Despair and Determination

I just couldn’t post yesterday as the news seemed totally overwhelming. Fascism and autocracy are on the march across the world and gathering steam here at home. Corruption and voter suppression are rampant here in the US. And the climate is collapsing faster than anyone imagined.

The Saudis brazenly murder a regime critic on foreign soil who is also a legal resident of the US and a Washington Post journalist and the Trump/Kushner response is that this won’t interfere with the money the Saudis are paying us/them. We have no ambassador in either Turkey or Saudi Arabia because they might interfere with Trump/Kushner business interests. In Bulgaria, an investigative reporter is raped and murdered and we hear crickets for the Trump administration. In Poland, in defiance of the EU, the ruling party cements its autocratic grip on the country by packing the Supreme Court and more silence from Trump/Kushner. In Israel, an American graduate student wishing to study in that country has been held in detention for being part of a Justice for Palestine group. Reports surface that Trump approached Japan’s Prime Minister Abe about allowing Sheldon Adelson to open up casinos in Japan. Coincidentally, Adelson poured additional millions into supporting GOP candidates in the midterms. In Brazil, the Wall Street Journal is backing an overt racist and demagogue for president in the upcoming second round of voting.

Here in the US, Republicans are upping their voter suppression effort as the midterms draw closer. In Texas, a political aide who was trying to combat those efforts was arrested apparently simply because he was a Democrat. New rules implemented by the Trump administration will effectively block any large-scale demonstrations near the White House. In West Virginia, in what may foreshadow the future on the federal level, the legislature and the judiciary are engaged in a constitutional crisis as the politicians try to purge the Court.

Just hours after the latest climate report showed that the world has a little over a decade to confront global warming head on and avoid a climate change catastrophe, the Trump administration disbands the EPA advisory panel on particulate matter.

All this in just a matter of hours.

It’s going to be hard enough to win control of the House and the Senate this year. It’s going to be hard enough to repair the damage that Trump has done to this country over the next few years. It’s going to hard enough to fight back against the forces of fascism and autocracy that are gaining across the globe and in this country. With all that on our plate, how are we going to save the planet from a global climate catastrophe?

But the answer to despair is determination. Nothing will change unless we fight for that change. The abuses of the Trump administration can at least be constrained somewhat by winning the House and even more so by winning the Senate. The massive corruption of the administration can also be exposed. Congressional action can force this administration to once again stand up for human rights as well as constrict its ability to further harm the planet. Voter suppression and gerrymandering can be eliminated by winning elections in the states.

To quote the inestimable Sarah Kendzior, we must fight precisely because we are the answer. There is but “one check: the people. That is why we fight. That is why we protest. That is why we vote. Because we, the people, are all we have left.”