I received this message from Penzey Spices in my facebook feed. Only the first half because it is quite long.
Can we talk? I get it. It’s heartbreaking watching Republican corruption sweep through Washington.
Seems to make no sense that those supposedly driven by eliminating waste are first eliminating the dedicated federal workers whose job it is to make sure government contractors deliver on what we are paying for. Seems to make even less sense that the largest recipient of government spending is overseeing this process.
Unless of course the whole point is to open the doors of the treasury to be looted by the president and his enablers. Musk sacrificed $20,000,000,000 turning Twitter into a pro-Trump echo chamber. The idea of the president rewarding him with a return on his investment would explain a lot.
Same thing with the president blaming Russia’s invasion of its neighbor Ukraine on Ukraine. It makes no sense to open the door to Russia invading more of its neighbors. Why would we enable the enemies of democracy and abandon our allies? Makes no sense.
Unless of course our president is on the payroll of Russia, and China, and Saudi Arabia. Then suddenly it all makes complete sense. We may never see his financials, we may never know for sure. But from my experience, once you assume he is on the payroll of our enemies, you will be done with ever being surprised by what he does next.
This level of corruption, this level of selling out of our fundamental bedrock American values, is far-far beyond anything that has happened in our nation's history. I understand how many of you can be feeling heartbroken right now. That’s only natural, but know they are taking advantage of your heartbreak. Don’t let them.
Their blitzkrieg “Shock and Awe” of this past month was designed to break spirits and silence all those who object to their attack on our values and our institutions. But we knew who he was from his first four years. Nothing shocking here.
And there’s nothing awe-inspiring in the cast of characters he has unleashed on our government. From the barely adult Musk minions right up to his appointed cabinet secretaries, it truly is just a bunch of amateurs. No awesome here. Not at all.
They want you silent. They need you silent. So this probably won’t shock or awe you either, but we’re saying don’t be silent.
As much as this is heartbreaking, as much as this seems hopeless, all of this is pretty much following the standard arc these things take. Ending the silence is the first step.
There is no magic wand we can wave to reverse the last election, but that doesn’t mean we can’t greatly reduce just how much they can get away with or start the process of building the turnout for the next election to the actual landslide needed to reverse the changes now being made.
So please. Stop the silence. Share with friends. Alert the family. Wake the neighbors. Talk about the good people being hurt. Dedicated federal employees who have given so much to their country; transgender kids just trying to fit; immigrants who do all our hardest, most needed work. People with preexisting medical conditions.
Do we really need to cut Medicaid and lose so many lives just to get people who already have billions of dollars tax cuts? No. No, we really don’t. Talk about the cruelty. Talk about the corruption. Talk about the billions of actual people worldwide who are being hurt by the president’s attacks on democracy. This can’t stand.
www.newsweek.com
forward.com
bsky.app
nickcohen.substack.com
