Category: Let’s Talk Politics

Two nights ago at the Grammys, Bad Bunny won Album of the Year—the first time a Spanish-language album has clinched the top honor. His powerful acceptance speech grabbed headlines at a time when simply speaking Spanish is grounds to be profiled and detained by ICE. He stated, “We’re not savage; we’re not animals; we’re not aliens. We are humans and we are Americans…Hate gets more powerful with more hate. The only thing that is more powerful than hate is love.”

As Bad Bunny’s team gears up for their Super Bowl performance this weekend, MAGA is going apoplectic with rage, trying to organize a boycott. Turning Point USA has vowed to host its own “All-American Halftime Show” to celebrate “Faith, Family, and Freedom.” (Who’s going to remind them that Puerto Ricans are American citizens?) 

The Right’s killjoy attitude made me consider what a truly American soundtrack would be for the Super Bowl. With all of today’s political division and anger, I imagine it would be loaded with minor keys, dissonance, uneven rhythms, tension, and eerie synths. It would get louder as life’s stresses ratchet up, and would be masked temporarily by the distractions of a hit TV show or football game. It would be heard most clearly through chainlink fences, abandoned buildings, and streets cratered with potholes. It would quiet slightly as payday loan signs and pawn shops give way to Applebee’s and Home Depot, becoming fainter still among the small, polished storefronts of boutique businesses. 

But this anxious thrum would never disappear completely because the threat of losing it all underlies my life and yours. On any given day, a person in the US can set out on the road to bankruptcy. It happens when your child goes to the ER with a spiking fever. It happens when your 401(k) collapses because of self-dealing executives. It happens when your home burns down, and the insurance company denies your claim. It happens when you’re forced to close your business because ICE arrests you at your immigration hearing. It happens every damn day here. 

Right now, we have no real, dependable financial or physical security. Our soundtrack keeps our nerves on edge because we are at the behest of a rich few who would rather hoard resources and armor-plate their lives than pay their fair share of taxes. 

Compared to the rest of the developed world, the average American is unhealthy, unhappy, and in debt. We don’t even rank among the world’s 20 happiest countries—a list dominated by Scandinavia and other parts of Europe. Young people in the US are especially anxious, lonely, and stressed, feelings that have persisted for several years after the pandemic. And although people over 70 comprise only 11 percent of our country, they hold 30 percent of our wealth—a record share that is growing. 

We also spend comparatively more on healthcare, and yet we lead shorter, more disease-prone lives, with higher rates of obesity, chronic lung disease, HIV/AIDS, drug overdoses, infant mortality, and homicide.

A mind-boggling 72 million Americans—41 percent of working-age people—have medical debt. This number swells to 79 million if we include elderly folks. Even if you have a job, whether or not you hold medical debt is basically a coin toss.

Conservatives contend that we pay lower taxes than many nations, which is true, but with soaring prices for basic necessities and without a proper safety net, the majority continues to sink. Further, the ascension of AI and the continued consolidation of American companies are likely to exacerbate the plight of the working and middle classes. 

Folks may struggle to find work outside of service, healthcare, or the trades in the near future. A majority of the white-collar workforce could be replaced by cheap robots. Lawyers, radiographers, artists, engineers, teachers, writers, and many more professions could be replaced by a lucky few humans overseeing super-intelligent machines. 

Capital always acts in its own best interest; that is, profits over people. Every imaginable way that a company can make its owners and shareholders more money is explored. The tech broligarchy seems to believe that workers are an expensive problem to be solved—fat to be trimmed from the lean filet of our “optimized” market. But if you don’t pay living wages, boys, who do you expect to buy your shit? 

Most of our elected leaders aren’t helping. Many Democrats would rather cruise with the establishment and line their own pockets than work to unite the party with actual progressive policies. Republicans are even more hopeless; they brazenly slash food benefits while giving tax breaks for private jets and throwing money at wars against non-white people, internally and abroad. Their supreme leader’s main concern right now is building his gilded ballroom over the ruins of the White House’s East Wing.

Whether you’re a Democrat, Republican, independent, or non-voter, can we agree on one thing? If a person works 40 hours a week, they shouldn’t also have to be on food stamps or Medicaid. This is the government subsidizing greedy companies that refuse to pay their workers a living wage. 

As it stands, there’s too much luck and inherited privilege at play. The wealthy can drive their luxury cars down an open four-lane highway playing whatever song they want. They can swerve or even crash without much consequence. Look at Trump: six business bankruptcies, and yet he and other nepo babies fail up. The less fortunate are given a narrow balance beam, where a stiff breeze can throw them off course, and that stress-filled American soundtrack often becomes deafening.

Broadening opportunities for this second group is patriotic. The opening line of our Constitution reads, “We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, ensure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”

Promoting our “general Welfare” is often forgotten because people with grotesque wealth have convinced enough voters that having a strong social safety net (i.e., welfare) is anti-American. The truth is that punishing poverty runs counter to our most noble founding values. 

For those who believe that we’re a Christian nation, how about we lead with love, generosity, and acceptance rather than worshiping wealth and large corporations?

And here’s a radical idea: we should accept folks as they are—irrespective of gender, sexuality, culture, and ethnicity. That is what underpins American liberty. We have an enviable diversity that could serve as our country’s greatest strength if we let it. Can you imagine the collective sigh of relief if we all just dropped our weird prejudices? 

It might even help us change our current soundtrack to a better, more uplifting song—something sexy and fun like Bad Bunny.

Do you have friends who voted third-party in 2024? Folks who self-righteously eschew both the Left and Right, seeing Democrats and Republicans as two sides of the same coin? They might be self-described “Independents” who have difficulty stating which news sources they trust, putting FOX News and The New York Times into the same bucket of skepticism. Perhaps they’re calling for candidates with a more middle-of-the-road approach, or they don’t see anyone who perfectly embodies their values and have given up entirely on voting. Head, meet sand. 

