Following the brutal murder of Renee Good, the demonstrations were a show of defiance in the face of the Trump regime's escalating intimidation tactics.
We went to one protest on Friday in Pittsburgh, in front of the ICE Detention Facility. We had a permit. It was peaceful. No law enforcement showed up, not even ICE. I did not see a single soul looking out of the windows which faced the sidewalk on which we had gathered. Many passing cars honked in support. I went to a second protest yesterday in my near-end suburb, a borough of @ 35,000, the majority of whom are Democrats. Again, no cops, no National Guard, no ICE. It was much larger and again, almost all of the passing cars honked in support of us. We placed hundreds of flowers on a makeshift memorial for Renee. Someone's drone filmed us from overhead. Maybe a news station? The loveliest thing I saw was a little girl of about the same age as Renee Good's son, holding a bouquet of pristine white roses in her mittened hands. (It was blowing snow all day.) No speeches, but poems and some damn clever signs. This is irreverant, but my favorite was the one which said, "I thought ICE was for cocktails, not men with tiny cocks." Silly, but it made me smile on what was otherwise a somber kind of day.
Imagine if the good Germans in Hitler's aborning days as a dictator had turned out in such numbers to protest his actions. The horror known as WWII may never have happened.
Rick's piece on 'what must be done' was fine. But, I'm not seeing anything that can be done that will forestall massive state and civil violence.
There is one thing. We can stop resisting. We can lay down and let them roll right over us as we beg for mercy and cower in our homes. If we did that, maybe they would slaughter fewer of us, in the short run anyway. But that's not happening, is it?
I'm watching how the language has been changing. First there was tut-tutting about how 'sad' it was that immigrants were being badly treated. Then the weak pleas of "is this America now?" Then lamentations about how citizens were being pushed around. Then mayors and governors started talking about how their number one objective was keeping their citizens 'safe', as if we were talking about bad weather. You can be safe, sort of, in the short run, by going home and locking your doors. A lot of people are doing that, as they remain willfully ignorant of America's fascist repression. But now, those euphemisms have been going quiet as many of us recognize the imagined American pieties of the past are gone. What comes next is that which forces people to take a side.
The Regime's weakness and failure prompts them to ramp up their brutality. The intent for this is two-fold: to try and convince us of their infinite and inevitable power, and to make themselves feel big and strong. Given this formulation, massive mayhem appears inevitable before any fever begins to break, if it does. Trump's toxic mind demands blood, the order will go out to butcher citizens a hundred at a time will happen. Soon.
We saw steely resolve and mourning. We all know where this is going. We are getting our affairs in order this coming week because we are all Renee Good, one conflicting order from summary execution.
I hear you, but look at it like this: our expectations have been high that the 'news media' was a Fourth Estate of our society and so was honor-bound to report the truth to us. That has been evaporating like a fart in the wind as corporate suits bend the knee to Trump and 'maximize shareholder value' by getting out of the news business and turning to entertainment for their business model. That space is being back-filled, at a rapid clip, by messy and imperfect new media. There is wailing that the opportunity for propaganda and lying is great with all of this 'unregulated' broadcast communication, but the integrity of the old media was collapsing before Trump even appeared.
Is it all bunnies and flowers? Nope. It will be a fractious mess for a long time. But anybody who is unaware of what's going on is doing that on purpose.
Thank you, Susan, I am glad you are inspired. The day of the shooting and after police have been on regular patrol. When the AG says crime when there is none . He keeps law enforcement busy, that is his way of weaponizing the police. What ever Trump or Vance say, or Noem he gets all fired up and uses tax payers money for his lies, this I feel puts lives endangered when this being done. No police or ambulances for those who really truly need medical attention and or help, incase of a real person who has been robbed or broken into. This shooting saddens me. . Please everyone invest in Lincoln Square. This is a true opportunity for democracy to thrive.
