime,â rather than of the laughing family gathering for a holiday meal. This mental mistake, this unwitting juxtaposition of one thing for a different thing, is like a steamroller that paves the way for you to accept unacceptable things. You would never nod sagely and agree that a bomb should be dropped on a child. But air strikes to âcrippleâ the âcommand and controlâ of a âhostile regime?â Well, of course, serious people understand that this may be necessary in the grand chessboard that is geopolitics.
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Are you willing to be killed for your own governmentâs sins? Are you willing to have your house destroyed and your child hit by shrapnel and your elderly parents lose access to medicine because of the policies of the latest president? If that seems unfair for you, it is unfair for anyone, anywhere. From this perspective, it is easy to see that the hurdle that a war must clear to be truly moral is so high that it stretches up into the clouds. Grounding ourselves in this perspectiveâalways holding people, and their right to live, in the forefront of our mindsâis the only way to make clear judgments about what our own government does with its killing machines.
Seriously, use the browser you like, donât worry about battery. Matt Birchler has advice for Mac users.
On r/AskReddit: What things in porn actually happen in real life?. Pizza is delivered.
The New York Times and Fox News agree â the New York subway is scary. Hamilton Nolan disagrees.
Subwayâs not scary. Itâs fine and safe. Itâs full of women and children. There are tons of old ladies on there. You should def be helping those old ladies carry their grocery carts up the stairs. That is an issue we can discuss. The rest of the stuff, I donât know what youâre talking about.
You sound real corny being scared of the subway.
When I say this, you may read my meaning to be, âThe subways are fine if you are brave,â or âRiding the subway is a character-building because it teaches you to be tough.â No. Iâm not saying that. Iâm saying that the subway is fine. It is not scary. It is the standard mode of transportation for millions of New Yorkers. Six million rides a day. Let me try to put it in terms that a non-New Yorker can understand. âI am scared of riding the Google shuttle bus to my job at Google.â âI am scared of riding the Epcot monorail.â See how crazy that sounds? Same basic thing.
Most of the people who live outside the city drive cars to work. This is far more dangerous than riding the subway. Last year there were ten murders in the NYC subway system, with well over a billion total rides taken. During the same time period, there were 253 traffic fatalities in New York City. One person dead every day and a half. Cars? Those things are fucking dangerous. The subway? You might be tempted to buy a churro. Could be damaging to your diet, yeah. But you can work it off. Donât make such a big deal out of it.
There are homeless people on the subway. They are there because they have no homes. Some of them are mentally ill. If you ride the subway a lot, it is possible that you will see a homeless person who does not smell good sleeping on a train. It is possible that you will see a mentally ill person ranting and raving. This may make you uncomfortable. But imagine how they feel. Not only are they homeless, but they are also in need of mental health treatment, and they donât have it, and instead they are consigned to riding a train all day, where people constantly move away from them and view them with disgust. An awful fate.
What might a serious policy response to this situation look like, from mature adults who take this issue seriously? Is it⊠âhave cops with guns arrest them all?â Come on. Give me a freaking break. Stupid Rambo ass policy. A real solution would involve a serious investment in mental health and housing programs, and then having a dedicated team of outreach workers who can go onto subways and connect the homeless people there to the services they need. Incidentally, this is Zohran Mamdaniâs proposal. When Serious Political Thinkers talk about it, they say âhe wants to defund the police.â
Mitchellaneous Vol. XCIII: Ten things I saw on the Internet
O Monstro do Espaço (The Star Beast) by Robert A. Heinlein. Portuguese edition, 1982.Â