While I share some of this cynicism in my darker moments, the false equivalence of Dems and the GOP is intellectually lazy. There are core differences between the two parties—they aren’t “the same” because leaders on both sides of the aisle make money from insider trading.  

A Democratic president, despite his faults, would never terrorize Minnesota with a $28.7 billion, poorly trained, racist paramilitary force. He would never consider seizing Greenland and alienating our allies. He would not punish red states by freezing $10 billion in federal funding for needy children.  He would not accept a luxury jet from Qatar or brazenly make $1.4 billion during his first year in office. He would not take a secondhand Nobel Peace Prize to assuage his ego. He would not try to stage a coup with fake electors because he didn’t like the results of a presidential election. And he would never issue a presidential pardon to hundreds of violent felons who attacked Capitol police officers. 

These are the acts of a deranged, power-hungry Emperor Palpatine. Broadly speaking, MAGA Republicans are the Empire—united, unthinking, unquestioning, obedient to male authority, and obsessed with power. They are deploying violent masked stormtroopers in cities, who are killing civilians and trying to ignite a backlash to justify further oppression and control. 

In their better moments, Dems make up the scrappy Rebel Alliance, which struggles to unite such a diverse coalition of interests. I’m disappointed that they are not meeting this moment as a party. They’re disorganized, unpopular, and weak. Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries, in particular, have failed to produce more than “strongly worded letters” and one government shutdown, taking a short stand for healthcare subsidies. We have an all-brains, no-balls problem. (MAGA suffers from the opposite affliction.)

There are pockets of effective resistance and courageous messaging coming from individuals, such as AOC, Jasmine Crockett, Bernie Sanders, Ron Wyden, Mayor Frey of Minneapolis, and Mayor Mamdani of NYC. Folks like these with strong progressive values and backbones should be leading the party. Democrats’ current leadership is simply too comfortable, compromising, and feckless to embrace any ideas outside of its old centrist establishment. 

The United States has not had a truly progressive president in my lifetime. Unfortunately, in the spirit of compromise, Democratic presidents governed right-of-center or moderate at best. Bill Clinton got “tough on crime” and helped fuel our current mass incarceration crisis. Barack Obama passed a half-cooked universal healthcare bill and continued extrajudicial drone strikes. Joe Biden…what did he do again? At least these presidents didn’t embarrass Americans and upheld the dignity of the office. (Even Clinton’s sex scandals seem quaint when compared to Trump, Jeffrey Epstein’s former bestie, who has been convicted of sexual assault and is accused of raping a 13-year-old.)

Overall, Republicans are a minority party that plays the game better than Dems. They stick together and tolerate being led by a grotesque, convicted felon because he’s helped them consolidate power and punish their political enemies. 

One conservative insider estimates that up to 40 percent of young GOP staffers in DC are “groypers”—chronically online white supremacists who despise women. A leaked Telegram chat from these Gen Z Republicans contained messages such as “I love Hitler” and referred to Black folks as “watermelon people.” Tell me who you hang out with, and I’ll tell you who you are.

Racism and misogyny have proven to be potent political forces during times of economic uncertainty. The problem is that this MAGA ideology eventually throws most groups under the bus. It is inherently unstable because you can’t win elections without women and people of color. To remain in power, MAGA needs to change the rules of the game (e.g., gerrymandering, postponing or canceling elections, disenfranchising women, etc). Alternatively, it can pivot hard back to the economic populist issues that made it attractive in the first place. 

Underlying MAGA’s appeal is ignorance, fear, and poverty. Blaming immigrants, non-whites, and women is an old tactic to deflect blame from the actual cause of misery in the United States: a widening wealth gap and a lack of social mobility. 

But no matter how many ways progressives and democratic socialists convey this, it does not seem to break through with most Americans. Tribalism and calls to white or masculine identity are more magnetic than economic arguments. Also, a quote often (mis)attributed to John Steinbeck gets to the crux of the issue: “Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat, but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.” 

Right now, these “temporarily embarrassed millionaires” don’t understand how progressive policies will help the working and middle classes. This is a failure of Democratic messaging and needs to be remedied. 

Most importantly, when the pendulum of power inevitably swings back our way, progressives should govern with audacity and without compromise—the same way MAGA Republicans have. The key difference, of course, is that our positions actually reflect what a majority of Americans support. Most people want Medicare for All, regulations on big business, a higher minimum wage, higher taxes for the wealthy, strong unions, access to abortion, investment in infrastructure, and a stronger social safety net (i.e., welfare). 

Taking a clear, progressive stand on all of these matters will go a long way. We also must promise to prosecute every masked ICE vigilante who has assaulted our civilians in ICE detention centers, on the streets of Minneapolis, and everywhere. Make accountability matter again. And to sweeten the deal for young, disaffected non-voters, Dems shouldn’t be afraid to call out Israel’s Netanyahu and Iran’s Khamenei for genocide.

Above all, progressives—whether they run as Dems or not—must craft a platform that’s uplifting and aspirational. Reflexively blaming white men for everything may be satisfying in the short term, but alienating specific groups based on blanket assumptions is exactly what we’re fighting against. 

Imagine a world where, when you die, your ashes are mixed into an engraved brick that is used to build your city. Crowds pour into the streets, marching from all directions with instruments and playing a dirge that swells into an animated anthem. People unite in the city square to honor your memory. I don’t cry easily, but the fourth time I saw this scene from Andor, I still had tears running down my face. This custom from the planet Ferrix was one of the strokes of world-building genius that made me fall in love with the show. 

