To those who voted for the man and his party and those who could not be bothered to vote in the last election, you have condemned all of us to reckless, vengeful, dishonest, factional, inept and dangerous government. You knew what you were doing. There are no excuses. You are responsible.
My generation of Baby Boomers grew up in the 1950’s and 60’s believing in government as a force for good in our lives, and in the main, it delivered. Under Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the federal government assumed new and powerful roles in the nation’s economy and in the health, welfare, and well-being of its citizens. It became the champion of the average American, from food safety to employment safety to full employment.
“I pledge you, I pledge myself, to a new deal for the American people.” – FDR, 1932.
That new deal for the American people was sustained and expanded through 4 presidents who shared a view that government is a force for good in the lives of every day Americans: Truman’s ‘Fair Deal’; Eisenhower’s ‘Middle Way’, Kennedy’s ‘New Frontier’, Johnson’s ‘Great Society’.
Each those presidents believed that government exists to protect the natural rights of all, regardless of party or creed or color or belief. They believed in government as a force for good in our lives, and each of them helped achieve that end.
I never thought as a society that we would come to doubt the value of government in our lives. Growing up, it was such a ‘given’.
I was an operations and strategy consultant in my career, brought in to improve operations. Sometimes, I worked along unsentimental private equity firms. Even the worst of them (in their quest for return on investment) didn’t come close to doing the mindless, mean-spirited, and shameful things being done in this administration …because in the end, even cold-hearted investors need to have a business that runs (and performs at market standards).
What is being done to our government is demented and brainless. It is criminal. And the victim is the United States citizenry.
Polls show that about half of the president’s supporters favor a strong executive branch not beholden to Congress. In other words, they don’t support our constitutional democracy. They don’t think they need government; it doesn’t work for them. They tell pollsters that they want to ‘burn it all down‘, Constitution be damned. ‘We won. Just do it.’ And that is truly frightening.
This today from WBUR about the mass layoffs:
A local meteorologist has reportedly been caught up in the Trump administration’s latest wave of layoffs. The Boston Herald reports Francis Tarasiewicz, who recently started tracking weather at NWS Boston’s Norton office, was included in yesterday’s layoffs of probationary employees at the NOAA . “This wouldn’t be half as hard to bear if I hadn’t fought my whole life through foster care and impossible odds to serve this great nation,” Tarasiewicz posted on X. “This past month of serving my community has been the honor of a lifetime.”
We were well served by Francis Tarasiewicz. Indiscriminatingly trashing government, ‘burning it all down’, is what vandals, hoodlums, thugs and terrorists do…
Government descends to just a sick performance for a ‘burn it down’ base that revels in the spectacle (of owning the libs) …until they realize they too are on the receiving end of it. Ask the people of Los Angeles: fires don’t discriminate. And zwhen the fires are burning, people are damn glad there are firefighters –a.k.a. government– there to help put out the blaze.
The White House ambush of President Volodymyr Zelensky was one of the most shameful episodes in recent American history …and there have been many. Bullying from a position of power is the stock and trade of Trump, Vance and the despicable mob that has seized the US government …with the explicit or tacit support of the American public.
Tomorrow the working dogs and I are off to a visibility protest here in Vermont, near Sugarbush, where the hideous Vice President will be skiing.
Comment back on my protest dog photo from Tony, a retired history teacher and coach (and fellow traveler) in Maine, who took my Fluff:
