Feeling resigned

Tl;Dr: Feels like (our political situation) can’t be helped, maybe it’s time to just lay back and take it

I’ve been making the analogy that Trump is like a heart attack – urgent action (like CPR) is needed to help the patient survive the event.

Looking at what our urgent action has accomplished so far, I’m having some  doubts.

No question that our situation is bad, but perhaps there’s little that can be done politically until the next elections.

I’ve been putting a lot of faith in extra-political means, like protesting. And I’m starting to feel like I’m going it (mostly) alone.

If 11 million folks turn out today, I’d feel encouraged, and I put that at about a 20% chance. The opposition seems disorganized and frankly unpopular.

So what’s the alternative?

If you listen to the doom-sayers we will descend I to a different Archy in the next week or so: Oligarchy, Monarchy, Kleptocracy, etc etc. At the most extreme, Trump will crash the economy (happening, btw), dissolve the nation and Peter Theil will rebuild it as libertarian micro-nations.

Well… I agree that generally United States democracy will be degraded. I doubt the nation will dissolve. And to be Frank that’s what we voted for. (Yes, I mean every voter in the U.S. – regardless of whether you voted or for whom).

The more likely outcome a more extreme version of the Right/Left political pendulum we’ve seen for many years now:

• Civil rights will be degraded, some people will be oppressed
• Taxes will become more regressive, more $ to richer people
• Cultural decay

At least for the next 4 years. And then things will swing back toward the left for a few years, maybe more intensely.

And maybe there’s little to do about it. Without a change in house/Senate or a mass popular movement… Well… What would change it?

From this perspective, I’d basically be pinning my hope on the inertia of the nation & it’s bureaucracy to right the ship (Trump is attacking the bureaucracy hard, by the way). But there’s a LOT of inertia in the nation, and it will probably right itself eventually.

In the mean time, perhaps it’s time to give up on CPR and think about:

• How to change the opposition (looking at you Democrats) to be actually effective
• Getting out while it’s still possible

To push the Heart Attack analogy farther: the patient will likely survive, but a lot of its heart will die, and it will be more feeble in the future.

I’m gonna go fix my bike