I began watching Andor a few years late but right on time, and I’ve had it on repeat ever since. Trump had just taken his second oath of office and was ramping up his mass deportation efforts. Our country’s most racist high school dropouts joined ICE with $50,000 signing bonuses. They donned tactical vests and covered their faces to avoid accountability for their crimes. Later, the Trump administration started killing people in boats off the coast of Venezuela, finally kidnapping the country’s president and telling the world that we will take their oil. 

Oppressing large groups of people and seizing resources from smaller, less powerful countries are actions that mirror Emperor Palpatine’s designs on absolute power over the galaxy.  To see Andor for the first time in 2025 felt prophetic. Although it was released in 2022, creator Tony Gilroy had witnessed and exposed the abuses of malignant tyrants like Trump throughout history. 

The Empire’s brutality, lies, and need for control hold an eerie parallel to the rise of MAGA fascism in the United States. There is a cultish devotion to a single leader, abetted by a hypocritical and corrupt bureaucracy of anonymous, masked agents. Similar to stormtroopers, ICE agents are deindividuated, morally disengaged, and unbridled by laws or decency. They routinely rough up civilians with impunity, as demonstrated by the countless videos of ICE assaulting people, breaking car windows, and most recently, murdering an unarmed Minneapolis woman in broad daylight. 

And just like in Andor, there are seeds of resistance everywhere—throughout our cities and in our deepest red rural counties. These are folks who reject the manufactured narrative, folks who witnessed George Floyd and Renee Good being killed in cold blood and seethe against the gaslighting and propaganda. We all saw the videos.

In Andor, the Imperial Security Bureau supervisor Dedra Meero works tirelessly to astroturf violent resistance in occupied areas—in the case of the planet Ghorman, this is a pretext to seize control of a resource the Empire needs to construct the Death Star. The anti-Ghor propaganda being pumped throughout the galaxy isn’t enough: Supervisor Meero tells her boss, “You need Ghorman rebels you can rely on to do the wrong thing.” 

During a tense demonstration in the city square of Palmo (Ghorman’s capital), an imperial sniper intentionally shoots a young imperial security trooper, igniting a violent massacre. Stormtroopers and security droids gun down hundreds of people. Imperial propaganda claims it used justified force for security reasons. Sound familiar?

Kristi Noem could only dream of Supervisor Meero’s success with the false flag attack: Noem failed to goad Portland into a violent pushback after deploying the National Guard. (Instead, we came dressed in inflatable animal costumes and made the occupying force look ridiculous.) 

Both the Empire and the Trump administration command us to reject the truth we see with our own eyes. In an episode that won Andor an Emmy for writing, Senator Mon Mothma makes her final address to the Galactic Senate following the Ghorman Massacre. She says, “The distance between what is said and what is known to be true has become an abyss. Of all the things at risk, the loss of an objective reality is perhaps the most dangerous.”

Our government’s propaganda is failing: they call victim Renee Good a “domestic terrorist” and promise absolute immunity for murderous ICE agents. We know better. This administration is intentionally poking progressive cities with the tip of its spear, trying to justify imprisoning or deporting people for their political beliefs or skin color.

Mon Mothma’s speech continues, “When the truth leaves us, when we let it slip away, when it is ripped from our hands, we become vulnerable to the appetite of whatever monster screams the loudest.” 

In the United States, it’s clear as kyber crystal who that loud monster is and where his appetites have led us: Donald Trump is like Emperor Palpatine except he’s more attention-hungry, weaker, pettier, and dumber. Also, Palpatine wasn’t a convicted rapist.

In the midst of so much blatant injustice, I keep returning to a quote from my favorite monologue in the show: Nemik’s Manifesto. It states, “The imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort—it breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear.”

This administration knows it is racist and wrong and is scared of being overrun. They are treating us as if we are blind and stupid. They believe their violence is a show of strength, but it’s temporary and there will be a reckoning. When we have our own Nuremberg trials, Kristi Noem, JD Vance, and Stephen Miller will face the consequences of their lies and manipulation. They will need to own every broken car window, every injured protestor, and every murder in detention facilities and at the hands of ICE agents. 

And soon, when Trump chokes on that holy cheeseburger, the world will dance in the streets. 

During the Reagan administration, the unwritten Eleventh Commandment was, Thou shalt not speak ill of fellow Republicans. In 2025, in the wake of the assassination of a notorious young conservative, the new Twelfth Commandment dictates, Thou progressives shalt not speak of Charlie Kirk. Period.

Journalists, pilots, firefighters, teachers, military members, and university professors have all been fired for their comments in the wake of this shooting. There was a website (recently removed) called “Charlie’s Murderers,” where disgruntled Christian nationalists could dox and intimidate people who dared to question Kirk’s sainthood. 

Flags across the country were flown at half-mast by presidential decree. The White House announced that October 14, Kirk’s birthday, will now be recognized as a National Day of Remembrance. The NFL hosted moments of silence at their games. And Huntington Beach had a roving gang of white men in MAGA hats with Jesus flags chanting, “White men, fight back! White men, fight back!” 

That was, of course, before the white male assassin from the Republican, gun-loving family was captured. And not coincidentally, the day after the assassination, Trump’s “justice” department quietly removed a study from its website showing that the vast majority of political violence is committed by right-wingers.

While Tyler Robinson’s motives remain unclear because he’s not cooperating with the authorities, there’s been a torrent of consequences for progressives.

Under pressure from Trump, Jimmy Kimmel’s show was temporarily thrown off the air for a rather anodyne observation. He said: “We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and doing everything they can to score political points from it.” No lie detected.

One man, Larry Bushart Jr. has been held in a Tennessee jail for over a month with his bail set at $2 million. His crime? Posting trolling memes about Kirk to a Facebook page. 

