Vive la Résistance

I did not and will not watch any of the inauguration and post-inaug hoopla. I most certainly did not listen to Herr Drumpf's "American carnage" inauguration speech, which was apparently little more than a rehash of the same old pseudo-populist wrath that helped push the world's nakedest emperor into power. Maybe I'm being a bit of a hear-no-evil see-no-evil monkey, which is quite unlike me, but I just haven't been able to stomach the spectacle. (And speaking of American carnage, there's evidence of it right now on the WhiteHouse.gov web site.)

That said, there were actually good reasons for anti-Drumpfs to watch it all if they were in a position to do so, as Kathryn VanArendonk explained in a piece that originally appeared in Vulture and was posted on Salon.com earlier today.

You should watch it because watching the whole of it, rather than clips filtered through other media, will give you a stronger, more visceral, more immediate sense of the reality of what’s going on. You should watch it actively, skeptically, thoughtfully, critically, and as just one part of a bigger plan of action and resistance. You should watch it because it’s really happening, and we need to learn how to look directly at the thing we don’t like or don’t understand. Refusing to watch Trump will not make him less the president. We need to learn to watch the president we have, and use that knowledge so that we never let this kind of presidency happen again.

I get that, but I still didn't watch. Which doesn't mean that I'm going to continue not watching Drumpf on TV and other media, moving forward. It's just that I really, really needed a bit of a break.

Let the record show...
Except for the parts relating to being a person of faith -- since I'm not, really -- I could have written this post, which was actually written by North Carolina pastor John Pavlovitz. And so, I think, could at least 65 million other Americans.

Let the record show that I did not consent to this.

Let it show that I did not vote for this man, that he did not represent me, that I did not believe he was deserving of being here, that I grieved his ascension....

...And if I prove to be wrong, it will be one of the most joyful errors of my life. I will own these words and if necessary, willingly and gladly admit my misjudgment because it will mean that America is a better and stronger nation, and the world a more peaceful place.

But right now I don’t see that happening.

Right now I am worried for my country, concerned for our planet, scared for the future of my children, and greatly saddened that 62 million Americans seem okay with all of this.

Let the record show that I was not okay with it.

Not at all.

U.S. voters who protest Trump's ascendancy to the throne are not alone. Our friends across the pond are expressing their views as well; for instance, a banner reading "Build bridges not walls" was draped across London's Tower Bridge earlier today. And that's just one of many protests planned across Britain. My friend Tammy Samede, whose thoughts on activism and unity I shared here shortly after the election, is right in the thick of it.

And the protests are and will be going on around the globe. Most heartening of all, the Women's March on Washington, taking place in D.C. on January 21, has gone global, with even Antarctica getting in on the act, meaning that the movement now covers all seven continents. You can find a map of the planned protests, as well as additional information about demonstrations in various cities around the world, in this CommonDreams.org piece.

Let the record show that millions and millions and millions of people across the globe are not happy with the profoundly narcissistic, thin-skinned, grievously unqualified and egregiously unprepared man-child who has just become the most powerful man in the world. And he'll have a historically unqualified Cabinet to help him try to wreck the republic.

"I'm still holding up this little wild bouquet..."
Damn, I miss Leonard Cohen, from whose song, "Democracy," the above sub-head was snatched, and I grabbed it because, despite all of the above, there may be reasons even now for hope. And like comic relief, I will take reasons for hope where I can find them. Tech company founder, author and speaker Peter Leyden speculates that Drumpf's rise to power heralds not the beginning of a new era of hatred and retrogressive policies, but the end.

It’s easy for politicians to whip up public fears against [progressive] changes and rally people to go back to the old ways, to make America great again. This is the standard playbook for right-wing nationalism. In the 1930s... that era’s right wing took those fears and drove a good chunk of the world into fascism and a world war. Today Trump is heading down that path — but he won’t get far.

I think Trump ultimately is going to do America and the world a service by becoming the vehicle that will finally take down right-wing conservative politics for a generation or two. He is getting the entire Republican conservative establishment to buy into his regime. He is creating an administration that is blatantly all about rule by — and for — billionaires, sold out to the oil and carbon industries, and celebrating an out-of-control corporate capitalism. It will be a caricature of conservative policies. In short order he will completely and irrevocably alienate all the growing political constituencies of the 21st century: the Millennial Generation, people of color, educated professionals, women. He’ll eventually do the same for a significant number of more moderate Republicans. And does anyone out there really think Trump will do anything for the white working class that got him elected? Watch as repealing Obamacare blows up in his face.

I hope to Goddess that Leyden is correct. Pablo Picasso famously said that "every act of creation is first an act of destruction." I hope that in the process of creation, the most precious parts of the American experiment are not completely destroyed.

Vive la Résistance.


More than one way to skin a dragon 
The really, REALLY good news -- and now I can say it publicly -- is that Jason Michael Jones, aka Salty Droid, is a fully licensed lawyer once again (he'd voluntarily dropped out of the legal profession about ten years ago). Jason was one of the first to document the Scamworld creds of our new Scammer-in-Chief. And he has already gone to work battling some of the other scum of Scamworld.

...why can’t I be a lawyer and a SaltyDroid? Because it may cause “a certain amount of emotional distress” among Scientologists and their attorneys?

I’m pretty sure I just answered my own question.

I’m fuckin’ doin’ it.

And he seems to have hit the ground running.

Where should we start? {#alreadystarted}

How about maybe multi-billion dollar snake-oil hydra head Herbalife?

Carl Icahn :: President Trump’s new special advisor on regulatory reform … owns the biggest chunk of cult-Herbalife. Edith Ramirez :: who is not not a foe of the company :: is stepping down as chairwoman of the FTC … leaving three of the five commissioner slots open for The Donald to fill. I’m sure HotCarl will have some super duper great ideas about how to ‘reform’ the agency.

Go, Jason and Salty. We're going to need both of you, now more than ever.