Dan, this Substack post--and what's happening now--motivated me to renew my paid subscription. I've had several disagreements that made me (rather pettily) cancel my earlier subscription, but now is not the time for such pettiness. All of us who are to the left of Liz Cheney need to suck it up and put our internal squabbles on mute NOW--because as some guy put it a good 250 years ago, we all hang together, or we each hang separately.
The NFL kowtowing to the insanity around Kirk doesn’t surprise me. The blowhard owners are the most transparent super-patriots in Corporate America. They literally wrap themselves in the flag at every game, with a salute to the flag, the national anthem, and for god’s sake, military flyovers. If we all weren’t so used to it we’d realize the sham and incongruity.
Of course this is all cynical on their part. It’s a shabby device to make sure everyone inextricably links America and patriotism with football. It’s so shameless, you’d think they were selling pickup trucks.
Get involved in a local pro-democracy organization: Indivisible, your local Dem party, League of Women Voters, ACLU, NAACP - there are tons. Or get involved in a mutual aid group like your food bank or immigrant support. And if there isn't something, start one. Every actual face-to-face connection we make with another person who shares our values is a connection they have to break to achieve their goals. Every connection makes protest louder. Every connection makes non-compliance more impactful. Think local. The French Resistance didn't swing at Hitler; they eroded Nazi power in their own back yard.
Yes, all of that! I guess I’m thinking about how someone like myself - not a University leader, not a corporate leader, something of a community leader, can use my own voice to set an example of refusing to be silenced. I do have a 3x5 resist flag flying, but that hardly seems enough. As you say, perhaps it’s the power of all of our voices together, refusing to be silenced.
Democrats need to be friendlier. Last time I went to an event with my local Democratic party, where we staffed a booth at a street party, it was hard to even get them to talk to me or each other. They just sat looking at their phones or staring into space. Also, there were almost no young people there. Everybody was in their seventies or eighties. It was hard to create any connection at all. I hope it's not like that in other places.
That's a bummer. In my town the Dems who do tabling are outgoing and friendly, and there are more young people (yay!!) involved lately. But older people are common likely because we are retired and thus have more time. I'm always inspired by younger people who are working full time, raising kids, and still do organizing.
The very heart of your message: “We are on the precipice of something very dangerous in this country. But Trump can only succeed if we choose silence.”
We should fill our social media and every outlet that we can think of with criticism of Trump and his acolytes on this subject. Freedom of speech is preserved by speaking. A lot. Quote freely from Dan’s newsletter. That’s why he writes it.
Someone else here referenced Benjamin Franklin. He also said, “Whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation must begin by subduing the freeness of speech.”
I'm not sure this is a safe thing to do in parts of red America. I do not fill my social media feed with criticism of Trump, even to a selected audience. It turns people off, for one thing: they are tired of hearing what they already know. Preaching to the choir doesn't work, and trying to persuade the Other Side also doesn't work. I think people will have to figure out for themselves that Trump is a con man. Some of them may already have figured this out, and they don't care, because the chaos is so entertaining.
Perhaps. I live in Florida and in a fairly conservative (semi-nutty) area. I have made sure it would be difficult to find the physical me from any clue in the virtual me.
You are right — you first responsibility to keep yourself safe. I try not to be reckless about it, but I refuse to do what Trump wants us to do, which is keep quiet. I am thankful people like Dan, the PSA guys, and a lot of elected Dems also don’t keep quiet. But it times like these, it’s up to everyone who feels they can.
I repeat: focusing on Trump is what he wants. When are the GOP Quislings going to be held to account? It’s unacceptable to give them a pass. They should be asked directly if they agree with the threats made by Vance and Miller.
As for fear, I implore those in my sphere not to give into it. Fear is MAGA’s currency so don’t buy it - devalue it.
Just checked CNN, no actual violent acts reported as yet, despite the unprecented level of RW hysteria threatening a Rwanda level bloodbath, a crusade to kill (or at least completely silence) us demonic liberals.
