I have been accused of rooting for America to fail, and being no better than Rush Limpbaugh when he wanted President Obama to fail, when I was being gleeful about the possibility that a stock market correction could help bring down the DJT presidency before its time.
Yes I know a lot of “little people” depend on the stock market and if there is a crash it will hurt me and people I care about and institutions I work for and it will be a disaster. But I am beginning to wonder if it is a price worth paying to get that man out of the White House before he can wreck the world economy, destroy the constitution, and/or start an impulsive war that will put countless lives in danger.
During the lean years when my mom and I first moved off on our own we lived in an apartment in Anacostia that had more than its share of roaches. But I was an oversensitive child and I had a hard time killing the roaches. Sometimes I tried to throw them out the window onto the grass under the kitchen and bedroom windows. Sometimes I captured them in cups and flushed them down the toilet. It was just hard for me to kill them. I thought of them as living creatures and could not grasp the idea of pests and vermin. Paradoxically, one time a cricket got into the house and for some reason THAT i did try my very best to kill, but that is a story for another time LOL.
Anyway, as I got older I grew to understand that I could not make a comfortable home for the pests and that killing them served a larger health purpose for me and my mom. I never liked it, but I got to the point where I could do it, sometimes whispering a little “I’m sorry” under my breath before I swatted the fly, stepped on the roach, or set the inhumane snap trap for the mouse I could hear but never see.
That attitude did not completely go away until decades later when, caring for my bedbound mom, I discovered that short-term pain for a long-term good is required in many different areas of life, and when you are desperate you no longer have to argue with yourself about whether you are willing to make certain kinds of sacrifice to save someone you love. I had to learn how to give painful injections and watch my mommy wince as the medicine went in very slowly, as I had been taught to do. I had to learn how to do in-home wound care and watch my mommy cry as I packed the SeaSorb in tightly. “It’s getting better, mommy” I would say, to reassure myself as much as her. “I can tell it is not as deep as it used to be. It is healing, I promise.” “It’s okay, baby, I know you have to do it” she would whimper as a tear rolled silently down her cheek to join the others on the pillow.
And in the years since she had her amputation I have often thought about how hard it is to be a surgeon, to have to cut someone open and cause them pain and maybe leave a permanent scar, all for the larger purpose of removing the cancerous growth, cutting away a dead or diseased area, and saving a life. You have to be ruthless and set aside the idea that you are destroying other innocent body cells, or leaving someone without a limb.
Sometimes the conservationist has to set a fire in a controlled burn to save a larger area from being ravaged by fire, or to create a firewall against locusts, or to prevent a larger and less easily controlled fire from occurring later.
The command test on Star Trek was whether you were willing to send one person to certain death in order to save the ship and everyone else on it. Deanna kept failing because her natural compassion got in the way, and even when she figured it out it was hard to make the call, but she did it. In other similar situations, individual officers would volunteer themselves willingly as the one to be sacrificed for the good of the rest of the crew. And we are coming to the point in the liturgical year when Christians believe that a precious life was voluntarily sacrificed to spare many more people from suffering the spiritual consequences of divine disobedience.
I don’t want people to lose their retirement funds, or small businesses to become insolvent. I don’t want the government to shut down or economically depressed areas to lose infrastructure spending. I don’t want to hurt the families of the politicians who I hope will be bounced from their House seats in 2018. I don’t want to inconvenience people who are on their way to a critical doctor’s appointment or might lose their job for being late to work because I caused a traffic jam in a protest.
But I also have to look past how hard it is for me to cause pain and focus on the big picture.
The injection has to be given, the wound has to be cleaned, the leg has to come off.
I want the Senate to filibuster Gorsuch. I want Dems to stand firm on the budget deal and other Rcon legislation as well. Let Rs fight amongst themselves and tear themselves apart. Because they and their president have the ability to do serious harm and they must be stopped. We all have to decide what sacrifices we are willing to make and what sacrifices we are willing to tolerate and to what extent we are willing to bear personal sacrifice ourselves for the ultimate goal of taking our country back from the fanatics currently threatening to destroy it.
DJT is doing serious harm to our country and the world. The wound was already infected when he arrived. Now there are things we must do to cut him out and some of them will hurt. But if you cannot move the 800 lb boulder, sometimes you need the will to cut off your own arm to survive.
The oncologist can’t cry over the healthy cells that will also be affected by the toxicity of the chemotherapy. The firefighter can’t weep for the trees that will be lost in the controlled burn that will prevent a larger fire from threatening more lives and homes. The battered mom has to pick up what she can carry and leave in the middle of the night with the baby in tow, facing an uncertain future of sacrifice but hoping it is the way to save herself and her child. The surgeon can’t think about the living cells she is cutting through to get to the diseased area that needs to be removed.
I know this is controversial. I know the ends do not always justify the means. But reality-based reasonable people have to concede there are many medical, emotional and political situations where pain now leads to a better outcome later.
After this is all over we will get stitched up and maybe we will bear a permanent scar.
But our country will still be alive.
as each moment has unfurled i’ve been waiting to awaken from these dreams
PREVIOUS TRUE BLUE REPORT diaries
Mar 26: Dare we hope the tide is turning? Or is that unrealistically optimistic?
Mar 25: Sheldon Whitehouse, Al Franken, Bobby Brooks, Betsy Anderson, ACA phone callers
Mar 24: HaHaHa-Ha-Ha You’re gonna need Congressional approval and you don’t have the votes
Mar 23: Rcons hate Obamacare for selfish, greedy, racist reasons, but not enough to fix it.
