By Marguerite Jill Dye
A friend on Facebook from South Africa posted a quote that has helped me see it’s time for me to change my focus: “I cannot put it to you more simply than this: As long as you persist in considering the situation hopeless, then it is and you make it so. The moment you break out of that circle, the moment improvement begins and continues.” (From the “Wisdom of Seth” blog, posted by Jane Roberts.)
With the free press under assault and immigrants being rounded up at all hours, nightmares of Argentine death squads have returned to haunt me. Instead of being sent back to their countries of origin, victims were taken to secret prisons or thrown to their deaths from helicopters into the Rio de la Plata. People disappeared, never to return. Memories of living under a military dictatorship do not easily pass.
The difference between my Argentine-American friend and me is that she feels there’s no point in keeping up with what’s happening here because she believes that people have no power to change the situation. It’s a learned apathy, fear, and lack of personal or societal power. Whereas I grew up in America and believe in democracy, justice, and the will of the people.
This is a strange time in our homeland. Without the checks and balances of a functioning two party system, we are at the mercy of leaders many of whom are afraid to voice opposition to an unwieldy leader and his destructive agenda. Many elected representatives and appointed officials, including the family oligarchy, are in cahoots, and are getting as many bills through as quickly as possible, until the populace and rule of law find a way to stop it. Ryan and Pence are on a Tea Party mission: Trump, the FBI’s James Comey, and Putin, among others, have opened us up to Russian intervention; and Bannon orchestrates the alt right extremism for “the deconstruction of the administrative state.”
Hello? Is anyone listening?
He’s talking about deconstructing OUR administrative state, the USA! At the Conservative Political Action Conference, Bannon declared that Trump’s cabinet appointees “were selected for a reason, and that is deconstruction.” If your goal is to deconstruct the Environmental Protection Agency and Departments of Education, Energy, Housing and Urban Development, the U.S. Treasury, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and the State Department, how better achieve your goal than by appointing their greatest critics and opponents to lead them to their demise? as Jamie Green articulated in resistancereport.com.
Conservative David Frum wrote in The Atlantic, “If this were happening in Honduras, we’d know what to call it. But it’s happening here and we are baffled.” But it’s up to us to stand up for our democracy and envision the change we want to create by following Frum’s advice: We need to focus on issues that all Americans care about such as fair taxes and wages, clean air to breathe and safe water to drink, access to health care and a sound public education, so we can become an inclusive movement for change. Instead of drowning in the swamp of billionaire tax cuts and enrichment, we must open our arms and embrace disenchanted conservatives and puzzled workers who are beginning to see the dichotomy between campaign promises and our new alt-right reality. Instead of becoming distracted and more divided by Bannon’s first “shock event,” we need to see the Muslim ban and immigration raids for what they are: a tool of the dangerous, extreme alt right to create chaos and further divide America while distracting us from a successive surprise action.
How can we get America back on track and protect our nation from its deconstruction through the current alt right coup? There is an accessible, simple plan that we can implement together: indivisibleguide.com provides an effective strategy for resistance. By targeting our U.S. senators and representatives, we can demand and attend town halls, show up at public events, make office visits, and call them en masse. We can make them accountable and thank them for their conscientious votes. Over 7,000 Indivisible and affiliated groups have formed around the country to resist.
The guide offers on-going support, guidance, and camaraderie. “A real resistance movement is a marathon, not a sprint,” it reminds us.
Try as I must to distance myself from the political corruption and shocking news each day, my conscience keeps pulling me back to speaking up and standing up for what I believe in and what I am completely against. What I can do is avoid feeling that the situation is hopeless and try to share ways that will help us fight for social justice and work together for the greater good. Our future depends on it, and so does our Nation and the world.
“Power to the people” I say! “El pueblo unido jamas sera vencido! The people united will never be defeated!”
To end here is a positive “Angel Post:” Be aware of what’s happening around you. Be mindful of your actions and thoughts. You create your own reality through both your deed and mindset. When you envision the good, you create it. When you focus on the bad, you maintain it. The most important thing you can do is to visualize the good you desire.
Look for the positive in each situation and in each person, too. Try to see their unique perspective, developed from their life experience. If you can connect with their innermost self and understand where they came from, you’ll find your differences will melt away. You might, in time, become friends.
Everyone has strengths and weaknesses. Finding your common thread will help you weave a human tapestry to heal humanity’s hurt.
Marguerite Jill Dye, author and artist. She lives in Killington, Vt., and Florida with her husband Duane.
Photo by Marguerite Jill Dye
Paper cut assemblage titled “We are indivisible!”