Thus, so far, a long standing pattern persists - extreme rhetorical violence coupled with comparatively very little actual violence. What we've seen is acts by lone, disordered individuals - including Kirk's killer. There still has been no large scale, organized, RW violence since Jan 6, 2021. Trump was arraigned,tried, and convicted without incident. My personal term for this is, "the kayfabe factor". We seem to live in two seperate worlds now. Particularly MAGA insists on their own online world, ever more divergent from material reality.
Trump is attempting to govern and consolidate power through terror, but he does not, to this point, command the actual force to back it up. There isn't the scale. The laws haven't changed, District Judges are standing firm. I expect, in time, successful lawsuits for wrongful termination. The law's delay gives ample time for this hysteria to exhaust itself. Other matters will command public attention, particularly Epstein, with months, even years, worth of revelations to come (discharge petition will soon have 218 votes). Then, there's the economy, and healthcare, with growing dysfunction and immiseration. Trump now wants to restrict economic information, which worked so (not) well for him during Covid, but that's his only play.
So, don't panic, at least not just yet? Warren nailed it, it's Trump who needs to chill, not us. Stick to that.
Dan, your posts mean so much to so many of us. You acknowledge the fear being generated, and yet you calmly encourage us to keep going. Besides being a subscriber to the Message Box, I also subscribe to Brian Tyler Cohen (who is, I think, also striking the right tone,) and the Bulwark, which is mixed. Tim Miller is doing a lot of angry scolding of people on the left based on random posts and a couple of face-to-face encounters he had with people who said things that were less than empathetic. What we on the left need right now is not a scolding, but some guidance on how to move forward during these repressive times. And you are doing your best to provide that. Much appreciated.
The irony in all of this is to assume that the left is organized enough to have any kind of strategy, especially now. I say that as a life-long lefty. But all of this is chilling. I'm attending in-service for fall term at my college where we have a TPUSA chapter, and I am very worried, even though we are in a small, podunk town.
I live in a similar small college town in TN. There is a TPUSA chapter. A few years ago, a local Democrat on the faculty doxxed the TPUSA sponsor by putting his face and name on a flyer that she distributed all over the campus, including in the building where he worked (the nursing school). The flyer accused him of racism and said, "You are on our list."
She was disciplined, a little. Until then, few people even know of TPUSA. But suddenly, the students found out that you could out your professor for being liberal. I was very angry that she did this: it endangered everybody who was in higher education and was liberal. But local Democrats thought she was really cool. That's when I became disillusioned with local Democrats.
dang. That's a lot. I think this campus is making an effort to support communication among student groups and faculty, so none of that has happened. Whew.
Yeah, this was just two crazy people who like stirring up chaos and becoming infamous for a little while. They actually wanted to be on TPUSA's professor watch list, and now they are. It was so destructive though to the reputation of liberals in this community. They didn't care.
Hope the top people at the organizations most likely to be top of Stephen Miller's list get out in front immediately, sue them right now for accusing the groups for doing anything but working to provide free speech for all. If they wait to see what is coming, it can be too late because history shows they could lose their funding and standing with people who want the right to peacefully protest and have their voices heard.
"borders" on McCarthyism? This is the new McCarthyism, pure. People are getting fired for their opinions, egged on by members of the administration and, increasingly, others in positions of power. Try to take the 50-years-from-now view. That's exactly how this will be interpreted.
It's getting to be like Communist China, if people always feel they have to edit their public (and at times, private) language. But the guy at the top instigating all of this is a moron of exceptional extent. How is this possible in America?
I hope that the courts will push back against all this censorship and retaliation. It is clearly illegal.
Trump and his handlers may think they hit the jackpot with a timely assassination, as it distracts people from the Epstein files and from Trump's general unpopularity with voters. This incident may work to move voters back to the Trump fold, if they believe that the "violent Left" is to blame for the assassination. But it may not work. Voters seem pretty focused on economic issues, and they "forget" about even violent and shocking events pretty quickly.
I had a dream the night before Charlie Kirk was killed: in the dream, a house had been flooded with yellow poop by a man in a suit. I was supposed to clean it up. The man did not say anything about it, and neither did I. (He said he worked for JP Morgan!) Today I realized that this dream may have been about "flooding the zone with shit," as Steve Bannon famously advised Republicans to do. His theory is that by flooding the zone with shit--meaning too many events, too fast, too confusing--you distract voters so that you can do what you want to without them noticing.