What’s remarkable to me is that some of the folks, like former Washington Post columnist Karen Attiah, have been fired for paraphrasing the young bigot’s past statements. Here is word-for-word what Kirk has actually said:

• “I think it’s worth it to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the Second Amendment to protect our other God-given rights.” (TPUSA Faith Event, 4/5/2023)
• “Reject feminism. Submit to your husband, Taylor. You’re not in charge.” (Kirk’s response to the Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce engagement, The Charlie Kirk Show, 8/26/2025)
• “If I’m dealing with somebody in customer service who’s a moronic Black woman, I wonder is she there because of her excellence, or is she there because of affirmative action?” (The Charlie Kirk Show, 1/3/2024)

And parroting conservative Christian views, he has called trans folks an “abomination” and a “throbbing middle finger to God.”

Of course, not everything he said was so racist or misogynist. He shared a rather tender exchange with a trans student that surprised me. I disagree with his urging this person to find their “diagnosis,” but this opinion was given with thoughtful sensitivity rather than his usual fire and brimstone. (I reckon it’s a lot easier to spew hateful rhetoric when the person affected isn’t standing in front of you.)

Let’s get one thing clear: there has been a near-universal condemnation of this horrible murder. Democrats, independents, Republicans, and the politically unaffiliated have overwhelmingly come out against this violence. Certainly nobody important or influential has been “celebrating” Charlie Kirk’s death. Violence and murdering aren’t really progressives’ thing, actually. (Again, look at the study Trump tried to hide.)

• We weren’t the ones who bloodied capitol police officers on January 6, 2021. Those were confederate flag-waving Trump supporters who later received pardons.
• We weren’t the ones who assaulted and killed elected legislators for their politics. It was a right-winger who assassinated Melissa Hortman, Minnesota’s Speaker of the House, her husband, and dog this year—a heinous act that received zero response from the White House. Oh, and let’s not forget the right-wing lunatic who nearly beat Nancy Pelosi’s husband to death.
• We weren’t the ones who ordered an armed, poorly trained group to bust the skulls of immigrants and protesters. Those would be America’s least favorite racists and high school dropouts: ICE agents.

We were, however, the ones who have tried to make this country a little bit easier for everyone, advocating for affordable healthcare, housing, and education. We’ve tried to stand up against the oppression of women, LGBTQ+ folks, and minorities that the Bible is often used to justify. You know what they say: There ain’t no hate like Christian love. 

Are progressives losing the messaging war? Absolutely. Can we be insufferable in our virtue signaling? Yes, yes we can. Do we have too many ancient establishment leaders who are not meeting the moment? One-hundred percent.

But progressives are coming from a place of fairness and love. We’re pissed off but largely peaceful. Trump’s white MAGA goon squad says, Fuck your feelings! and they don’t realize that we are NOT their enemy. We aren’t the reason they can no longer afford their groceries or find decent wages. 

Right now, MAGA’s fury is centered on women, immigrants, and trans folks. And Charlie Kirk’s death is being used as a cudgel to silence us and an excuse to go to war. But when that rage finally discovers the real culprit of their misery—the dirty-rich oligarchs who consistently put profits over people—Americans may actually be able to reconnect across this abysmal political divide. 

Just hearing HIS dumb name makes me want to crawl back into bed. Is anyone else tired of this trifling wannabe dictator in HIS revenge era? 

HE seeks flattery and commits retribution against perceived enemies. HE’s breaking U.S. institutions with his dishonesty, selling off American prestige to the highest crypto bidders while HE golfs at taxpayer expense. Our country has a huge “For Sale” sign as we become an unreliable ally and an international joke. 

How can we be expected to go on about our lives when THE BIG DUMP is setting the stage for full-fledged fascism? 

Real pushback has been slow to materialize: 

• Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer wrote “a strongly worded letter.” (Thank you, Senator, for that thimble of water you threw at the raging inferno.)
• Columbia University surrendered to THE BIG DUMP’s demands in fear of losing $1.3 billion in federal funding. 
• Paramount paid a bullshit $16 million settlement because they needed a merger to be approved by the government. 
• Countless law firms are doing pro bono work for this administration under looming threats of executive orders. 
• Tech CEOs and media conglomerates are bending the knee, so they, too, can receive favorable treatment. 

Who has the courage to cut off HIS tiny hands while they’re in our government’s cookie jar? 

Fortunately, the response hasn’t all been defeatist. California Governor Gavin Newsom’s team has struck a nerve by mimicking the all-caps childishness of THE BIG DUMP’s Truth Social. (Camille Zapata, the Governor’s social media lead, has been brilliant here.)  

South Park creators Matt Parker and Trey Stone are also having a moment. One of my favorite parts of the show’s season premiere was the artwork around the White House: a Caesar-esque BIG DUMP portrait with a micropenis. One of HIM riding a tank. And others of HIM making love to a military plane, a glory hole, and a sheep. These background elements were masterpieces set in gaudy gold frames.

Because let’s face it: nobody embodies self-serving excess like THE BIG DUMP. Winning at any cost, staying in the spotlight, and denying accountability for wrongdoing are HIS three guiding values. HE has sold tacky branded sneakers, trading cards, watches, crypto, and bibles. HE lies, cheats, and steals without shame to get what HE wants in business, government, and golf. 

And HE’s rarely faced consequences for his bad behavior: If you’re rich, they let you do it. 

In a way, HE’s the perfect American—the dark apotheosis of our culture’s cruelest extremes. Rather than our individualism, we got rapacious greed; instead of our independence, we got isolationism; we traded our directness for bullying aggression; and our proud patriotism has given way to white Christian nationalism. And true to our nation’s roots, HE’s the consummate showman and entertainer who would do absolutely anything to get ahead. 

Imagine if every American behaved as THE BIG DUMP does, with no curiosity or tenderness. No awareness of anyone else’s agency or needs. No compassion or love. Just angry puffery and a win-at-all-costs mindset. Mad Max comes to mind. Avarice reigns and humaneness dies.

I’ve likened THE BIG DUMP’s track record to a white shirt covered in stains—if it were just one scandal, one stain, we wouldn’t be able to avoid looking at it or talking about it. But because HIS crimes have coalesced into a foul, sweeping skid mark, we can no longer unite on a single talking point. The elements of HIS greasy splatter include:

• SEXUAL ASSAULT – Being convicted of sexually abusing E. Jean Carroll, facing over two dozen assault accusations from women, and most definitely having HIS name in the Epstein files.
• ATTEMPTED ELECTION FRAUD – Calling Georgia’s AG to find “11,780 votes” after the 2020 presidential election
• PREFERRING LOYALTY TO COMPETENCE – Packing the government with shady, inexperienced sycophants
• BLATANT CORRUPTION – Accepting a $400 million Qatari jet and offering White House access to people who buy HIS crypto coin
• MILITARIZED RACISM – Using ICE to harass and deport law-abiding brown folks, while allowing in white immigrants from South Africa

These are just a few examples from the top of my head. You can see how all of this overwhelmed the stain-free shirt a long time ago. HE’s a bad hombre who has become the stain, setting an example to others about an ugly new American way: a world in which integrity, honesty, and decency don’t matter. HE displays “leadership” by projecting false strength, bullying, and burying enemies in lawsuits. 

THE BIG DUMP doesn’t have any real friends. HIS third wife recoils at HIS touch. HE’s fundamentally alone, and doesn’t realize HE’s being used by Stephen Miller, JD Vance, the Heritage Foundation (Project 2025), and others to usher in hyper-conservative wet dreams. They made a deal with the devil and it’s paying off—for now.

I know of only one family member who voted for THE BIG DUMP: my dad. We haven’t talked in years and it makes sense why he’d want this administration. He’s a gambler who never paid child support and rarely came around while I was growing up. He’s never taken accountability for his choices, and feels entitled to my attention by virtue of being my biological father. In other words, he demands unearned respect. 

THE BIG DUMP mirrors this type of warped masculinity: one based on selfishness and domineering rather than the hard work of protecting those more vulnerable. I imagine many of the men who voted for HIM have similar stories. I wonder if they feel their lives have improved now that there’s a new tax write-off for private jets. 

Americans are feeling the financial strain from decades of self-serving policies architected by millionaires on both sides of the aisle. In fact, the top 10% of U.S. households owns 67.2% of the wealth, while the bottom half owns only 2.5% (Federal Reserve 2025). 

And rather than rising up at the injustice of our extreme wealth inequality, THE BIG DUMP tells us to blame wokeness, feminism, and immigrants. Women and “diversity hires” aren’t the issue here; greedy individuals and corporations are. HE tells us to direct our pain to the left or the right—anywhere but up. HIS rich backers are getting huge tax breaks while HIS tariff costs trickle down into our grocery stores. HE’s counting on clueless suckers to support HIM.

Deep down, we know that a real man would be helping others rather than seeking to enrich HIMSELF. Be careful, MAGA: future generations of your family will be embarrassed by your allegiance to one of the world’s worst leaders. I know I am.

What’s happening in global trade right now reminds me of middle school. There were bullies who felt they could harass and intimidate the smaller, smarter students. And for a while, their aggressive tactics worked: the victims coughed up some homework or lunch money. 

But years down the road, what became of these two groups of students? Many of the bullies became criminals and lonely deadbeat parents, while their bookish victims are more likely to have happy families and good jobs. 

On the world stage, Trump’s America is the uneducated bully. He has unilaterally threatened to raise tariffs on our allies and competitors alike, wrongly believing this will “force” other countries to the negotiating table. He’s done this based on a fundamental misunderstanding of what a “trade deficit” is. 

The tl;dr is this: The US has been awash in cheap goods from around the world because 1) we have more money to spend on shit than a lot of other countries , and 2) we have an insatiable consumer culture. For a long time, our trading partners built industries to feed the “American Dream”—and we, in turn, got access to abundant, affordable stuff.

That era may be coming to an end. If we, the bully, continue down this road of trying to strong-arm smaller countries with tariffs, we’ll end up a weak, isolated loser. Other world leaders such as Xi Jinping, Mark Carney, and Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo know better than to capitulate to American aggression. 

Would tanking the US economy finally break the cult leader’s spell? 

Throughout the Trump era, reasonable people on the left and right have assured themselves that the fan-fever would break with each colossal misstep:

• In 2016: There’s no way Americans will vote for a misogynist who bragged about “grabbing women by the pussy.”
• In 2020: There’s no way Americans will support an anti-science moron whose failed Covid-19 leadership contributed to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Americans.
• In 2021: There’s no way Americans will continue supporting the traitor who fomented a violent insurrection on our Capitol.
• In 2024: There’s no way Americans will re-elect a criminal who was convicted of 34 felony counts.
• In 2025: There’s no way Americans will continue supporting a racist who is detaining and deporting non-white legal US residents (in defiance of the courts) while welcoming white Afrikaner “refugees.”

Misogynist, moron, traitor, convicted criminal, and racist. 

And yet, here we are. None of these failures dented his popularity the way we’d assumed—but his biggest challenge is yet to come. These tariffs are threatening our addiction to material goods.

If we continue on this course, in the next few weeks, Americans will see the prices of nearly everything start to rise. Container ships, normally filled to the brim with all of the shit we’re used to getting on the cheap, have been arriving at our shores empty. We cruised on inventory for a while, but that’s drying up. 

When Trump’s boneheaded tariff policies make everything more expensive and difficult, will he still have support? It’s not the first, second, or eighteenth time we’ve asked ourselves this question. But maybe—just maybe—MAGA will wake up when their wallets are empty and they only have Trump to blame.

Given Trump’s recent waffling and tariff pauses, he may actually recognize the fragility of his fan base. In America, he can be a misogynist, moron, traitor, convicted criminal, and racist—but rising prices on everyday goods are a bridge too far. It’s the economy, stupid. 

Wiping the gluten-free sadness cake from the corners of our frowns, we liberals have finally accepted our fate. We’re retiring our unopened jars of eco-friendly glitter and adding our Harris-Walz signs to the compost piles. 

Most of us have (rightly) wandered around in a kombucha and cannabis haze during these months since November 5. This familiar pain puts weights on our limbs and drapes everything in a funeral shroud. It’s tempting to withdraw and binge-watch Veep for the eighth time while housing three bags of chickpea crisps. 

We can #RESIST and scream “Not my President!” until we sound like RFK Jr. with strep throat, but didn’t we learn that protests are for suckers? The real way to exact American change is with a shit-ton of money, misinformation campaigns, and anti-democratic brute force—not by making cogent arguments or building coalitions! Why have we been walking the High Road when false Christians will claim moral superiority anyway?

I should be furious about the threat of fascism in the United States, but why would I give MAGA’s savage idiots the satisfaction? They thrive when progressives like me despair. “Owning the libs” with cruelty is the point—their raison d’être. 

Instead, I’m going to do what pisses them off the most: live better, healthier, and happier. Life is too short to agonize over larger forces over which I have no control.

 Plus, while Trump is defying norms—that’s kinda his thing—screwing over the poor and vulnerable isn’t strictly a GOP joint. President Nixon once supported a universal basic income while Clinton got “tough on crime” and dismantled welfare. Generally speaking, both democratic and republican administrations work to service the wealthy men and corporations who donated to their campaigns. That’s the way our system works. 

Does it make me a “bad progressive” if I refuse to be upset for the next four years? Maybe, but I don’t give a shit. I haven’t converted a single person into a liberal with my protesting, political donations, or writing. I will continue to do these things, but I will divorce my feelings from the outcome. 

Here’s a thought that has helped me: On some level, I believe that re-electing Captain Bonespurs may have prevented a Second Civil War. There, I said it. Who knows what MAGA would have done if Kamala Harris were elected president? 

Trump—the world’s sorest loser—has continually lied to his followers and manipulated them into believing the 2020 election was stolen. Acting on that lie, thousands of Americans descended on the Capitol in the violent January 6 Insurrection. That pot was boiling over, and it’s possible that having Trump in office for this second term—as disastrous as it’s proving to be—may have saved us from a more violent historical timeline. 

Rosy hypotheticals aside, take joy and pleasure in what you can control. Try:

• Creating change within smaller communities and helping folks who are within reach
• Tuning out from the anxious drip, drip, drip of the daily news
• Making a delicious meal for people you love 
• Chopping some wood 
• Staring at the colors of sea foam in the sun 
• Combing a stream for cool rocks and making a mosaic
• Being proud for standing on the right side of history
• Taking a shit on the White House lawn

Etc., etc…

One question you need to answer for yourself is what is your uncrossable line? What is your point of no return? Is it when the Trump administration deports peaceful student activists such as Palestinian Mahmoud Khalil? When they lock up journalists or political opponents who have been critical of his administration? When they set up concentration camps for two million immigrants? When they tank the economy with tariffs and more tax cuts for the wealthy? When they dismantle the Department of Education and schools in poor areas are forced to close? When they pass a national abortion ban? When our water sources become so contaminated with industrial waste that we can no longer drink from our taps? When a majority of Project 2025’s reactionary proposals have been enacted? When they defy the Supreme Court or try to disband Congress? 

Now that your heart is racing, take a breath…

These are all possible outcomes, but we can’t treat every transgression against progressive values as a catastrophe. We don’t have the energy. This administration is already notorious for what Steve Bannon calls “flooding the zone.” While you’re raging over the mere suggestion of turning Canada into the 51^st state, annexing Greenland, or removing a handful of trans women from school sports, you end up missing Trump’s primary objective: dismantling the government to deregulate business and give the wealthy large tax breaks. You can’t feel the rain when you’re drowning in an ocean of scandal and absurdity.

You can still be a good progressive without tracing every greasy fingerprint that MAGA leaves in its wake. We need to stop listening to what Trump the Showman says and watch what he does. For example, the administration has already completed 100 of the 300 proposals outlined in Project 2025, and there are another 46 in progress as of March 15, 2025.  USAID, the UN Human Rights Council, the WHO, the National Park Service, the EPA, and many other organizations are getting hosed by DOGE and Trump’s executive actions. I suspect the policy-ignorant president is indifferent about these changes but likes the distraction of our outrage—it provides more cover for business deregulation and his tax cuts for the rich.

Remember: Their favorite lube is liberal tears. Don’t give it to ‘em. These guys deserve to jerk off with sandpaper. 

It’s only a matter of time. Will it happen today? Tomorrow? Our short fuse is burning, and another American school, church, grocery store, or concert is going to explode, devastating a community.

Gun violence has affected me personally. My grandfather killed himself in 2003—the most common cause of gun-related deaths. One of my former coworkers from the Bay Area was shot and hospitalized. And the only time I did ecstasy, two men were killed in the San Francisco club I was at; the DJ’s bass was so loud that we only knew because of the throngs of people backing up from the bodies until the police arrived and interviewed everyone on the premises. 

I’ve also been shot at in Eugene, an incident that prompted me to write an informal will. Jon and I were walking home on the Amazon Trail late one night, a protected pedestrian and bike path that runs along a creek through athletic fields and park space. We were nearly home when we heard two booming cracks—it was so random and out of character for this city that until the next day, I’d insisted that the muzzle flash was fireworks. Sure enough, our neighbors had a bullet go through their bathroom window in the incident, confirming that someone was aiming at us.

