I've written a couple blog posts about political things/the current situation. I might have written more but I've been in a quandary for a while. I haven't wanted all that to intrude on the coziness of my website. I want my site to be a respite. But I read things and save stuff and really want to share it all. Even though I don't want politics to intrude on the site in general, I definitely have thoughts and feelings about what's going on. But I'm just a regular person with no ground-shaking insights into things and you can find anyone's opinions on what's happening all over the place. In fact, it is sometimes hard to avoid it all. And then I'm back to wanting to keep this place tranquil and not bombarding anyone with my not-so-special thoughts.
I still don't know what I want to do but I decided today I'm at least going to make this blog post. We'll see what it turns into, if anything!
Let me start off by saying I am Gen X. What does that mean for the purpose of this post? Not sure but I might say something and you'll think, "Man, how can she think that .... ooooh, she's Gen X, that explains it." Or not. Just thought it would be helpful to place myself generationally.
I am appalled at everything. At the utter lack of guardrails on anything happening in the government. At the complete, craven capitulation of an entire (currently controlling) political party. At the complicity of many members of the other party. At the fact that we have fucking concentration camps now. It's almost incomprehensible to me. Still. Even after 6 months.
So, a lot of people are doom and gloom - democracy is dead, we'll never have elections again! And guys, if you are thinking that way, stop it. That's what this fascist regime wants you to think. Thinking like that is complying in advance, which just helps along their plans. The situation currently sucks and I guarantee it will get worse as this regime repeatedly overreaches and tries to hold onto power. Democracy has taken a beating and its opponent has been planning this for decades. But we will have elections in the midterms and, while democracy is seriously wounded, it's not dead yet.
Speaking of elections - there are people out there who are thinking all we need to do is hold on till midterm elections and then Democrats will be voted back in, the MAGA republicans will be voted out and things will get back to normal. And, no. That sweet pipe dream will not happen, for many reasons. For one, no one should count on the Democrats as "the good guys," come to save the day. That whole party has their own problems and issues. And even if Democrats win a majority in the House, there is still the Senate and the current president to deal with. There will be Congressional elections but only, I believe, a third of the Senate is up for re-election and, despite all that has happened, there are people who are going to vote Republican no matter what. So get the idea of a dramatic change next year out of your mind. There will be change! But it won't substantial change.
Then there are people who think well, we just have to ride out this term and then we'll have a new president in 2028 and things will go back to normal. And, no. We may have a new president in 2028 (and I absolutely believe it will NOT be the current one) but things will not automatically go back to normal.
Our government's functioning has been severly compromised, any soft power our nation had is almost gone at this point and our relationships with our allies will never be the same again. Economically, we've been hurt by this ridiculous tariff situation because markets that turn away from us will find new trading partners and we will not get that business back. I have no idea what kind of economic hole we might find ourselves in by 2028 but considering the chairman of the Federal Reserve can be replaced next year with one of the president's sycophants who will do his bidding regarding interest rates, I'm thinking the situation will be heavily flavored with stagflation. And a simple change of which party is in charge will not magically change that nor will change, when it does happen, go quickly.
There are things that give me hope, even in the midst of this morass.
This is not the first time we've been in this situation. We've had tyrannical corrupt governments, we've had tariff situations and we've even had concentration camps and mass deportations before. America has some really ugly parts in its past. But we came out of all those situations before and we will get out of this one. I don't think it will be quick or easy and a lot of people who should pay for what they've done will face no consequences at all. That fucking sucks but that's history. Takeaway: we will get out of this.
Another thing that gives me hope is the pushback and resistance from the people. Maybe protesting has started as soon as it did because knowledge about everything that happens is so immediate - you don't have to wait for a weekly paper or nightly news to find out what happened in other places. It's kind of a double-edged sword, I think, in that knowing about all of the things that are happening can be demoralizing but it has also helped fuel resistance to manifest quickly. Takeaway: the people are protesting! We're not just laying down, we are standing up and demanding to be heard!
I also look to what others have to say to find hope (or at least understanding). There are a bazillion social media accounts you can follow to get perspective on and find out what's going on. YouTube is my poison of choice and I wanted to share some of the people I follow on there.
If you only check out one of the channels here, make it Belle of the Ranch. She does 3 short videos a day analyzing current topics. The delivery is down home and folksy but the research and thought she puts into her answers are stellar. There is a secondary channel, The Roads with Belle which does 3 different video series: The Roads Not Taken - underreported news that will add context to future stories; Research Road - weekly science and tech news round up; and The Interstate - state level news that might not have made it in the national news yet. All of them are super interesting although if AI voices bother you, both Research Road with "Dana" and The Interstate with "Dee" are AI-narrated although they've been highly personified and I find the content worth listening to.
I highly, highly recommend listening to and/or reading what Heather Cox Richardson has to say. I watch her on YouTube - on Tuesdays and Thursdays she holds politics chats that I find very informative. These live chats are also held on Faceboook, if you do that instead of YouTube. Lately she's had someone go through her chats, which are about 35-45 minutes and chop them up into sections so you may want to look through her channel and see if a particular topic interests you. She also writes a nightly Letters from an American. She is an historian and this is a record of what's happening in our times. Sometimes they are entirely about a historical event but often she is chronicling what this administration has done and she will also correalate something that happened historically with what is happening today. It's freaking Substack, sorry about that, but her content is free and well, well worth reading.
Paul Warburg is a geopolitical analyst and he provides analyses of global topics but many of them relate to what is currently going on in the US. I like him because he speaks in a down to earth, easy to understand manner. He's also an independent so I think you're getting a fairly unvarnished view of what's going on. The videos are usually around the 30 minute mark.
Resistor Vic is a guy from Colorado who does very short videos (usually 5 minutes or less) giving his thoughts on the current situation. Right now, in addition to his daily briefing, he's doing a multi part series on the budget bill that just passed, highlighting a section of it each day.
This is getting kind of long so I'm going to end it for now. Well, almost. I said at the start that I didn't know what to do about adding politics talk to the site but I'm kind of lying. I have so much I want to share and say, more than can really fit in a blog post. I've been thinking about making a web page with all of this (a digital garden?) but my issues are still there - it doesn't fit in with the overall cozy theme of the site. I mean, Pixel Art, Cats and Overthrow the Government. Which of these doesn't belong? So maybe I'll stick with a series of blog posts. Maybe I'll do my digital garden page and try to think of some innocuous name for it. We'll see. If you have any thoughts, about any of this, I'd be interested in them!