Mar 22: Neil Gorsuch’s attempt to seem wide-eyed and innocent makes him look even worse
Mar 21: Using Trump as a bad example—no Trump Sleep, Trump Food or other Trump habits
Mar 20: Is DJT a compulsive liar, or out of touch with reality? Five scenarios...
Mar 19: A budget is a moral document—a statement of public compassion
Mar 18: Ribbons: CBO scorers, Senate Intelligence Committee, Judge Derrick Watson
Mar 17: They know DJT is lying. Here’s one sad reason they follow him anyway.
Mar 16: Mick Mulvaney's ignorant, callous, evil, Republicon definition of compassion
Mar 15: Message Discipline 101—Pushback against Rcon talking points re DJT 2005 tax return
Mar 14: Message Discipline 101—Pushback against Rcon talking points about Obamacare repeal
Mar 13: Culture, Civilization, Rural America, Working Families—the missing word is a “tell”
Mar 12: The Rcon definition of Christians is as wrong as the Rcon definition of Democrats.
Mar 11: Ribbons: A Day Without a Woman, Native Nations Rise, Voting Rights Act still lives
Mar 10: How to talk to people who have trouble understanding actions have consequences
Mar 9: Where’s the fire? The real reason Rs are trying to rush TrumpCare through Congress
Mar 8: Message Discipline 101: TrumpCare, RyanCare, GOPCare, DonTCare—what’s in a name?
Mar 7: How very hard it is for a woman to go a day without paid (or unpaid) work
Mar 6: Can DJT really be stumbling into the exact investigation we want?
Mar 5: How is it even possible that deplorables see a man of faith when they look at DJT?
Mar 4: Blue Ribbon Winners—Chris Hayes, Malcolm Nance, Cierra Fields
Mar 3: I’m glad Bannon, Conway, Carson, Sessions, Miller, et al. are in the DJT Administration
Mar 2: “In every major fire it always starts with smoke. And smoke is what kills you.”
Mar 1: Am I the only one whose skin crawled at the Carryn Owens BIRGing moment?
FEBRUARY
Feb 28: Spinspotting 101: Special Prosecutor for what? It’s so easy to answer that question
Feb 27: Spinspotting 101: I’ve seen no evidence because I haven’t looked for any evidence!
Feb 26: If Neil Gorsuch were a man of integrity, he would decline the S.Ct. appointment
Feb 25: True Blue Ribbons: Russia Flag trolling, Dixie Swastika grabbing, District Days demonstrating
Feb 24: There is no such thing as a compassionate conservative
Feb 23: Chief of Staff, Nat’l Security Advisor, GOP Head, President Bannon—too many hats!
Feb 22: DJT has a few questions for you—SMURF THIS POLL!
Feb 21: The end of “access journalism” means it’s time to #sendtheinterns
Feb 20: KAC lying low for now… can we banish her (and all her ilk) from the airwaves completely?
Feb 19: DeVos cartoon, Ruby Bridges, unearned unhappiness and childlike faith
Feb 18: Blue Ribbon Winners—Vice Adm. Harward, Melissa McCarthy, and intel whistleblowers
Feb 17: And Ain’t I an American?
Feb 16: Please tell your family and friends—If you regret your DJT vote, speak up NOW
Feb 15: R-supported forced childbirth laws deny the autonomy of women
Feb 14: What did the president know? Everything. When did he know it? From the beginning.
Feb 13: Coping with The Madness of King Donald by hoping political comedy will save us
Feb 12: The Poverty and Justice Bible
Feb 11: Blue Ribbon Winners—Swastika removers, Ninth Circuit Panel, and the Persisterhood!
Feb 10: The first three words of the Constitution are “We, the People” not “I, the President”
Feb 9: Who first inspired your political activism? Who inspires you now?
Feb 8: We cannot and will not be silenced—Here’s what to do if they try to silence you
Feb 7: Plain Talk Tuesday: Tell people the Affordable Care Act is the same as OBAMACARE
Feb 6: Interview Skills 101—Internalized oppression and what Ryan Lizza did right. BRAVO!
Feb 5: These protest signs with Bible cites will confuse and befuddle RWNJs
Feb 4: Blue Ribbon Winners—Temple B’Nai Israel, Judge Robart, CNN, Senate Phone Callers
Feb 3: Not rich, not smart, not a good businessman, not a winner—DJT is NOTHING he claims to be
Feb 2: Thursday action—Encouragement, thanks, and apologies (pick one or more)
Feb 1: July 7, 2009 to August 25, 2009 and September 25, 2009 to February 4, 2010
JANUARY
Jan 31: If you’re on overload that’s part of their plan—there’s more than one way to #resist
Jan 30: Interview Skills 101 for reporters attempting to interview KAC and other Rcons
Jan 29: Blessed are they who hunger and thirst after righteousness
Jan 28: Blue Ribbon Winners—Women's March participants and #NoMuslimBan demonstrators and...
Jan 27: I wish Steve Bannon would tell me to keep my mouth shut
Jan 26: Thursday Action—Have you ever written a letter to the editor? Here’s how to start
Jan 25: The Asch Conformity Study, inauguration crowds, and the importance of speaking out
Jan 24: #ResistTrumpTuesday—good news day or another paying dues day?
Jan 23: Spy the Lie 101: How to enjoy watching Rcon spokesbot interviews, even KAC!
Jan 22: Why I prayed for the President* today
Jan 21: The only silver lining in the midst of these clouds
Inaugural (!) diary: Stop expecting Republicons to make sense