Remember that Kirk's assassination was inner-party violence, not political. Political violence in this case suggests that it was committed by a democrat, which it wasn't.
Reading this article (thanks, Dan) inspired this thought; admittedly, a touch long, but please read and respond. Ok, so many years ago, we appreciated, “the news,” because we believed it was objective and unbiased - - we wanted to be informed and, then, form our own thoughts and opinions. More recently, “Social Media” was born and, in its infancy, was used by some to share innocent, in-the-moment thoughts: “OMG, shoe lace broke!” But it has matured. Now, folks use it to “influence” the thoughts and opinions of others.
I think it necessary that we have some mechanism that prevents good yet susceptible people, from being “influenced” by bad actors.
If we assume that we cannot bring back “The Fairness Doctrine,” then is there a demand for a space in the Internet for an unbiased, objective and fair repository for “news”? Obviously, it would have to utilize real-time apps (chat, live stream video, etc.). But, what if anyone who writes or posts to this repository voluntarily takes an obligation of journalistic integrity - - that is, unbiased, objective and fair reporting - - the violation of which has some form of punishment/repercussion.
Does anyone think that may be a worthwhile avenue to pursue? And, regardless of your thoughts (yes/no), please share the reasons why. I do not wish to engage in debate, but would welcome a free-flow of ideas on this topic exchanged among friends. Thank you.
I think the problem you run into is when someone sets themselves ip as the arbiter of what is legit news, that entity is now a censor.
If we ever are in power sgain, I eould like a law passed that either disallows algorithmic control of who sees what, or a required “plain English” explanation of every algorithm freely and widely available to all.
Dan, this Substack post--and what's happening now--motivated me to renew my paid subscription. I've had several disagreements that made me (rather pettily) cancel my earlier subscription, but now is not the time for such pettiness. All of us who are to the left of Liz Cheney need to suck it up and put our internal squabbles on mute NOW--because as some guy put it a good 250 years ago, we all hang together, or we each hang separately.
The NFL kowtowing to the insanity around Kirk doesn’t surprise me. The blowhard owners are the most transparent super-patriots in Corporate America. They literally wrap themselves in the flag at every game, with a salute to the flag, the national anthem, and for god’s sake, military flyovers. If we all weren’t so used to it we’d realize the sham and incongruity.
Of course this is all cynical on their part. It’s a shabby device to make sure everyone inextricably links America and patriotism with football. It’s so shameless, you’d think they were selling pickup trucks.
Gobsmacked by the NFL moments of silence. But Dan, what’s your average reader to do? Other than to continue to participate in protests?
Get involved in a local pro-democracy organization: Indivisible, your local Dem party, League of Women Voters, ACLU, NAACP - there are tons. Or get involved in a mutual aid group like your food bank or immigrant support. And if there isn't something, start one. Every actual face-to-face connection we make with another person who shares our values is a connection they have to break to achieve their goals. Every connection makes protest louder. Every connection makes non-compliance more impactful. Think local. The French Resistance didn't swing at Hitler; they eroded Nazi power in their own back yard.
Yes, all of that! I guess I’m thinking about how someone like myself - not a University leader, not a corporate leader, something of a community leader, can use my own voice to set an example of refusing to be silenced. I do have a 3x5 resist flag flying, but that hardly seems enough. As you say, perhaps it’s the power of all of our voices together, refusing to be silenced.
Post of the day. Great thoughts.
Democrats need to be friendlier. Last time I went to an event with my local Democratic party, where we staffed a booth at a street party, it was hard to even get them to talk to me or each other. They just sat looking at their phones or staring into space. Also, there were almost no young people there. Everybody was in their seventies or eighties. It was hard to create any connection at all. I hope it's not like that in other places.
That's a bummer. In my town the Dems who do tabling are outgoing and friendly, and there are more young people (yay!!) involved lately. But older people are common likely because we are retired and thus have more time. I'm always inspired by younger people who are working full time, raising kids, and still do organizing.
Thank you for making this one a “free” one. I’m a subscriber but was glad this could be shared!
