The Week Ahead

November 24, 2024

A number of you have written to ask my thoughts about social media and whether I’ll be part of the exodus from X. I feel the same way about this issue that I felt about breastfeeding and cloth diapering as a young mom. They worked great for us in our household. But I had lots of friends who used formula or disposable diapers with great success. I’m a big fan of people doing what works best for them on these sorts of issues, and that’s how I feel here. Different options make sense for different people. As for me, I’m keeping a toehold on Twitter because I don’t believe in making it easy for them. Nolite te bastardes carborundum, as fans of Margaret Atwood’s novel “The Handmaid’s Tale” say. But I am posting more often on BlueSky, and I’m liking it there. The tone is respectful, and more and more interesting people, including journalists so you can find breaking news, are there. Also, the knitters, chicken and other animal people, and liberal Alabamians (yes, there is such a thing), seem to be out in full force. I like the respectful conversations and the tone so far. You can find me here if you’re considering heading in that direction, too.

Looking towards the week ahead, I’ve been forced to confront the past. It’s that feeling of déjà vu—we’ve been here before—and honestly, I have no clue how so many Americans could have thought it was a good idea to go back. My tweet from 2018 fills me with such a sense of sadness and naivete. At the time, a lot of people dismissed me as an overly dramatic female type. But I understood that Trump was pushing the country into klepto- and kakistocracy (a government whose corruption benefits its leaders and a government of incompetence, respectively) and stacking the Court to gain power, even though I couldn’t yet contemplate that Court would one day give Trump absolution for his crimes and Americans would return him to power nonetheless.

So many of us are stuck in that place of sadness and wondering what more we could have done. That’s understandable. But we cannot let it prevent us from getting back to work. We teach our children that when you fail, you pick yourself up and get back to work. I intend to remain relentlessly in favor of democracy.

Donald Trump was scheduled to appear in a New York courtroom this week, on Tuesday, November 26, to be sentenced for his conviction on 34 counts of falsifying business records to keep Americans from learning he’d paid hush money to adult film star Stormy Daniels on the eve of the 2016 election to keep her from making their sexual encounter public. Trump denies it ever happened. A Manhattan jury didn’t believe him and found him guilty of cooking the books to conceal the payment.

Now, that sentencing has been delayed indefinitely. It’s not clear it will ever happen. Trump’s lawyers have suggested evidence that the Supreme Court said is protected as part of his presidential immunity was improperly used against him, and the Judge has given them until December 2 to file a motion to dismiss based on the fact that Trump is now the president-elect. We don’t even whisper that no man is above the law in this country anymore.

It’s not clear what the DA’s position is, although they’ve suggested they may argue that sentencing could be continued until after he leaves office, although Trump’s lawyers say the threat of that sentencing would be an unlawful impediment on his performance while in office. In a practical sense, for those who fear Trump will not leave once reinstalled in the White House, it would be yet another incentive to cling to power.

At this point, it does not appear that Trump will face justice in a criminal court, despite being indicted in four of them and convicted in one. Future historians will undoubtedly assess this era as a dark time where the rule of law was under attack and a demagogue rose to power. But it does not have to be the final chapter in the American experiment. Already, as Trump prepares his next administration, there is work for us to do.

Last week saw the announcement of people who were absolutely unfit to hold office to take cabinet positions, including some who made it clear that Trump’s effort to separate himself from Project 2025 last summer was a farce. As you doubtless recall, Project 2025 was so stunningly unpopular that Trump lied and said he knew nothing about it to keep the association from dampening his chances. To put it down where the hogs can get it, he lied to the American people, unsurprisingly and again, about what he was committed to doing if he became the president. Let’s not let him get away with that. There is still value in the truth, and this is a big one: the truth that Project 2025, which frightened and disgusted many Americans, is Trump’s plan.

Project 2025 was 900+ pages of anti-American authoritarianism and Christian nationalism brought to life under the rubric of conservatism. But I have never known conservatives who thought it was a good idea to have Russia-friendly people like Tulsi Gabbard as the Director of National Intelligence, or a man like Seth Hegseth, who has been accused of sexual assault and who paid off his accuser, in charge of the Department of Defense. Conservatism is out, even more so than during the first Trump administration, and Trumpism is in—firmly and exclusively in place.

Sometimes it’s the “little” things that take your breath away, like this from Marjorie Taylor Greene.

National Public Radio (NPR) was founded in 1970. According to the MacArthur Foundation, it serves as a major source of news and cultural programs for more than 60 million Americans each week, with 260 local member stations and more than 50 podcasts. Its mission from the outset: To be a “source of information of consequence,” “celebrate the human experience,” help citizens be “enlightened participants” in society and “speak with many voices and many dialects.” So, of course, that means it’s on the chopping block with Trumpism. I wonder how many of you share my experience of having learned important details about daily news and democratic principles while commuting to or from work and listening to NPR? Greene would take aim at that free flow of information in our society.

Then there is Federal Communications Commission nominee Brendan Carr, who wrote the FCC chapter in Project 2025. The mission statement sounds good, “The FCC should promote freedom of speech, unleash economic opportunity, ensure that every American has a fair shot at next-generation connectivity, and enable the private sector to create good-paying jobs through pro-growth reforms that support a diversity of viewpoints, ensure secure and competitive communications networks, modernize outdated infrastructure rules, and represent good stewardship of taxpayer dollars.” But it goes downhill fast, for instance early on, where he lays out the the tradition of bipartisanship on the FCC is a matter of tradition, not law, suggesting without coming out and saying it that Trump could change that.

The FCC regulates radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable networks. In response to an LA Times tweet, suggesting Carr might “make life more difficult” for media companies, Carr confirmed it, suggesting he could take away broadcast licenses from media companies that don’t “operate in the public interest.” That’s preparation for authoritarianism.

So many people on both sides of the political equation have checked out, and, for entirely different reasons, are unaware of the truth. But these are facts that people need to be aware of, and we are the people who can do that. Make sure you share what Carr has threatened or that Trump’s nominee for Secretary of Defense is a TV presenter who paid off a woman who filed a police report accusing him of rape.

We live in times where courage is called for. We already see signs that some people will not be brave, that some people will obey in advance. But I take heart from the following quote, a line from the film “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey”—that speaks forcefully to how I am feeling as we enter this holiday week: “Some believe it is only great power that can hold evil in check, but that is not what I have found. It is the small everyday deeds of ordinary folk that keep the darkness at bay. Small acts of kindness and love.”

What small acts of kindness or truth-telling can you plan for yourself this week? I’d love to hear about your ideas. Let’s make a difference, even when that seems challenging.

We’re in this together,

Joyce