We Must Preserve Our Rights

 American Citizens Live in Fear

A woman I know well who has lived peacefully and happily in this country for almost sixty years is now afraid to go out on the street alone. She entered this country legally as a young woman, and she became a citizen nearly 50 years ago. Now, she is afraid to go out by herself. She sees people arrested randomly and deported, and she wonders if she will be next. She is not alone. Many of our fellow citizens are living in fear today.

Is this what we have come to? Is this the country we love? Why is this happening?

Why is This Happening?

It is happening because our president, the Grifter in Chief (GF) finds himself in a bind. In his election campaign, he promised to deport millions of immigrants, but he cannot keep that promise for two reasons. First, he cannot keep his promise because if he were to deport millions of farm and factory workers, he would damage the economies of almost all of the red states, and he would lose political support in those states. Second, he cannot keep his promise because it would be very costly to do so. He wants to reduce taxes, but the deficit hawks in Congress will prevent him from doing so unless he can cut federal spending drastically. This is no time for him to propose spending billions of dollars for a program of mass deportation.

So, he is faking it. He is pretending to keep his promise by deporting a relatively small number of people randomly chosen from among citizens and residents who represent no threat to American workers or to the United States. Some people are deported because they are alleged without proof to be members of gangs that are labeled “terrorist organizations.” Other people are deported because they have spoken out in support of Hamas, although support of Hamas was never mentioned in his campaign. Still other people are deported through "administrative error!" The latest absurdity in this tragic comedy is that a two-year old child who is an American citizen has been deported.

Our Rights Are Disappearing Before Our Eyes

To do all of this the GF has had to ride roughshod over the rights to due process and to free speech. He has arrested a judge, and he has threatened others with impeachment because they made decisions that he didn’t like. He has pressured universities to teach only what he approves of. He has pressured law firms not to represent clients who oppose his policies. Without warrants or due process, he has arrested foreign students who supported Hamas and put them in detention facilities. He has said openly that he cannot carry out his program of deportations without eliminating the right to due process. In effect, he says that no one has a right to due process if the president decides that it is an impediment to something he wants to do. In other words, he claims that he can ignore the rights enshrined in our Bill of Rights whenever it is convenient for him to do so.

We Cannot Accept the Destruction of Our Constitutionally Protected Rights 

We must understand clearly the implications of the deportation of students who support Hamas. As a Jew and a supporter of Israel (although not of its actions in Gaza), I can easily understand why people are angered by support for Hamas, but I can also see that the right to free speech cannot apply only to speech that I approve of. The right applies also and perhaps especially to speech that is unpopular. If we allow the president to deport these students, we are accepting the idea that he is allowed to decide when speech is free and when it is not. 

That is completely unacceptable. We cannot allow a president to claim that speech is free only when people say things that he approves of.  The same applies to the issue of due process. We cannot allow a president to claim that the right to due process may be ignored whenever the president decides that ignoring it is convenient for him.

Otherwise, my friend and millions of other American citizens will continue to live in fear in their chosen country, and our rights as Americans will be destroyed merely because the GF needs to appear to be keeping a campaign promise. If we do not act now, we will soon all be living in fear.

We Must Win in 2026

 Resistance is Big and Growing 

Donald Trump and his administration are the greatest danger to American democracy that I have seen in my lifetime, but fortunately, he is provoking a lot resistance, and the resistance is growing. Voters on the left are attending the rallies organized by Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez. Thousands of people in a red state like Montana attending their rally in Missoula, where Sanders and Cortez spoke about resisting oligarchy. The Montana Free Press said,

“Taking on oligarchy is enormously difficult,” Sanders told the capacity crowd. “These guys own the economy. We now have more concentration of ownership than we’ve ever had in the history of this country. They own most of the media. They own the United States Congress and the White House. They got enormous amounts of wealth and power. But, you know what we got? We got the people. And the last that I have heard is that 99% is a hell of a lot bigger number than 1%.” 

Resistance is coming from the political right, too. A poll reported by Newsweek showed that nearly 25% of Republicans oppose Trump’s tariff plans. In addition, farmers are among those most endangered by those plans, and the farmers are also among those who would be most hurt by the deportation of undocumented workers. There is also resistance to Trump’s plans to lower taxes on the wealthy. Even Steve Bannon thinks they are a bad idea. Then, there is the resistance in the courts to Trump’s attempts to suppress dissent and eliminate the rule of law. A judge as conservative as Amy Coney Barrett has shown opposition to some of Trump’s actions.

