I see a lot of people filled with despair. I get it. This moment is very hard. But if you give in to despair, if you give up, if you obey in advance by declaring that all is lost, then all will be lost.
And it isn’t. This is a party that took 5 months to pass a damn budget. These are not geniuses. These are not people we can’t beat.
This will not be easy, but we can do it.
There are so many of us and we are so determined to save democracy.
Stop with your “there will be no elections in 26” garbage. You know who is planning on elections in 26? The trump administration. In leaked internal memos they are pushing to do all they can now because they know there will be elections and they know they will lose.
Pretending they are not awful people doing awful things is foolish. Pretending this is not a difficult and awful time is foolish.
But giving up hope is something worse than foolish. It is weak and without the benefit of historical context.
We fought a civil war. We had the horror of the reconstruction era. We had slavery. We had Japanese Americans in camps on our soil. We had college kids shot in Ohio. We had McCarthy.
The battle we face is different but your ancestors didn’t give up. They followed Washington even after he lost battle after battle. They followed Lincoln even after it seemed the war would never end and we would never win. They went to war in Europe and Asia knowing that many wouldn’t make it back.
This is our moment. . As Mike Madrid said “let us be worthy of the moment.”
For those of you feeling despair, I found a lot of hope in Mike Madrid's words. He was a Latino GOP political consultant, Co-Founder The Lincoln Project and Author of “The Latino Century: How Americas Largest Minority is Transforming Democracy”.
You can find the full text (and a video) at the link. Here are some of my favorite parts:
This was a sobering Fourth of July. We witnessed a President sign into law a budget that will dramatically harm our great American project. We will be a much poorer, more indebted, sicker, and less free nation as a result.
But as deflating as this moment may seem, I want to offer some perspective.
Every generation of Americans has been summoned to defend the promise of democracy. Some have stood in snow-covered camps with no shoes and no certainty of survival. Others have crossed oceans into fire, fighting for freedom not only for themselves but for the world. Some marched in the Deep South against the racist laws that have scarred us since our founding. And some have stood their ground at home, marching, organizing, speaking up, so that our institutions might endure and our ideals might live.
Now, it is our turn.
Our moment may not look like Valley Forge, Gettysburg, or Omaha Beach. We are not dodging bullets or charging trenches.
But make no mistake, we too are in a war for democracy. It is a different kind of battle, fought not with muskets and bayonets, but with ballots and truth, with civic engagement and institutional defense. The stakes, while less visible than physical combat, are no less meaningful. If we fail to engage, if we lose faith in truth or drift into apathy, the American project, the promise that people can govern themselves, will erode from within. This bloodless war may be quieter than its predecessors, but defeat for our freedoms and our Constitution would be no less final.
Let us be clear-eyed: we are not asked to cross icy rivers or charge into enemy fire. We are asked to vote, to speak, to organize, to protest, to resist authoritarianism not with muskets or tanks, but with conviction and clarity. It is not glory we are called to, but responsibility.
To believe that our time is uniquely cursed is a form of arrogance. We are heirs to people who endured far worse and prevailed. But to believe that democracy will survive without our effort is a form of delusion.
This nation has survived civil war, global war, economic collapse, racial injustice, and constitutional crisis. It has done so not by accident, but because enough people, sometimes just barely enough, rose to the challenge.
We must do the same.
This is a moment of choosing. Between fact and fiction. Between hope and fear. Between democracy and something much colder.
Let us be worthy of the moment. Let us honor Washington's quiet plea for courage, Lincoln's call to finish the work, and Eisenhower's faith in ordinary people to do extraordinary things.
Today, fear has gripped millions of Americans, but the moment must be met with catalyzing action, not paralysis. Turn fear into righteous anger. Do not let it leave you frozen.
The cause of liberty has always depended on imperfect citizens rising to perfect occasions.
Now it depends on us.
https://open.substack.com/pub/greattransformation/p/let-us-be-worthy-of-the-moment?r=4n19kl&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email
