Honestly, my head is spinning, and mouth is cursing as the emperor with no clothes, who is fiddling as he sets fire to the world, does one crazy thing after another. (Please forgive all my metaphors.) On the other hand, I have heard from many in the US of the joy, connection, purpose they felt during the demonstrations on April 5th, which also happened to be my 82nd b/day!
Many congratulations on your birthday and thank you for sharing it with Hands Off! I think the resistance is deeply important for morale at the very least. It will be the economy that does him in but until it does we've got to stick together.
I was there. In heavy red state Florida, in very red Vero Beach, hundreds and hundreds of sign-holding protesters filled a major intersection - all four corners! It was fantastic and positive, honking and boisterous - so happy to see the turnout, I wept. Now, reading your excellent account of the coverage - you opened my eyes to the lies being broadcast... Drumpf considered us to be paid actors? WHAT? This is the man running our country? Who still listens to this? Speechless...my blood pressure is climbing. DID YOU KNOW: Broadcasters used to be bound by the Fairness Doctrine. "The Fairness Doctrine mandated broadcast networks devote time to contrasting views on issues of public importance." It was abolished by Reagan administration in the 80's...leading the the free-for-all we're in now.
Susan.....Thank you for enlightening us about The Fairness Doctrine. Sometimes, I think, it results in "false equivalency," but that's a risk we would like to the taking right about now. It's great that you got out in the street in Vero Beach. There hasn't been a peep in the Sierra foothills, but I'm sure there was a crowd in Sacramento as there was last month when I was able to get there. I'm looking forward to being a part of the demonstrations in Minnesota going forward.
I’ve been thinking about this for a long time. I think we’ve always been bombarded by lies, only now they’ve gotten more sophisticated, subversive, blatant, omnipresent. Almost every commercial and advertisement we see on TV, Facebook, etc., is based on fabrication and manipulation to separate us from our money. It doesn’t mean our friends and acquaintances lie to us, but I feel like the national and global economy is based largely on fabrications and hidden predatory agendas based on manipulating our emotions, and omissions of important information. I think the difference now, is a complete omnipresence of fake media, and the attitude of “ we seem to be able to say anything and get away with it” that apparently is working wonders for the perpetrators. Just gotta stay on your toes at all times.
I have to agree with you. There's a tendency to romanticize the "good old days," as if Walter Cronkite were incapable of misleading us. But now I feel like I'm drowning in it and sometimes I feel like I don't know how to come up for air.
Susie, I believe that a majority of our country totally understands that Trump only lies, and that he's a very sick human being. The fact that he won this last election says more about our country then about him. I believe we as a country refuse to elect a women President, and that we are still racist in nature. Price of eggs, the economy was not the reason Trump was elected. We had a former President who said after he won, that he would be a one term President. He then changed the course of how we normally conduct party politics, stayed in a job that he was too old for, demonstrated it, and then dropped out with 60 days or so to the elections. The economy was in good condition and getting better. The markets were doing well. We have a main street media problem that doesn't address the news period. People don't read anymore. I'm not sure how this all ends up, but I do feel Trump and his puppets will try hard to overthrow our democracy and the rule of law.
I agree that elections are won and lost on issues that go much deeper than "the price of eggs." The pocketbook issues are a convenient way to mask the deeper wounds that plague us.
Omg. A 5 year old being given a gun??? A real gun??? The USA learns nothing from the rest of the world, unfortunately. Breaks my heart, when I see the ignorance, the dumbing down, the propaganda and trillionaires ruling what was never a great country, but at least wasn't the cess pit of ignorance it is now. So many good people, who don't stand up for right and truth? That's the problem. Martin Luther King nailed it so many decades ago. Slave culture never left.
The rifle looked completely real. It shoots pellets or BBs which can't kill you but can certainly hurt you. Wouldn't want to get hit in the eye. The ignorance is epidemic.
I find this to terrifying and also so absurd (I just don't understand how people think he's telling truth) I hardly know what to do but just try to keep breathing.
I understand. We have to embrace the truth of our own lives, try to make some contribution to the resistance however small, and value what we know is true.
Susie, I can identify with almost everything you said here. Thanks for writing it. I do still watch Rachel Maddow almost every night, but I was very surprised at other media coverage of April 5. Unfortunately, I grew up in a family with many secrets. Truth telling was instilled in me by the nuns at Julie Country Day School. We are living at a time none of us could have ever predicted. I try very hard to keep sane and watch some comedy and British Drama from the past to maintain some type of balance and positive energy!🌹
Many people tell me they find British TV very healing. I love that. I'd love to hear more about your experience with the nuns and how they approached truth-telling. Was that an eye-opening experience or was it frightening?