We Must Join Forces to Win in 2026

All of these sources of resistance must come together in the elections of 2026 to wrest control of Congress from the president. The Republicans will probably lose congressional seats because historically, the president’s party usually loses seats in the midterm elections. The Republican majority in Congress is very thin, and the loss of only few seats will cost the party control of Congress. Moreover, the party is already divided over the president’s budgetary policies. Trump’s advisors know all of this, and that is why they are trying so hard to attain their objectives before the elections of 2026.

The Alternatives Are Unthinkable

The importance of taking control of Congress away from Trump in 2026 cannot be overstated. In our political system, the people express their power through elections. Members of the House of Representatives are required to run for office every two years because the founders of our republic believed that such frequent elections would make the representatives responsive to the will of the people. Twenty twenty-six is our chance! Let’s do it!

We must also win in 2026 because the alternative is unthinkable. If the people cannot stop Trump, he will destroy our world and our democracy, or he will be overthrown by a military coup. American military officers swear an oath to “support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic.” If Pres. Trump fails to execute the laws faithfully or ignores orders of our courts, he will become a domestic enemy of the Constitution, and the officers will be obliged by their oath of office to oppose him. Our military has a long and honorable tradition of abstaining from involvement in domestic politics, and that tradition is one of the bases of the success of our democracy. If the military is forced to break with that tradition, our democracy will exist only as long as the results of our elections are acceptable to our generals. We cannot allow that to happen. We must win in 2026.

We can do it!

A Grifter Faking It

Recent Arrests of Foreign Students

Our Grifter-in-Chief  (GC) has recently had a number of foreign students and professionals arrested ostensibly because of their views on war in Gaza. The GC’s excuse is that their presence in this country is a danger to American foreign policy, but that excuse is so ludicrous that it can only be thought of as a fig-leaf to cover his illegal actions. In an earlier post on this blog, I said that the purpose of these arrests was to stifle dissent by showing that the GC can make dissent very expensive for any dissenter. That is true, but it is not the whole story.

To stifle dissent, the GC would not have had to focus on arresting foreign residents. Using appropriate, legal excuses, he could just as easily arrest American citizens, and doing so might have been even more effective for suppressing dissent. However, the GC chose to arrest foreign students because he has another motive: he wants to appear to fulfill his promise to deport aliens from the United States while not really deporting very many of them. 

The GC Made a Promise That He Can't Keep Right Now

In his election campaign, he promised to deport millions of undocumented people, but as president, he appears to be reluctant to undertake deportations on such a grand scale. There are two reasons for his reluctance. First, deportations of millions of people would be very expensive and would interfere with his goal of reducing federal income taxes. He won't be able to persuade the deficit hawks in Congress to accept the tax cuts unless he also cuts government spending, and he won't be able to do that while paying for the deportation of millions of people. 

The second reason for the GC's reluctance is that deporting millions of workers would generate strong opposition from some important supporters of the Republican Party. Farmers and owners of other agricultural businesses would not want to lose their work forces, and merchants in small towns would not want to lose their customers. 

The GC Pretends to Keep His Promise

So, the GC is in a bind. If he deports millions of undocumented workers, he will generate strong opposition among his supporters. On the other hand, if he fails to deport people, he will lose the support of many voters who voted for him because he promised to deport millions of people. His solution to this dilemma is to pretend to keep his promise. He arrests a few hundred Venezuelans and ships them to El Salvador, and he arrests a few hundred graduate students and professionals. He conducts a few raids in urban areas that usually vote for Democrats. In total, the government says that it has arrested about 30,000 people, but the GC has avoided arresting millions of people in factories, fruit fields or dairy farms. Thus, he can appear to be keeping his promise, and he avoids alienating his supporters.

At the same time, he furthers his progress toward his main goal, which is to lower income taxes for himself and other billionaires. He knows that the deficit hawks in his party won’t let him do that unless he can cut the cost of the federal government by trillions of dollars. So, Elon Musk is working as quickly as he can to fire thousands of federal employees, and the GC will propose a budget that includes big cuts to programs like Medicaid on which many of his working-class supporters depend. He knows that this is no time for him to propose the billions of dollars in new expenditures that deportation of millions of people would cost. So, he fakes it.

Maybe Later

If he succeeds in lowering the income tax rates for billionaires and if he succeeds in suppressing political dissent, he may get serious about deporting the millions of undocumented workers in the United States, but even then, I wouldn't count on it. Deporting millions of workers would be contrary to his policy of trying to revive American manufacturing. He will not be able to persuade people to build factories in the United States if there are not enough workers to staff those factories. I don't know whether the goal of deporting undocumented workers is more important to him than the goal of reviving American manufacturing. Only time will tell. In the meantime, expect him to continue to fake it.