My stories aren’t unique in this country—I suspect that most folks’ lives have been shaped by homegrown gun violence in one way or another. Several times a year, The Onion promotes its quintessentially American article: “‘No Way to Prevent This,’ Says Only Nation Where This Regularly Happens.” Many people from other countries consider this a dangerous nation and couldn’t imagine sending their children to schools where shooter drills and bulletproof backpacks have been commonplace.

Although violent crime was more prevalent through the 70s and 80s, the Columbine Massacre in 1999 ignited a trend: men started slaughtering Americans in crowded places. Instead of taking action, “pro-life” congressmen and organizations such as the National Rifle Association circled their wagons and reaffirmed their constitutional right to bear arms—an amendment written when loading one bullet into a gun was a total pain in the ass.

Killers’ manifestos and court testimonies lack a common theme: some are xenophobic or misogynist, while others are purely delusional. Mental health experts pore over murderers’ upbringing and beliefs, and the media’s hot takes are often appallingly racist: white killers suffer from psychiatric issues while Black killers are evil.

This uniquely American problem has a simple solution—banning all assault weapons—but our elected leaders lack the courage to enact it. Many of them have been bought off by the NRA and weapons manufacturers or see themselves as “patriots”—their shorthand for absolute gun rights supporters. They don’t care that guns are the leading cause of death among our children. They don’t care about the hypocrisy of their “pro-life” extremism that condemns pregnant women to die. They don’t care that students are protesting across the country, and a majority of Americans support gun regulations. They dig in their heels and reissue their hackneyed “Thoughts & Prayers” across social media when the inevitable occurs, week after week.

Aldous Huxley wrote, “Propaganda…offers false, garbled, or incomplete evidence, avoids logical argument and seeks to influence its victims by the mere repetition of catchwords, by the furious denunciation of foreign or domestic scapegoats, and by cunningly associating the lowest passions with the highest ideals, so that the atrocities come to be perpetuated in the name of God.” 

This was written in 1958, but it feels fresh in light of today’s Republican Party. The right-wing propaganda insists that Democrats want to take away all their guns, which is false. It’s a specific type of gun that should not be in civilian hands, no matter how manly it makes them feel. It’s the same damn gun used in most mass shootings: the AR-15. 

There’s also a specific type of person who shouldn’t be allowed to own guns: those convicted of domestic violence. Two-thirds of mass shooters have a history of beating women and related crimes. For a group so obsessed with curbing violent crime and “protecting life,” why can’t conservatives see that assault weapons and domestic abusers are the problem? 

Progressives have called for a commonsense gun buyback program similar to one enacted in Australia after the 1996 Port Arthur massacre that killed 35 people. In the years since their gun deaths have dropped precipitously. Further, states such as Oregon have closed the “Boyfriend Loophole,” which makes it more difficult for those with violent pasts to buy or own guns. But without a nationwide adoption of these policies, we’re still seeing spikes in gun deaths.

There’s no logic to the arguments of gun rights absolutists because they’re not thinking—they’re feeling. Their emotions surrounding their identity and security are threatened, and conservative leaders are happy to manipulate this fear to seize more power.

I wish I had solutions to extinguish the rift between Americans on this issue, but when data fails to sway our leaders and conservative voters, we sit and await the next tragedy in the cycle. 

Being white in America is charged and complicated. The word doesn’t sit well on my tongue—it’s a thunderbolt. 

“White” is an insurrection, a poison river, a noose strung up on a tree branch, a MAGA bumper sticker. It’s a badge with its knee choking the life out of another person. It’s a firehose aimed at peaceful demonstrators. It’s a gun pointing at someone on the wrong lawn.

No evolved person takes pride in being “white.” It is a label without a motherland, language, community, or rituals. The defining characteristic of being white in America is unjustly denying other groups the freedom of movement and freedom from harm. It’s the color of hate and exclusion, of apartheid, Nazism, and Native American genocide. It is the mark of colonizers and oppression—the cruel norm against which other people are compared or excluded. 

As a writer and editor, I refuse to capitalize “white” because it is an invalid culture of modern invention. The only time I bring up my race is to admit ignorance of something: how it feels to be followed around a department store, asked where I’m originally from, or fatally misunderstood by law enforcement. I didn’t earn or ask for the privileges stemming from our bloody legacy of slavery, but I recognize that being white in the U.S. has shaped my opportunities. 

People are surprised to learn that the definition of white has been fluid in American history.  Italian, Irish, Polish, and other folks now considered “white” didn’t used to be. The category has been shaped by immigration trends, wars, and political and cultural shifts. These days, there’s even a growing number of American Latinos embracing white supremacy—what some might darkly consider to be the ultimate act of assimilation in the United States.

One group, of course, has never been invited into the ranks of white, and that is folks of African descent whom white Americans have dehumanized to justify slavery and assuage their own shame. 

Historian and first prime minister of Trinidad and Tobago, Eric Williams, famously remarked, “Slavery was not born of racism: rather, racism was the consequence of slavery.” You can’t subjugate a group of people you respect—you must fabricate reasons for your inhumanity to resolve the cognitive dissonance.

These days, race is used most directly in American surveys and studies. For example, we’re aware of the generational wealth gap and disproportionate arrests within the Black community because we’ve tracked it. This information is important to measure groups’ relative quality of life and expose evidence of discrimination. France and Germany, which don’t collect demographic data on race and ethnicity, are rethinking their policies which obscure the toxic effects of racism within their countries. 

Although this data is currently crucial to show how different groups are treated in an unjust society, I look forward to a future when one’s racial category is of no more consequence than the color of one’s eyes. Ideally, it might even strike future generations as strange that we categorized folks by skin color or that white Americans could simultaneously worship Black culture and denigrate its people. 