Susie, I think, similar to you, I was always trying to be a good girl in childhood.I hardly got praise from my mother and my father didn’t live with us. They were legally separated. The nuns, my teachers, did praise us when we did good. I got good grades, and was praised for that, by the nuns. I often won spelling bees and got little prizes for that. The nuns usually stitched “sachets “ which were the prizes! I felt comfortable with the nuns and stayed after school at times to clean the blackboard etc. I knew where I stood with most all the nuns. My mother was confusing, contradictory or angry often. I knew the nuns valued truth and wanting to be a good girl, I was truthful. Of course, there we’re family issues withheld.
It's wonderful to hear how you found a safe place with the teaching sisters and how they supported your effort to be truthful. I didn't have any religious models as a child and had to make do with a hodgepodge of influences.
I marched in Boston. The reported numbers have ranged from: 20,000 to 30,000, to 100,000, and all of which would be cause for front page features above the fold. I believe my eyes. . . we over-filled The Common and filled Tremont Street from the beginning of The Common all the way to the City Hall. I also believe in the deep honesty and hope that filled those streets,, so I guess I'm a good girl still, naive about the possibilities and potentials of our country, and, I believe that's what propelled me to march in Boston instead of Pittsfield. Pittsfield where the estimate was 2000 people gathered at Park Square. Bravo the good and hopeful hearts all.
The photos I saw of the crowd in Boston were really inspiring. Also Chicago! I know and you know this really happened, but out there in BB gun America, it's a non-topic.
I don't live in the US, so I miss a lot of it, but the constant lying from those in power does upend any sense of ease. I am exceedingly honest (my husband says 'painfully honest') and don't even feel comfortable with the occasional polite white lie. I suspect it will take awhile for any trust to be seeded, even when it should be.
Unfortunately, I think that's true. Citizens will continue to feel lied to even if future administrations are relatively well-intentioned. (One can only hope).
I was also stunned by the lack of coverage in the legacy media. Your blog articulated my incoherent rage at their knee bending. I was also amazed at the photos that came out of the NYC protest. My generation (the silent one) was well represented. So much for fading gracefully into the sunset.
Honestly, my head is spinning, and mouth is cursing as the emperor with no clothes, who is fiddling as he sets fire to the world, does one crazy thing after another. (Please forgive all my metaphors.) On the other hand, I have heard from many in the US of the joy, connection, purpose they felt during the demonstrations on April 5th, which also happened to be my 82nd b/day!
Many congratulations on your birthday and thank you for sharing it with Hands Off! I think the resistance is deeply important for morale at the very least. It will be the economy that does him in but until it does we've got to stick together.
As they say, from your mouth to God's ear!
I was there. In heavy red state Florida, in very red Vero Beach, hundreds and hundreds of sign-holding protesters filled a major intersection - all four corners! It was fantastic and positive, honking and boisterous - so happy to see the turnout, I wept. Now, reading your excellent account of the coverage - you opened my eyes to the lies being broadcast... Drumpf considered us to be paid actors? WHAT? This is the man running our country? Who still listens to this? Speechless...my blood pressure is climbing. DID YOU KNOW: Broadcasters used to be bound by the Fairness Doctrine. "The Fairness Doctrine mandated broadcast networks devote time to contrasting views on issues of public importance." It was abolished by Reagan administration in the 80's...leading the the free-for-all we're in now.
Susan.....Thank you for enlightening us about The Fairness Doctrine. Sometimes, I think, it results in "false equivalency," but that's a risk we would like to the taking right about now. It's great that you got out in the street in Vero Beach. There hasn't been a peep in the Sierra foothills, but I'm sure there was a crowd in Sacramento as there was last month when I was able to get there. I'm looking forward to being a part of the demonstrations in Minnesota going forward.
I’ve been thinking about this for a long time. I think we’ve always been bombarded by lies, only now they’ve gotten more sophisticated, subversive, blatant, omnipresent. Almost every commercial and advertisement we see on TV, Facebook, etc., is based on fabrication and manipulation to separate us from our money. It doesn’t mean our friends and acquaintances lie to us, but I feel like the national and global economy is based largely on fabrications and hidden predatory agendas based on manipulating our emotions, and omissions of important information. I think the difference now, is a complete omnipresence of fake media, and the attitude of “ we seem to be able to say anything and get away with it” that apparently is working wonders for the perpetrators. Just gotta stay on your toes at all times.
I have to agree with you. There's a tendency to romanticize the "good old days," as if Walter Cronkite were incapable of misleading us. But now I feel like I'm drowning in it and sometimes I feel like I don't know how to come up for air.
