We are at a true moment in history when we have a choice to make. Keep fighting for what’s right, or go home and get some sleep.
What will we the majority, we who have this choice to wield our combined power, do with this moment?
It’s a hard decision. Soon, things will happen that will make activists and protesters tired, and some will quit the fight. Those who remain must not waver in their resolve. If they do, we all lose everything.
The economy looks to be recovering. It’s an illusion, a vestige of automatic reactions to the fears of another great depression. But we’re dangerously close to one, much more so than at any time in my 60 years. It will make memories of 1974 and 1979 and 2008 vanish. It’s even being done in a different way this time; it’s not an accident, not a vagary of different causalities the people won’t understand. This was part of Trump and Putin’s plan all along. For proof, I offer the first three years of the Trump administration. Look at a timeline of major events and eventually you see the pattern: Trump and Republicans do or fail to do something, and Russia gets quietly stronger. While you weren’t even looking, they’ve made a pact with China to share military advancements. If we went to war, we would lose. It would eventually go nuclear if Trump wanted it to. I rather doubt it. His job is to let Russia dominate the world.
His failure to act on warnings by the CDC wasn’t an accident. Trump knew exactly what he was doing. Or what he was failing to do. Now you hear out of his mouth or read in his tweets outlandish bullshit. He’s even blamed President Obama for the coronavirus!
And of course, nobody knows what “Obamagate” is and my auto-correct says the same, even when put in quotation marks. But he keeps telling reporters, “you know what I’m talking about, but you’re fake news so you won’t print it.”
He hasn’t had any kind words for the family of George Floyd. He’s instead marshalling police from prisons, police with no markings on their uniforms, and some really scary shit is about to happen. Tear gas wasn’t enough. The threat to use regular military personnel wasn’t enough. Now choppers buzz protesters: terrorism from the White House. Soon rubber bullets will be gone, and metal jacket rounds will be locked and loaded. How far do you think he will go? He’s put lives at risk from COVID-19 and takes no responsibility; as we passed 100,000 dead, he made clear that he regarded it as fake news. In contradicting himself as he so often does, because he is a common bullshitter, he’d previously claimed that COVID-19 would be gone in a minute. Did nothing about it. Andrew Cuomo’s daily press conferences were scary and they were the fucking truth. Trump had to respond; he claimed he had “reacted faster than anyone” (among world leaders). His changeup bullshittery should be seen for what it is: all lies, every bit of it. You know what Jesus called Satan? The father of all lies. He did. And that’s the true power Trump worships: Satan and himself.
With unemployment so high because of the coronavirus, recovery is a lie. What you’re seeing on the news, about housing rebounding, is either false, or real but volatile and unsustainable. We’re going into a depression, and it’s not an accident, not a result of any one cause. Just the carelessness of Mitch McConnell and Donald Trump. Along the way they have sunk the very corporations they have served. All but the biggest holders of cash reserves, meaning the components of ALEC, will vanish. Oil and coal made them money. Made them rich and powerful. And that kind of cash and power means political clout. Ol’ Joe Lunchmeat on the street? He’s fucked. Especially if he’s black.
Expectations of a huge surge in the COVID-19 pandemic are already beginning to prove true. Cases have overcome testing; it’s no longer a case of more diagnoses because of more testing. And the protesters know this. They’re willing to give their lives for equal rights and respect for all people. They are heroes in the midst of a pitched battle that will only get worse.
The police do terrible things. Body-slamming a black school girl to the ground. Shooting kids with no provocation. Too many names to say out loud at once. Even Reverend Al missed Freddy Gray; there’s too many names. There always has been.
For the police officers who strive to do an unenviable job with honor, you have to help. Taking a knee is a nice gesture but nothing more. Stop this murder and assault on unarmed men and women whose civil rights are being violated right in front of you. This moment in history tells you that’s non-negotiable; you get your fellow officer to get his knee off the man on the ground or you’ll be counted as guilty as he is.
Whatever’s going on within the grounds of our White House, it isn’t right. I don’t believe for a second that their assault weapons are loaded with rubber bullets. They more resemble mercenaries than police. Trump wants blood; but more, he still wants to be dictator for life and to destroy democracy with such finality that we can never get it back.
This is the moment. Refuse to follow orders from Trump, and you’ll save lives and your soul.
We need to remember the lives lost to tyranny and murderous hatred. George Floyd’s children need to know that their daddy awaits them in heaven, but they also need to have faith in all of us that we won’t let his murder be in vain. That he’s one of many waiting in heaven for justice, and that justice is going to come.
It’s time. I was raised by bigoted parents who told me so many terrible things about black people that I was probably more phobic and hateful than they were. But that wasn’t what I wanted to be. Change was hard. It took years. But I had to do it. It can be done. Love can overpower hate. All you need do is want it to. We need the law enforcement and justice system to understand that we don’t hate each other. That we stand together on streets all over the country, black, white, Hispanic, Asian, and others. We can’t stop. Not now. If we do, they’re going to sweep the streets with the bodies of the Innocents. That’s too terrible to allow. Don’t give in. Stand together as brothers and sisters and don’t you give up. Because this time, we can do it. This time, we can change the country. Maybe the world. We have no limits. One people. Equal. All loved by our creator. Here we stand at a true crossroads in history. What will we do?
Be safe out there on the crossroads.♥️☮️
Memoirs of an American Christian 