Every now and again social media does what it was meant to do, which is to give us jewels that are created by everyday people from all walks of life and shared spontaneously with the world. Frequently the passion of the moment moves us to articulate things far better than we could ever do were we to think about something and analyze it. This is a long tweet that has started to pick up speed on Twit/X. Twitter is a right-wing cesspool these days, which makes it all the more endearing that this managed to rise above the sewage. I find it on point and poignant.
We had a dream. We being the Founding Fathers. We being Frederick Douglass. We being Abraham Lincoln. We being Franklin Delano Roosevelt. We being Martin Luther King. We being Thurgood Marshall. We being Jack and Bobby Kennedy. We being Ruth Bader Ginsburg. We being Barack Obama. We being so many over so many decades, two and a half centuries.
And now a step has been taken towards the antithesis of that dream as fascism puts out its ugly claws and grabs us, like a small animal, and sweeps us up into the sky. Can we, in turn, grab it by its entrails and stop its flight, with us in its talons? Or will it overcome us, as it has so many other nations on this earth before us? (Push the button and listen to McLean.)
—- Epitaph: July 3, 2025 —-
The Day America's Music Died:
Because Trump's Congress passed his Big Billionaire's Bill
Instead of "let freedom ring", it's a day of mourning for our Democracy – our brilliant American Experiment, despite our debts & flaws, contradictions… pic.twitter.com/dS81zeAwq7— John Mark (@jmhechemali) July 4, 2025
The sentiment of American Pie is perfect to this moment in time. What was passed through a complicit congress yesterday may stand out in history as the end of the beginning of America, the day that America began on an inexorable path to become something different than what it was designed to be, and what it managed to be for two and a half centuries. It could well be the end of the beginning and the beginning of the end. Can enough of us rally to save democracy is the only question worth asking right now? Everything else is collateral damage.
The modern conservative is engaged in one of man’s oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness.
John Kenneth Galbraith.
Exhibit A: The Only Bastards Benefit Act.
Selfishness I could live with. We know they all read Ayn Rand. It’s deliberate cruelty that is the mark of the Trump era.
And violence.
Oh such drama! Relax people & take a breath. We’ll survive just fine & prosper as well. We made it through democrat legislation, we’ll live through this.
Well, now, I wouldn’t say that. Until we get rid of all the fascists and their enablers, we WON’T “live through this.”
Go back to your bridge, troll. You’ve earned your nickel for the day. Make sure Donnie pays you cash. His word isn’t worth a single thing.