Make America America Again
The American Resistance must be a single-minded movement sniper-focused on the rejection of tyranny and the restoration of liberty. The rest can wait
One month and 12 days in and we’ve seen enough.
Believers in miracles can stop their poor prayers that the Donald Trump elected last November to his second chance in the White House will this time set aside grift and grievance to govern with integrity, respect for the law, and even a modicum of fairness.
A reasonable man would have taken victory at the polls as a mandate for thoughtful change where change is due. But not the Mad Hairter, his ketamine-crazed Musk-Rat, his Ozempic-ed Hillbilly, and a cadre of unimaginably bizarre appointees. They are hell-bent on alarming allies and appeasing tyrants overseas while constructing a nativist, conservative-Christian, authoritarian, rich-enriching state at home.
The House and the Senate majorities have been revealed to be almost universally spineless and pitiful creatures, and the Democratic minorities largely flaccid thinkers with nary a new thought. The Judiciary and the Fourth Estate are under assault.
No need to revisit the chaos and offer sops to the perps in power about this or that issue that really did need to be addressed, like the flabby bureaucracy or onetime boys competing against girls.
No reason to list all the sniveling billionaires and Jello-legged CEOs quivering up to His Highness (you know who you are, Tim Cook, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, et al).
No future in bemoaning the handing of unchecked homeland power to a batty brainiac and his army of pre-pubic geeks.
In fact, no alarm bell requires ringing other than the abandonment of Ukraine to Control Agent Putin and the show trial of Zelensky.
About the latter, Senator Chris Murphy, Democrat of Connecticut, said it all:
“What just happened in the Oval Office was a planned ambush, designed to help a brutal Russian dictator and hurt America's security. Trump has become Putin's lapdog, and America's global power is hemorrhaging as America sides with dictators over democracy.”
The courageous Senator Lisa Murkowski, Republican of Alaska, added: “I am sick to my stomach as the administration appears to be walking away from our allies and embracing Putin, a threat to democracy and U.S. values around the world.”
Oh, and to put a nice Red cherry on that piece of cake for Trump’s comrade, his boozy Defense Secretary has halted offensive cyber action against Russia.
The question now: How to define an American Resistance that can bring together patriots from the Right, Center, and Left and deliver us from our own Clockwork Orange?
The Dems had two chances to stop the drift toward tyranny. In 2016 the party undermined the swelling, true-populist candidacy of Bernie Sanders and handed what it thought was going to be a coronation to Hillary Clinton. In 2020 it again brushed by Bernie to push forward tired old-guard Joe Biden. That worked briefly, until it didn’t. In mid-2024 it became clear that Joe wasn’t just sleepy, he was slip-sliding away. There was no Plan B. And all the joy momentarily returned to liberal Mudville — and the hope abetted by a giddy mainstream media (guilty hand raised) — couldn’t convince the country that Kamala Harris was more than an empty pantsuit.
Now, though the Dems desperately need a hero to lead them back to relevance, a flailing, feckless party burdened with tired tropes and battered baggage is not the answer to the ongoing assault on American liberty.
The barricades against overreach by Trump, oligarchs, broligarchs, Christian-country brigades, and White nationalists must be manned by a broad coalition of patriots.
MAGA is a movement, as Trump has rightly observed. What’s required is a counter-movement that brings together people of good will and strong conscience from across the entire political spectrum — including those disaffected MAGAs already suffering buyer’s remorse.
The new movement — as single-minded as a sniper — should:
Reject tyranny. No king, no presidential third term, no unelected czar dismantling departments and institutions created by Congress, no loyalty tests for civil servants.
Insist that the American Republic be governed as the Founders intended: by three separate but co-equal branches — Executive, Legislative, and Judicial — exercising their power without fear.
Demand that the rule of law be followed and decisions by the Judiciary be enforced. That means a Justice Department that owes allegiance to the Constitution only.
Protest the politicization of the military.
Affirm the support of our allies and denounce the embrace of our enemies, especially Russia, North Korea, and China.
Work to lessen the financial burdens on U.S. families by loudly opposing policies that will raise the cost of food, housing, and energy — and propose new ones that will offer relief to the paycheck-to-paycheck middle class.
Protect the safety nets on which so many elderly and poor citizens depend.
Repeat endlessly that the United States is a secular nation.
The America born 250 years ago in the musket smoke of Concord and Lexington must combat the tilt toward tyranny before all else. The cultural issues that obsess so many citizens should be put aside for another day.
Already pockets of American Resistance are springing up. Some are being organized under the 50501 banner, which will hold protests across the country on March 4, the day that Trump addresses Congress. But the Resistance must coordinate and not be distracted by red herrings like annexing Greenland, renaming the Gulf of Mexico, and turning Gaza into a pricey resort. Neither should it heckle and attempt to humiliate MAGA voters.
Leaders such as Bernie, Liz Cheney, AOC, Murphy, Murkowski, Jasmine Crockett, JB Pritzker, Liz Warren, and others need to come together and endorse a movement that transcends parties and politics, that pushes back against Trump’s monarchical dreams and Elon Musk’s reign of terror. Maybe Mike Bloomberg and like-minded moneybags could step up to the plate, too.
And all the true patriots who have watched in quiet horror as this administration has revealed itself must now march, shout, engage in economic boycotts of pandering companies, and confront tyranny as the fed-up Colonists did when they demanded liberty from King George III.
In 1772, angry Rhode Islanders got London’s attention when they torched the HMS Gaspee. Lighting up a Big Tech billionaire’s mega-yacht or releasing a million cockroaches at Mar-a-Largo would be wrong, of course. But we are still allowed to dream, aren’t we?