The Rule of Law is Almost Dead

A Scofflaw President

To President Trump, the law means nothing. He does whatever he wants. He has arrested people and deported them without any consideration of due process, and he has peremptorily fired civil servants without alleging any legitimate causes for the firings. The president's party controls Congress, and that makes him safe from impeachment. He is immune from criminal charges resulting from just about anything he might do, and if his supporters are convicted of crimes, he can pardon them, thus making them immune, too.

Most recently, we have learned that a man in Maryland named Kilmar Abrego Garcia was arrested and deported illegally to El Salvador, where he is a prisoner in the Center for Terrorism Confinement, and the administration says that it happened through “administrative error.” Not only that, but the Trump administration claims that the courts cannot order that the man be returned to the United States because he is now in Salvadoran custody and is therefore outside of the jurisdiction of our courts! 

In other words, the administration made a “mistake” and has no intention of rectifying it. The man can rot forever in a Salvadoran prison. Apparently, the Center for Terrorism Confinement is now Mr. Trump’s Bastille, and “administrative error” is his lettre de cachet. We are now in the France of Tale of Two Cities. If you think that I am exaggerating, you should read this article.

A Hairsbreadth Away From the End of the Rule of Law

On Friday April 4, a federal district judge who did not agree with the administration's claim, ordered the administration to return Mr. Garcia to the United States by the evening of Monday April 7. However, instead of complying with the court's order, the administration appealed the court's decision to the 4th District  Court of Appeals, which declined to intervene, and consequently, the administration has made an emergency appeal to the Supreme Court.  In other words, President Trump intends to preserve his right to deport anyone at will without interference from the law or the courts.

The Chief Justice has delayed the district court's order temporarily to give the court time to think about this. We are on the cusp of a constitutional crisis and a hairsbreadth away from the end of the rule of law.

We Should Be Scared

Mr. Trump's determination to preserve at all costs his ability to deport anyone at will is extremely frightening. The case of Mr. Garcia may really be an administrative error, but there can be no doubt that our president has discovered a very convenient way to deport any of us at will in order to suppress dissent and enforce his will. Anyone who says anything he doesn’t like can be "disappeared" through an "administrative error." This possibility is in addition to the methods of dissent suppression discussed in a previous post on this blog.

Anyone may be made to disappear in this way. Why should administrative errors occur only with immigrants? Why can't an American citizen also be made to disappear through administrative error? We know that Mr. Trump is vengeful and vindictive, and we know that he has contempt for law when it opposes his will. He and his supporters are suggesting even now that Judge Boasberg is committing “judicial overreach” and “legislating from the bench” merely for insisting that the president follow the law. They say that an “unelected judge” should not be allowed to oppose the will of an elected president. In other words, they believe that an elected president should not be bound by the law. A vengeful and vindictive president with contempt for the law has surely figured out that “administrative error” provides him with an easy way to rid himself of inconvenient enemies.

We Must Resist

We cannot allow our freedom to be destroyed in this way. We must resist, and there are several ways to do it.

• We can talk to our friends and neighbors about what is happening. Begin with people who are already opposed to Trump or his policies. Encourage them to become politically active. Even this president cannot deport thousands of people.
• We can take part in public demonstrations opposing the president's policies.
• We can work for candidates running for office. The election of Judge Crawford to the Wisconsin Supreme Court has shown that working for candidates can be effective even against strong opposition.
• We can contact our representatives in Congress and urge them to oppose the president's attempts to stifle dissent. 
• Urge our representatives to oppose policies that will be economically harmful to our communities. This may be a very effective method because it may give even Reublican representatives the confidence to oppose his policies.
• We can donate money to the candidates and political parties we would like to support.
• We can donate money to organizations like the American Civil Liberties Union and others that are fighting the the president in the courts. This may be the most effective method of resistance because delay is our friend. In 2026, the president will probably lose control of Congress, and that will reduce his power considerably.

We Should Be Prepared to Leave if Resistance Fails

I have no desire to leave my country. I am an American, and the United States is my home. However, we must face the possibility that we may need to leave if resistance fails. I recommend that everyone who values his/her freedom should begin to plan seriously to move to another country. With reasonable luck, we may never need to carry out our plans, but we should be prepared.

Here is what you can do. 

• First, if you don't have a passport, get one. If your passport is near its expiration date, renew it. 
• Second, Find out about countries that welcome American immigrants. 
• Learn about the advantages and disadvantages of each country. 
• Who can qualify for a resident visa? 
• What is the cost of living there? How safe is the country? 
• What kind of healthcare system does it have? 
• Does it already have a large expat community? 
• Think about where you would like to live. 
• Look into the process for getting a visa that will allow you to live there. 
• If the process is lengthy, get it started. 