Susie, I believe that a majority of our country totally understands that Trump only lies, and that he's a very sick human being. The fact that he won this last election says more about our country then about him. I believe we as a country refuse to elect a women President, and that we are still racist in nature. Price of eggs, the economy was not the reason Trump was elected. We had a former President who said after he won, that he would be a one term President. He then changed the course of how we normally conduct party politics, stayed in a job that he was too old for, demonstrated it, and then dropped out with 60 days or so to the elections. The economy was in good condition and getting better. The markets were doing well. We have a main street media problem that doesn't address the news period. People don't read anymore. I'm not sure how this all ends up, but I do feel Trump and his puppets will try hard to overthrow our democracy and the rule of law.
I agree that elections are won and lost on issues that go much deeper than "the price of eggs." The pocketbook issues are a convenient way to mask the deeper wounds that plague us.
Omg. A 5 year old being given a gun??? A real gun??? The USA learns nothing from the rest of the world, unfortunately. Breaks my heart, when I see the ignorance, the dumbing down, the propaganda and trillionaires ruling what was never a great country, but at least wasn't the cess pit of ignorance it is now. So many good people, who don't stand up for right and truth? That's the problem. Martin Luther King nailed it so many decades ago. Slave culture never left.
The rifle looked completely real. It shoots pellets or BBs which can't kill you but can certainly hurt you. Wouldn't want to get hit in the eye. The ignorance is epidemic.
Sure is. The education system is the problem. It’s brainwashing propaganda from beginning to end. So sad.
I find this to terrifying and also so absurd (I just don't understand how people think he's telling truth) I hardly know what to do but just try to keep breathing.
I understand. We have to embrace the truth of our own lives, try to make some contribution to the resistance however small, and value what we know is true.
Yes, that's a beautiful way to put it, Susie. xo
Susie, I can identify with almost everything you said here. Thanks for writing it. I do still watch Rachel Maddow almost every night, but I was very surprised at other media coverage of April 5. Unfortunately, I grew up in a family with many secrets. Truth telling was instilled in me by the nuns at Julie Country Day School. We are living at a time none of us could have ever predicted. I try very hard to keep sane and watch some comedy and British Drama from the past to maintain some type of balance and positive energy!🌹
Many people tell me they find British TV very healing. I love that. I'd love to hear more about your experience with the nuns and how they approached truth-telling. Was that an eye-opening experience or was it frightening?
Susie, I think, similar to you, I was always trying to be a good girl in childhood.I hardly got praise from my mother and my father didn’t live with us. They were legally separated. The nuns, my teachers, did praise us when we did good. I got good grades, and was praised for that, by the nuns. I often won spelling bees and got little prizes for that. The nuns usually stitched “sachets “ which were the prizes! I felt comfortable with the nuns and stayed after school at times to clean the blackboard etc. I knew where I stood with most all the nuns. My mother was confusing, contradictory or angry often. I knew the nuns valued truth and wanting to be a good girl, I was truthful. Of course, there we’re family issues withheld.
It's wonderful to hear how you found a safe place with the teaching sisters and how they supported your effort to be truthful. I didn't have any religious models as a child and had to make do with a hodgepodge of influences.
I marched in Boston. The reported numbers have ranged from: 20,000 to 30,000, to 100,000, and all of which would be cause for front page features above the fold. I believe my eyes. . . we over-filled The Common and filled Tremont Street from the beginning of The Common all the way to the City Hall. I also believe in the deep honesty and hope that filled those streets,, so I guess I'm a good girl still, naive about the possibilities and potentials of our country, and, I believe that's what propelled me to march in Boston instead of Pittsfield. Pittsfield where the estimate was 2000 people gathered at Park Square. Bravo the good and hopeful hearts all.
The photos I saw of the crowd in Boston were really inspiring. Also Chicago! I know and you know this really happened, but out there in BB gun America, it's a non-topic.
I don't live in the US, so I miss a lot of it, but the constant lying from those in power does upend any sense of ease. I am exceedingly honest (my husband says 'painfully honest') and don't even feel comfortable with the occasional polite white lie. I suspect it will take awhile for any trust to be seeded, even when it should be.
Unfortunately, I think that's true. Citizens will continue to feel lied to even if future administrations are relatively well-intentioned. (One can only hope).
I was also stunned by the lack of coverage in the legacy media. Your blog articulated my incoherent rage at their knee bending. I was also amazed at the photos that came out of the NYC protest. My generation (the silent one) was well represented. So much for fading gracefully into the sunset.
Ann...In my experience, older folks are always over-represented. We remember and we are outraged.