The very heart of your message: “We are on the precipice of something very dangerous in this country. But Trump can only succeed if we choose silence.”
We should fill our social media and every outlet that we can think of with criticism of Trump and his acolytes on this subject. Freedom of speech is preserved by speaking. A lot. Quote freely from Dan’s newsletter. That’s why he writes it.
Someone else here referenced Benjamin Franklin. He also said, “Whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation must begin by subduing the freeness of speech.”
I'm not sure this is a safe thing to do in parts of red America. I do not fill my social media feed with criticism of Trump, even to a selected audience. It turns people off, for one thing: they are tired of hearing what they already know. Preaching to the choir doesn't work, and trying to persuade the Other Side also doesn't work. I think people will have to figure out for themselves that Trump is a con man. Some of them may already have figured this out, and they don't care, because the chaos is so entertaining.
Perhaps. I live in Florida and in a fairly conservative (semi-nutty) area. I have made sure it would be difficult to find the physical me from any clue in the virtual me.
You are right — you first responsibility to keep yourself safe. I try not to be reckless about it, but I refuse to do what Trump wants us to do, which is keep quiet. I am thankful people like Dan, the PSA guys, and a lot of elected Dems also don’t keep quiet. But it times like these, it’s up to everyone who feels they can.
I repeat: focusing on Trump is what he wants. When are the GOP Quislings going to be held to account? It’s unacceptable to give them a pass. They should be asked directly if they agree with the threats made by Vance and Miller.
As for fear, I implore those in my sphere not to give into it. Fear is MAGA’s currency so don’t buy it - devalue it.
Epstein anyone???
Lawrence O'Donnell, lasr night. Back to normal!
Just checked CNN, no actual violent acts reported as yet, despite the unprecented level of RW hysteria threatening a Rwanda level bloodbath, a crusade to kill (or at least completely silence) us demonic liberals.
Thus, so far, a long standing pattern persists - extreme rhetorical violence coupled with comparatively very little actual violence. What we've seen is acts by lone, disordered individuals - including Kirk's killer. There still has been no large scale, organized, RW violence since Jan 6, 2021. Trump was arraigned,tried, and convicted without incident. My personal term for this is, "the kayfabe factor". We seem to live in two seperate worlds now. Particularly MAGA insists on their own online world, ever more divergent from material reality.
Trump is attempting to govern and consolidate power through terror, but he does not, to this point, command the actual force to back it up. There isn't the scale. The laws haven't changed, District Judges are standing firm. I expect, in time, successful lawsuits for wrongful termination. The law's delay gives ample time for this hysteria to exhaust itself. Other matters will command public attention, particularly Epstein, with months, even years, worth of revelations to come (discharge petition will soon have 218 votes). Then, there's the economy, and healthcare, with growing dysfunction and immiseration. Trump now wants to restrict economic information, which worked so (not) well for him during Covid, but that's his only play.
So, don't panic, at least not just yet? Warren nailed it, it's Trump who needs to chill, not us. Stick to that.
Dan, your posts mean so much to so many of us. You acknowledge the fear being generated, and yet you calmly encourage us to keep going. Besides being a subscriber to the Message Box, I also subscribe to Brian Tyler Cohen (who is, I think, also striking the right tone,) and the Bulwark, which is mixed. Tim Miller is doing a lot of angry scolding of people on the left based on random posts and a couple of face-to-face encounters he had with people who said things that were less than empathetic. What we on the left need right now is not a scolding, but some guidance on how to move forward during these repressive times. And you are doing your best to provide that. Much appreciated.
The irony in all of this is to assume that the left is organized enough to have any kind of strategy, especially now. I say that as a life-long lefty. But all of this is chilling. I'm attending in-service for fall term at my college where we have a TPUSA chapter, and I am very worried, even though we are in a small, podunk town.
I live in a similar small college town in TN. There is a TPUSA chapter. A few years ago, a local Democrat on the faculty doxxed the TPUSA sponsor by putting his face and name on a flyer that she distributed all over the campus, including in the building where he worked (the nursing school). The flyer accused him of racism and said, "You are on our list."