Race is an evolving power dynamic used to justify the mistreatment of groups. Take pride in accomplishments and kindness, but don’t celebrate being “white.” To do so is perverse and pathetic. 

Some traditions and values should not be held sacred, no matter how long they’ve been practiced. For example, there’s no need for public duels over insults to honor, the burning of heretics at the stake, or hanging bloody sheets outside one’s house after the consummation of a marriage. Fortunately, we’ve outgrown these practices, but it’s worth asking: what are examples of contemporary values and customs that will be spurned by future generations? And who safeguards these soon-to-be-old ways of thinking?

Social conservatives strive to lock in the status quo, and they have littered history with their failures and cruelty. I’m not talking about pious, family-oriented folks who hold their values and customs within their churches and homes where it’s appropriate. I’m talking about reactionary activists who seek to impose dead ways of thinking on everyone else. 

Social conservatism is an ideology that supports “traditional” social organization, institutions, and power structures. In this country, this has meant the elevation of men above women, whites above minorities, Christianity above other religions, straight folks above the LGBTQIA+ community, and the United States above other countries. Overall, it seeks to protect a rigid social order rather than embracing change.

While its specific values and objectives have shifted with the times, American social conservatism is always a losing philosophy. The evidence is in the vast progress made in this country since its founding. 

Here’s a thought experiment: what would the United States look like if social conservatism had always won the day? 

• Women wouldn’t be able to work, vote, or own property because Christianity dictates that we should be raising children and obeying our husbands. Some social conservatives still hold (or recently held) these views. John Gibbs, a Republican running for a House seat in Michigan, founded a “think tank” at Stanford called the Society for the Critique of Feminism. In 2000, he wrote, “Some argue that in a democratic society, it is hypocritical or unjust for women, who are 50% of the population, not to have the vote. This is obviously not true, since the founding fathers, who understood liberty and democracy better than anyone, did not believe so.” 
• Slavery would still exist because “traditional” American power structures held that Black folks were inferior and could be considered property. Some are surprised to learn that the Bible was used to justify slavery. It’s also no coincidence that today’s most socially conservative, religious states are those which owned slaves. 
• Non-Christians, somewhat ironically, would have to flee American religious persecution. (Apparently, there are still 7 states that bar atheists from holding public office, although a 1961 Supreme Court decision makes these bans impossible to enforce.)
• Gays, lesbians, and trans folks would live in constant fear and be sent to reeducation camps because they are not accepted under God’s “traditional” order. Considering the recent surge of anti-gay legislation and book banning across the country, overcoming these cruel, ignorant beliefs is clearly a work in progress.

The vestiges of this racism, misogyny, and homophobia—the greasy residue of social conservatism—still haunt our institutions and culture. Some of the lasting prejudice is insidious (e.g., Americans tend to dislike female politicians), and some is obvious and legally enshrined (e.g., “Don’t Say Gay” laws in Florida). 

That is the legacy of social conservatism.

One of the most egregious recent examples has been the overturning of Roe v Wade, which allows the government to force women to give birth. This happened because Catholic conservatives hijacked the Supreme Court, using a thrice-married vulgarian to nominate three judges vetted by the Federalist Society. 

Roe was the white whale of social conservatism because it returns women to the home with forced motherhood. In states such as Texas, rapists can, in effect, choose the mothers of their children—unless women have the resources to leave the state, they must carry their rapists’ babies to term. Some conservative legislators perversely believe rape is actually a blessing by God and an “opportunity” to “help that life be a productive human being.” 

Here’s something I don’t understand: how do social conservatives rationalize the abuses and bigotry of their tribe throughout history? Doesn’t Clarance Thomas realize that in his grandfather’s time, he could have been lynched by fellow social conservatives for looking at a white woman, let alone marrying one? Doesn’t Amy Coney Barrett see that in her grandmother’s time, she could have been accused of having a difficult temperament due to her high intelligence and institutionalized for hysteria or some such nonsense? 

There’s a throughline from violent racism and misogyny to the Right’s anti-LGBTQIA+ crusade today. It wasn’t the progressives of their day who wanted to maintain slavery or lock up “difficult women”—those abuses were propagated by social conservatives. They are (and continue to be) the guardians of savagery.

But, as with all backlashes to progress, social conservatism is doomed to lose this fight. The Dobbs ruling was deeply unpopular among Americans because our country has outgrown the idea that the state should force women to give birth. 

Although reactionary leaders may occasionally get elected or achieve court victories, free democratic societies are never dominated by socially conservative values. This is because power is not inherent in one’s gender, race, or religion—it is constructed and protected by the society in which it occurs. 

For example, in a fundamentalist Christian house, the man is assumed to be the head and the wife must obey. But the privileges of being a Christian man are imaginary—they are only made real by the people who uphold those values. To those who don’t adhere to this interpretation of the Bible, this power is unearned, unjust, and antithetical to meritocracy.

Overall, social conservatism is doomed to fail because it runs counter to advancement. Like the forward march of science and technology, human thought and values can’t be locked into their medieval forms. 

Imagine that instead of using a modern washing machine, you decided to wash your clothes by boiling water, soaking them, and scrubbing them against rocks with lye or animal tallow. Sure, at one time in history, this was the best way to get our clothes clean, but we’ve evolved. By adhering to old, dead values, social conservatives are still beating their dirty clothes against the rocks. 

 If a country’s policies and culture fail to adapt to natural changes, those left out of power become restless and the revolution is seeded. Especially these days, knowledge is too widespread for disenfranchised folks to remain powerless forever. This is the story of women, people of color, the LGBTQIA+ community, non-Christians, and the working class. It’s only a matter of time before those unfairly denied social mobility will rebel.