Thank you for sharing and for your participation in working to save our country, Susan. You continue to lead from the front 💪🏼
We went to one protest on Friday in Pittsburgh, in front of the ICE Detention Facility. We had a permit. It was peaceful. No law enforcement showed up, not even ICE. I did not see a single soul looking out of the windows which faced the sidewalk on which we had gathered. Many passing cars honked in support. I went to a second protest yesterday in my near-end suburb, a borough of @ 35,000, the majority of whom are Democrats. Again, no cops, no National Guard, no ICE. It was much larger and again, almost all of the passing cars honked in support of us. We placed hundreds of flowers on a makeshift memorial for Renee. Someone's drone filmed us from overhead. Maybe a news station? The loveliest thing I saw was a little girl of about the same age as Renee Good's son, holding a bouquet of pristine white roses in her mittened hands. (It was blowing snow all day.) No speeches, but poems and some damn clever signs. This is irreverant, but my favorite was the one which said, "I thought ICE was for cocktails, not men with tiny cocks." Silly, but it made me smile on what was otherwise a somber kind of day.
Imagine if the good Germans in Hitler's aborning days as a dictator had turned out in such numbers to protest his actions. The horror known as WWII may never have happened.
Rick's piece on 'what must be done' was fine. But, I'm not seeing anything that can be done that will forestall massive state and civil violence.
There is one thing. We can stop resisting. We can lay down and let them roll right over us as we beg for mercy and cower in our homes. If we did that, maybe they would slaughter fewer of us, in the short run anyway. But that's not happening, is it?
I'm watching how the language has been changing. First there was tut-tutting about how 'sad' it was that immigrants were being badly treated. Then the weak pleas of "is this America now?" Then lamentations about how citizens were being pushed around. Then mayors and governors started talking about how their number one objective was keeping their citizens 'safe', as if we were talking about bad weather. You can be safe, sort of, in the short run, by going home and locking your doors. A lot of people are doing that, as they remain willfully ignorant of America's fascist repression. But now, those euphemisms have been going quiet as many of us recognize the imagined American pieties of the past are gone. What comes next is that which forces people to take a side.
The Regime's weakness and failure prompts them to ramp up their brutality. The intent for this is two-fold: to try and convince us of their infinite and inevitable power, and to make themselves feel big and strong. Given this formulation, massive mayhem appears inevitable before any fever begins to break, if it does. Trump's toxic mind demands blood, the order will go out to butcher citizens a hundred at a time will happen. Soon.
We will then be 'having a new conversation'.
I attended two protests yesterday. Both large crowds, both peaceful, and all activity important. Be defiant!
We saw steely resolve and mourning. We all know where this is going. We are getting our affairs in order this coming week because we are all Renee Good, one conflicting order from summary execution.
I'm seeing very little coverage of these protests, which is disturbing.
I hear you, but look at it like this: our expectations have been high that the 'news media' was a Fourth Estate of our society and so was honor-bound to report the truth to us. That has been evaporating like a fart in the wind as corporate suits bend the knee to Trump and 'maximize shareholder value' by getting out of the news business and turning to entertainment for their business model. That space is being back-filled, at a rapid clip, by messy and imperfect new media. There is wailing that the opportunity for propaganda and lying is great with all of this 'unregulated' broadcast communication, but the integrity of the old media was collapsing before Trump even appeared.
Is it all bunnies and flowers? Nope. It will be a fractious mess for a long time. But anybody who is unaware of what's going on is doing that on purpose.
There was some but not as much as there should be. Our entire state was filled with protesters in every city and almost every town.
Thank you, Susan, I am glad you are inspired. The day of the shooting and after police have been on regular patrol. When the AG says crime when there is none . He keeps law enforcement busy, that is his way of weaponizing the police. What ever Trump or Vance say, or Noem he gets all fired up and uses tax payers money for his lies, this I feel puts lives endangered when this being done. No police or ambulances for those who really truly need medical attention and or help, incase of a real person who has been robbed or broken into. This shooting saddens me. . Please everyone invest in Lincoln Square. This is a true opportunity for democracy to thrive.