Democracy Defenders: Celebrate Today
While There Is Still a Country to Celebrate
Nothing betrays the promises made in the Declaration of Independence quite like the decisions Republicans are making lately.
Nothing says, “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness” like ripping away health care from tens of millions of people, crumbling rural hospitals and cutting funding or hospice patients, kids with cancer, parents with mental illness, grandparents who are aging in agony.
That is the malice that Trump and his GOP allies are bestowing on us every day, but yesterday especially when they passed the Big Ugly Bill out of the House for the president to sign.
This will destroy lives. It will end lives.
In Montana, where I live, more than 31,000 will be kicked off Medicaid. That’s the highest rate of Medicaid recipients in the country, yet my all-Republican congressional delegation cheered when it passed.
The outlook for America is bleak, so I understand the inclination to fall into despair, to turn inward, to stay home and not celebrate. Let those who ignorantly and arrogantly voted against their own interests light their sky fires and sing the Star Spangled Banner. It’s hard too hard for many of us to believe those hollow words anymore. Are we really the land of the free and the home of the brave when our leaders have stoked lies and fear about immigrants?
When we take food from the mouths of hungry babies?
When we have damned generations of Americans for the benefit of the wealthy one-percenters?
I can’t tell you how to behave like any of this is okay. I can’t share my steps for celebrating America as if it deserves a party. I can’t tell you you have to make a casserole to share and show up at a friend’s potluck or a town picnic. I can’t tell you how to crawl out of bed and claw forward on whatever remaining shreds of decency and goodness that remain in this country.
But I can tell you about my friend Tony.
After graduating from a prestigious university, Tony moved back to hometown to live near his family, especially his mom, who he’s incredibly close to. His college friends thought he was crazy. Tony is smart, adaptable, and showed so much ingenuity, so they couldn’t understand why he was willing to move back to a town that was small, familiar, and suffocating — especially for a gay man.
Tony moved back because he believes in the promise of rural America. His daily runs along the golden corn fields of his hometown are like a meditation. He volunteers at community fundraisers and for the library. Tony is walking the talk. He believes he can make his community stronger by investing in public education, making sure hungry kids are fed, and taking care of the town’s elders. That’s why Tony decided to run as a Democrat in a county that has only ever elected Republicans in the past 30 years. The election was hard and Tony lost by a decisive margin. But Tony is an optimist — and he never regrets a run.
About a year ago, Tony’s mom was diagnosed with cancer. Tony, who works remote and whose salary pays higher than most in the town, has not spared a single resource helping his mother fight. He flies her all over the country for experimental treatments. Sometimes I see him post photos from her hospital room, machines whirring behind her. Sometimes I see him take selfies with his mom on airplanes, her sparse hair poking out from a cap. Sometimes I see him sharing photos from his runs, the remnants of sunlight glittering behind a corn field.
It’s clear that Tony believes in his hometown, the way he believes his mom will beat cancer. Through his lens, I believe in what Tony believes because his resolve and goodness is so strong.
Earlier this year, I began to notice another type of photo. Tony began sharing protest photos. At first they were aligned with national protests: Hands Off! May Day! No Kings! During those protests, Tony was surrounded by community. The few Democrats in his county joined him. But I also noticed Tony was posting photos standing at the four-way stop of his hometown alone, holding a sign. Every Saturday that he can, he panhandles for kindness, generosity, and community. His cardboard signs says, “Love Not Hate Makes America Great.”
Today I’m flying my U.S. flag because Tony holds that sign. Today I’m celebrating America because Tony holds that sign. Today I’m inviting friends over because Tony holds that sign. Because against all odds, even when the country he loves strips away the healthcare from people he loves, Tony believes that American can and will be better someday.
Maybe we’re delusional, or maybe we are just optimists.
But Tony and I — we’re celebrating today.
And you should too. The grief you feel will never fully leave. The worry is justified. But if you stay in the fight, then somewhere along the way, those emotions will make room for resolve. Tenacity. Fierceness. Healing.
And hope that erupts like explosions in the sky.
Onward, Democracy Defenders!
I keep posting this everywhere I can.
OUR DEMOCRACY IS IN GRAVE DANGER AND YOU WON'T HAVE MIDTERMS VOTING.
The NO KING and any other protests aren't going to give us a win.
WE MUST FIGHT AND THERE IS ONLY ONE WAY
A NATIONWIDE STRIKE IS URGENT.
https://events.pol-rev.com/tag/General%20strike
Or
https://generalstrikeus.com/
We must have 3.5% of our total population, sign up using the link https://generalstrikeus.com/
This is a great movement and read all information then sign the strike card.
The midterms are already criminalized and won't have the results we pray and hope for.
We must act now. Please share this everywhere you have social medias accounts, email and tell friends and family.
Only: WE THE PEOPLE, are the last line of defense.
To reclaim our democracy, we must face an uncomfortable truth: we must halt the engine that fuels this regime. We must, together, choose to disrupt the very systems it relies upon. This means a collective act of non-cooperation. It means temporarily stopping the flow of productivity that empowers those who seek to undermine us. It means, for a time, accepting financial pain.
I understand the gravity of these words. I know the fear and uncertainty that such a prospect evokes. Families will struggle. Businesses will face hardship. But I ask you: what is the cost of losing our democracy? What is the price of living under a system where our rights are eroded, our voices are silenced, and our future is dictated by a few? That cost, my friends, is far greater and far more enduring than any temporary economic pain we might endure.
Think of those who came before us – who risked everything, who shed blood and treasure, to establish and preserve this nation. They endured famine, war, and unimaginable sacrifice for the promise of a free society. Are we, in this generation, less capable of defending that legacy?
This is not about surrender. This is about strategic withdrawal of our energy and resources from a system that has become weaponized against us. By stopping our collective productivity, we starve the regime of its power. We deny it the resources it needs to perpetuate its control. We create an undeniable crisis that forces a reckoning.
This will be painful. There is no sugarcoating it. But we are a resilient people. We are ingenious. We will organize. We will support each other through community, through shared resources, and through the unbreakable bonds of our common purpose. We must prepare for this pain, knowing that it is the necessary path to a greater good.
The choice before us is stark: a brief, intense period of shared hardship for the promise of a free future, or a slow, agonizing slide into authoritarianism with consequences that will echo for generations.
Let us rise to this challenge. Let us stand together, united in our resolve. Let us choose freedom, no matter the cost. Our democracy, our future, depends on it.
God bless America!
Everyone in America is getting crapped on by the World's Greatest Grifter. He just dropped a big one on everyone. No one except the billionaires will escape. And even smug MAGA's who think they are immune are in for a rude awakening as the bills pill up and the help disappears and the ability to know and be prepared for emergencies goes away. And Mother Nature is still coming, and has already started, and nothing the world's greatest BS artist can do to stop her. If fact he is helping her to get here sooner........... The longer people tie their future to him the worse it will be for everyone..........