There are lots of resources online for obtaining the information that you will need. A search on something like “retiring abroad” or “living abroad” will get you started. Good luck!

Mozart and the Illusion of Political Stability

An Illusion of Stability

Recently, as I drank my second cup of coffee and looked out at a beautiful, sunny morning, I listened to one of Mozart's horn concertos. The music was lovely and conveyed a comforting sense of order and stability as his music generally does. His original audiences must have felt that it expressed well their feeling that they lived in a world that was itself well-ordered and secure. As I drank my coffee, I imagined a roomful of wealthy Viennese or Parisians listening to Mozart’s music and thinking how comfortable and secure their lives and their social order were.

We know now that their comfort was an illusion. Their governments and their social order were tottering to a fall. The French Revolution took place in Mozart’s lifetime as did the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. The Napoleonic Wars, which destabilized all of the governments and societies of Europe, occurred only a few years later. As I thought about that, I wondered whether our political situation today may be similar to that of Mozart’s original listeners. I wondered whether our sense of stability and order may not also be an illusion.

We too live under a government and in a social order that seem stable and secure. Those of us who are comfortably well off feel secure in our positions just as Mozart’s listeners did. Oldsters like me receive our Social Security checks regularly and draw from our retirement accounts. We sip our coffee, and we appreciate the orderliness of Mozart’s music. We feel secure, but our government and society are threatened just as the governments and societies of Mozart's contemporaries were threatened and for the same reasons.

Why the French Revolution Happened

The French Revolution was triggered by the fact that the French government was broke. The revenue of the government did not cover its expenses, and it had to borrow money to pay its bills. Its debts grew larger every year, and lenders were becoming more and more reluctant to lend. One of the reasons for this situation was that the nobles who owned most of the country’s wealth refused to pay taxes. To find a way out of that difficulty, the king had to convene a national parliament: the Estates General. We all know what happened after that.

The French government’s need for money triggered the revolution but was not its only cause. Pressure for change had been building for decades. The new, urban middle class resented the privileges of the nobility, and the urban proletariat demanded food and justice. The peasants in the countryside were also deeply oppressed and often on the verge of starvation. The royal government, like ours, refused to acknowledge the problems of the people. When the poor complained that they had no bread to eat, Queen Marie Antoinette famously responded, "Then let them eat cake." There were extravagant displays of wealth next to extreme poverty. The king and the nobles sat atop a social order that was waiting to explode.

Are We Too Deluded?

We too live in a social order and under a government that seem to be secure and stable, but we too have a government whose expenditures outrun its revenue. Our government, like that of eighteenth-century France, has to borrow money to cover its costs. Our upper class, like that of eighteenth-century France, owns most of the country’s wealth and refuses to pay a fair share of the taxes. In our country as in eighteenth-century France, social injustices have been accumulating. Perhaps our society like that of eighteenth-century France is a cauldron waiting to explode. 

The strains in our system are visible in both of our political parties. The Republican Party is an uneasy alliance between its billionaire wing and its working-class MAGA voters. The party uses racist and nationalist appeals to cover its oligarchic ambitions. The billionaire wing, represented by Elon Musk, is working as fast as it can to reduce the costs of government enough to allow the already minimal taxes that the wealthy pay to be reduced still further. The working-class MAGA voters depend on services that the billionaires want to eliminate. 

The Democratic Party, which has in the past claimed to be the party of the working class can no longer count on the unwavering support of labor unions and has yet to devise a unified response to the Trump administration. The Party is divided between its "progressive" wing and its "centrist" wing. The latter suffers from the illusion that there are still "independent" and "undecided" voters in our electorate. The party has so far been unable to unite around a progressive, populist platform that might really appeal to working-class voters.

In the meantime, the cost of living continues to rise for most Americans, and healthcare emergencies remain the number one cause of personal bankruptcy. Housing becomes every day more unaffordable. Our president wants to put a tariff on Canadian lumber, and that will of course make housing still more expensive. Many of our people have lost faith in our system of government because it has failed to live up to the tacit bargain that makes representative democracy consistent with market capitalism. In the meantime, our president and his people are working to stifle dissent and weaken our democracy. W. B. Yeats put it well:

    Turning and turning in the widening gyre
    The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
    Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
    Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
    The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
    The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
    The best lack all conviction, while the worst

    Are full of passionate intensity.

Perhaps the comfort that I felt listening to Mozart’s Horn Concerto was as delusional as the comfort felt by his original audiences. Après nous le déluge?