She was disciplined, a little. Until then, few people even know of TPUSA. But suddenly, the students found out that you could out your professor for being liberal. I was very angry that she did this: it endangered everybody who was in higher education and was liberal. But local Democrats thought she was really cool. That's when I became disillusioned with local Democrats.
dang. That's a lot. I think this campus is making an effort to support communication among student groups and faculty, so none of that has happened. Whew.
Yeah, this was just two crazy people who like stirring up chaos and becoming infamous for a little while. They actually wanted to be on TPUSA's professor watch list, and now they are. It was so destructive though to the reputation of liberals in this community. They didn't care.
Hope the top people at the organizations most likely to be top of Stephen Miller's list get out in front immediately, sue them right now for accusing the groups for doing anything but working to provide free speech for all. If they wait to see what is coming, it can be too late because history shows they could lose their funding and standing with people who want the right to peacefully protest and have their voices heard.
This is time for a bi partisan gun control act. It's time for the Charlie Kirk Gun Reform Act. Sign https://resist.bot/petitions/PDRJDG
That's not going to happen.
It's worth a try.
Make Rs vote No. Red Flag law would be most difficult to oppose, istm.
"borders" on McCarthyism? This is the new McCarthyism, pure. People are getting fired for their opinions, egged on by members of the administration and, increasingly, others in positions of power. Try to take the 50-years-from-now view. That's exactly how this will be interpreted.
It's getting to be like Communist China, if people always feel they have to edit their public (and at times, private) language. But the guy at the top instigating all of this is a moron of exceptional extent. How is this possible in America?
That's what dictatorship is like--cruel, poor, mean and filled with self-censored lives. Fun.
I hope that the courts will push back against all this censorship and retaliation. It is clearly illegal.
Trump and his handlers may think they hit the jackpot with a timely assassination, as it distracts people from the Epstein files and from Trump's general unpopularity with voters. This incident may work to move voters back to the Trump fold, if they believe that the "violent Left" is to blame for the assassination. But it may not work. Voters seem pretty focused on economic issues, and they "forget" about even violent and shocking events pretty quickly.
I had a dream the night before Charlie Kirk was killed: in the dream, a house had been flooded with yellow poop by a man in a suit. I was supposed to clean it up. The man did not say anything about it, and neither did I. (He said he worked for JP Morgan!) Today I realized that this dream may have been about "flooding the zone with shit," as Steve Bannon famously advised Republicans to do. His theory is that by flooding the zone with shit--meaning too many events, too fast, too confusing--you distract voters so that you can do what you want to without them noticing.
Right now--we need to be more street vocal. The Courts may help--but we are being called forward.
Remember that Kirk's assassination was inner-party violence, not political. Political violence in this case suggests that it was committed by a democrat, which it wasn't.
Reading this article (thanks, Dan) inspired this thought; admittedly, a touch long, but please read and respond. Ok, so many years ago, we appreciated, “the news,” because we believed it was objective and unbiased - - we wanted to be informed and, then, form our own thoughts and opinions. More recently, “Social Media” was born and, in its infancy, was used by some to share innocent, in-the-moment thoughts: “OMG, shoe lace broke!” But it has matured. Now, folks use it to “influence” the thoughts and opinions of others.
I think it necessary that we have some mechanism that prevents good yet susceptible people, from being “influenced” by bad actors.
If we assume that we cannot bring back “The Fairness Doctrine,” then is there a demand for a space in the Internet for an unbiased, objective and fair repository for “news”? Obviously, it would have to utilize real-time apps (chat, live stream video, etc.). But, what if anyone who writes or posts to this repository voluntarily takes an obligation of journalistic integrity - - that is, unbiased, objective and fair reporting - - the violation of which has some form of punishment/repercussion.
Does anyone think that may be a worthwhile avenue to pursue? And, regardless of your thoughts (yes/no), please share the reasons why. I do not wish to engage in debate, but would welcome a free-flow of ideas on this topic exchanged among friends. Thank you.
I think the problem you run into is when someone sets themselves ip as the arbiter of what is legit news, that entity is now a censor.
If we ever are in power sgain, I eould like a law passed that either disallows algorithmic control of who sees what, or a required “plain English” explanation of every algorithm freely and widely available to all.