WE RESIST BECAUSE WE MUST

I used to work with a conservative, back before maga, when Donald Trump was a mere celebrity, not celebrated by me. His name was Scott. I was not a BFF with Scott. Besides being a conservative who could define the word, Scott smoked cigarettes at a time when non-smokers rights were not honored. We shared a couple drinks one time and he told me that he had been a member of the Weather Underground back in the 60s. The Weather underground was the extreme version of the weathermen. He was in love with Ronald Reagan when I new him. That's pulling some neck-snapping G forces. Like a black, hispanic, or female on ICE. It was our good fortune that neither of us worked closely together, me having a difficult time keeping my mouth shut. I have not seen Scott for some 40 years, so I can't say if he is now maga. 

I was not inactive during the 1970s. I had the good fortune to be declared physically unfit for military service, thanks to a booklet given out at anti-war rally's with the title, '100 Ways to beat the draft. Thank you International Friends Service Committee. I marched in anti-Vietnam war marches. Civil Rights marches, too, mostly at the back of the parade.. I helped collect signatures for the petition to change the voting age to eighteen, former Congressman Earl Blumenauer was the leader of that effort. Those were heady days for young Boomers. We ended the draft, a thing I now consider a mistake. We ended the Vietnam War, made our nation a little better for minorities, and participated in the emerging Women's Rights Movement. We were making societal change by marching, chanting, street theatre, and other ways of arousing public protest. By the end of Jimmy Carter's only term, we even saw an effort to confront climate change. Then we got complacent. We went into the workforce full time, got married, had families, and lived life. 

That didn't work out. One party had became a wholly-owned province of right-wing groups sponsored by wealthy oligarchs. By the 1990s, they had succeeded in creating political structures that could be enticed with extravagant gifts. Yes, both parties relied too heavily on wealthy friends. Only one party was successful at shaping the Supreme Court. Along the way, campaign finance reform, never well-regulated, became the province of wealthy pressure groups who appealed to corporate personhood. The other party, my party, was forced to play on the rightwing field. People like Grover Norquist were paid handsomely to speak at weekly breakfasts in fancy DC hotels. Among the gems of eloquence he espoused, were such memorable phrases as, "bi-partisanship is the moral equivolent of date rape". Or "I want to starve government until it can be drowned in a bathtub". By 2016, we could hear Steve Bannon opine that, he wanted to deconstruct the administrative state. It too slowly dawned on us that these policies threatened the very democracy that we took such pride in. Earlier we had one of the most corrupt Presidential elections in our history in a state where the governor was the brother of the Presidential candidate from the Republican party. That state went to the republican candidate by some 600 votes. Instead of a complete recount, the Brooks Brothers Brigade stopped the recount and sent the results to the Supreme Court where 3 of the justices had spouses who were depending on a republican victory for jobs. They got their jobs. Since then things have only gotten worse.

We, my party, my colleagues in the resistance, anyone expecting government to conform to a Constitution containing more than a 2nd Amendment, should have stayed active. Maybe we could have prevented a Trump presidency. Maybe we could have had a Supreme Court worthy of the description. Maybe we should have had some regulations against wealth controlling elections. But that's all gone, along with that Constitution which resembles the remains of the East Wing of the Whitehouse. As things stand today our resistance will not bring back what we have already lost, it may stop further loss. With luck, and enough time, we may be able to write new laws to replace our Constitutional guarantees that have been lost, but we must work hard to defeat the party that allowed these laws to be crushed. That will be a difficult goal and may take longer than our children's lifetime. The solution, as I see it, is not an end to the two-party system. The Democrats have disappointed us in the past, neo-liberalism is one of those disappointments. But we may have learned from that mistake. I'm proud to say that we have been effective advocates for our Constitution as Trump tries to destroy it. A libertarian party added to our political options would not help. Third-party candidacy means the 3rd party takes votes away from the Democrats and too often trow the election into the Electoral College. Our only other option, short of surrender, is resistance.

Resistance involves many things. They can be active resistance or passive resistance. There can be protest music and comedy. Speeches or essays. During WWII, as the story goes, the British Special Operations Executive figured out that Nazi staff officers were incredibly arrogant, and stupid, like maga. They developed an aerosol spray of sulfer di oxide, rotten egg gas. A resistance volunteer would work their way behind a speaking officer and spritz their wool pants, or leather coat. The officer would be compelled to stop what they were doing and run off to change their clothes, lest people think that smell was coming from them. A favorite comedy group of mine from the 70s, Fireside Theatre,  got their start doing resistance comedy. Humorists from the Smothers Brothers to John Stewart, to the late-night comics of today, sharpened their wit on a succession of presidents, mostly Republicans, and republican politicians. The left got more witty; the right...well you can draw your own conclusions. 

The important point is that we must stop this descent into fascism and re-emergence of racism, there is no tolerance we can extend to them anymore. What can we do, those who can't stand in the cold holding a sign? We do what we can when we can. Use your voice. By insult, by humor, by making statements to counter the lies. In the old days of daily newspapers there were letters to the editor. Today we have social media. Wear your protest until it falls off or until they make it a crime. If you can afford it, contribute to the party that is opposing these fascists. Elect more of them. And remind your acquaintances who fell into maga that it was they whose support of an anti-democratic movement, that got us to this point. Welcome to the resistance.