These are not Normal Times. Pelosi’s House has got to stop acting like we’re living in them.
Those that are paying attention to the important things (through the haze of so much destruction it’s hard to choose) know that the sabotage the Trump team is enacting on the USPS is a five-alarm fire. This is a war on our enfranchisement which is basically the only real power we Americans have left.
I will not be outlining the case too much as those in our DKos community, like SemDem, already have done so. The very brief summary is: our current Postmaster General is purposefully destroying our United States Postal Service to disenfranchise millions of people. And to add: he owns assets that include the USPS’ competition. (I would ask how such a mockery of our democracy came to be, but we all know how). For Trump and DeJoy, his appointment and approval were win-win.
And as usual, it doesn’t seem like those that need to be fighting back are noticing much. The Friday Night USPS Massacre has already been relegated to Page 22 of every major reporting outlet. (They just had to follow the ‘Massacre by the Saturday “Executive Order” Distractathon.) The Democrats don’t seem to be that concerned gauging by the lack of any real outrage over Friday’s events.
Trump is stealing our right to vote. It’s that simple. This is an egregious free-government-ending power grab. That’s basically what he does, but this is the most significant of them all because now there is no question of the truth: he wants to be dictator. He wants to remove America’s democratic right to decide who we want to be our leaders.
Putting it another way: have you ever thought: what would America look like had the South won the Civil War? If we don’t stop #45, we could find out. The New Confederacy has the power; and the goal appears to be same as it ever was: destroy the free Union.
We need to calling our personal House Reps until Pelosi addresses what is happening right now. Does she believe in our democracy or not? This is her moment. This is ours too.
It’s so easy to look away and imagine that whatever Trump does he still won’t be able to penetrate elections run by local precincts. But that is living on the thin air of hubris at this point. He is out in broad daylight sabotaging our enfranchisement. And I’m guessing that what we can see may just be the tip of this nefarious iceberg.
The U.S. is no stranger to disenfranchisement as African-Americans can attest. But at no other time have we had a moment where a single authority figure has gone for the complete coup.
Americans are infamously apathetic. I look back and get nostalgic at all our lost chances to get in the streets. There have been many blown opportunities. We should have been in them when McConnell stole Obama’s right to appoint Garland to SCOTUS, but alas, we were blind in 2016 too. And now the micro-coup’s come at us so fast it’s even easier to feel powerless, and to just opt out.
Please consider making your own call to action to your friends and family to be setting the switchboards on fire in Congress. Call no matter what party affiliation. Senators and Representatives alike need to hear from us until they show us that they care about our republic.
The call to action needs to be a demand for impeachment. Postmaster General DeJoy can be legally Impeached. If the Senate looks away, he will still be under The House’s spotlight of subpoenas and investigations. I think if enough of us call our US Senators, however, that they might surprise us.
Again, Trump and DeJoy are robbing American citizens of our right to choose our President, Senators and Representatives by these actions. We have to act. If calling Congress solicits nothing, then we need to mask up and get in the streets again. Every left and civil rights organization, starting with Black Lives Matter, should be asked for help to do so.
If we fail to fight for our right to decide how our country is run in fair and free elections, we may not have another one. Then where will we be this time next year?
“The ballot is stronger than the bullet.”
– Abraham Lincoln