There is no question that we will suffer losses over the next 20 months, but Reverend Barber said it best: “No one victory will usher in beloved community; no single setback can stop us.” This post describes the latest national and state affront while outlining how we resist Trump, build and retake power, and create justice.
I’m going to be mercifully brief today because the only strategy that can resist Trump and retake and restore justice can be summed up in one word: organize. If you want a bit more detail: organize and build power. If you want more: organize, expand our base, and build power. The beauty of this is that Trump can’t stop us; indeed his every bizarre action helps us. What’s more, the power to build our base and to resist and ultimately usurp Trump and his klan depends on you. I’ve made this appeal before, but maybe it’s been couched in too much other information. Let me put this as clearly as I can: The only person who can help us build our base and create the power to restore sanity to this country is you, and while many of you are active, it is clear that more could be done. The good news is, it won’t take that much effort on your part to start this process. How? Begin by committing to reading and doing everything asked in the rest of this post. I am serious. It may take 27 1/2 minutes to complete all five steps.
- Join us on Facebook. (30 seconds). If you haven’t done so yet, go to our Facebook page and click “Like.” We have 666 likes right now. Our goal is to get to 1,000 by the end of March. Please do it now. Click here to get to our FB page, and then return here to finish the post.
- Identify Your Favorite Retake Blog Post. Forward it to Friends. (5 minutes). Go to our homepage, look over the posts, and find one that you particularly liked and that you think five of your friends would like. Copy the link into an email and send it five friends. If you really want to do it right, send it to 20. It will take just a bit longer. Tell them what you liked about the post and urge them to read it.
- Form an Affinity Group. (5 minutes). Think of 3-4 friends you like a lot, who share your values, and who are horrified by the direction our Nation is headed. Ideally these people will all know and like each other. Send a group email so they can see who you are inviting, and ask them to your house next week for coffee or lunch or dinner. When you gather, tell them why you like Retake and ask them to use their phones right then to sign up for the blog. Then ask if they will commit to meeting weekly to do some form of action or resistance.
- RSVP for the Outreach & Organizing Meeting, April 4. (2 minutes). Months of planning have gone into Outreach & Organizing, and at our last meeting there were 50 supporters broken into five teams: 1) planning outreach to other NM communities, 2) organizing Open House Activism gatherings; 3) strategizing to expand our base in Santa Fe, particularly to younger folks; 4) expanding our alliances with other organizations; and 5) planning a comprehensive block-by-block canvassing strategy. These are the building blocks — the hard but, yes, fun work of resisting Trump, building power, and creating justice in America. Click here to RSVP for the April 4 meeting. And when you meet with your friends (step 3), ask them to join you by taking out their phones and RSVPing right then.
- Read the Personal Action Toolkit from top to bottom. (10 minutes). Pay special attention to the SwingLeft strategy, but consider them all. Pick out one or two strategies that feel right for you and make a commitment to do them. Get a marker and a piece of paper and write these words: Personal Action Now. No Excuses. Tape it to your fridge. Don’t open your fridge again until you’ve taken an action: write to friends (Step 2) and ask if they liked the blog; go to our Facebook page and share a post you like; in your comment put the names of 2-3 friends so that it goes to their feed as well. These are simple steps that can be done while having coffee in the morning. Click here to get to the Personal Action Toolkit.
The key to daily action is to form a habit. Once you do, you will realize it really isn’t hard. Once you have friends involved and you are communicating and supporting each other, you will find it fun. You just need to get started. If 20% of the 1,700 people following this blog do it, we will double the number of supporters by the end of the month; we will have 150-200 people at our Outreach & Organizing meeting; and we will be on our way to getting the justice this country deserves and maybe to saving the planet for our grandkids. I promise one thing: if you close this post without doing 1-5, you won’t do it. DO IT. I guarantee you one thing: You will never regret the time you spend resisting this monster; but you will regret it if you didn’t spend enough time.
New Video Inventory on the Website. I hope you found the Valarie Kaur video in Thursday’s post inspirational. If you missed it, Click here, as Retake has assembled eight videos into one page, and her video is and will likely remain at the top. We will expand the inventory over time, but for now it includes:
- Two MLK, Jr. speeches, Mountaintop and I Have a Dream;
- Rev. Barber’s speech at the Democratic National Convention;
- An instructive video on moral language from George Lakoff;
- Two of the best video from Keith Olbermann that I have seen;
- A Robert Reich video that serves as a follow up to the Thursday blog about how Trump disputes facts, data, or opposition by attacking their validity;
- One riotous John Oliver destruction of Donald Trump and his penchant for lying. We need to laugh, often.
I will be adding more video on issues of interest regularly and will announce additions in the blog. To see the inventory, Click here.
Retake Our Democracy is a permanent show on KSFR. Today at 11am, I interview Steve Fischmann, NM Coalition for Fair Lending. I think it is one of the more interesting shows so far. Steve has an interesting slant on the legislative process as it unfolds in the Roundhouse and a deep understanding of the predatory lending industry. It is going to take a few weeks for KSFR to make podcasts available for listening at your convenience and to share with others. So listen in at 11 on Saturday.
Sat., March 11, 2:30-4:30 pm, ACLU Resistance Training streamed live at the Center for Progress & Justice, 1420 Cerrillos. This event will launch People Power, ACLU’s effort to engage grassroots volunteers across the country. The ACLU wants to organize people across the country to take the fight against Donald Trump’s policies not just into the courts, but into the streets. Retake Our Democracy will facilitate a 30 minute discussion following the live-stream. Click here to RSVP. The event is nearly full. Only those on our list as having RSVP’d are guaranteed seats or admission.
Robert Reich on Trump and His Cabinet Members’ Bending of Truth and Reality.
Reich really nails it, quoting some stunning comments from Trump and his henchmen (and one henchwoman), including HUD’s Ben Carson referring to slaves as being immigrants and DeVos claiming Historically Black Colleges as being ‘pioneers of school choice.’ Very worth watching.
Categories: Actions, Organizing, Trump
I will be there at the
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I would also like to add my encouragement to people to not become overwhelmed or discouraged. As is said in the Personal Action Toolkit, “Their strategy is that by doing so much so quickly your ability to react lessens and gradually what was once morally offensive becomes normal. This can’t happen. They win if it does.” I agree that we must not let their anti-democratic brutality become normalized, and we must also not let the distress they are causing make us give in and withdraw from the scene.
What is happening is certainly dispiriting – they are making rapid inroads in attacking pretty much every social and political value I hold dear. It is like the Battle of the Bulge – a full frontal attack that has overrun most of our defensive positions. In support of their attacks they have a lot of money from selfish moneyed interests, a powerful propaganda network, and a near-monopoly on governmental power. We definitely have the weaker hand here, and considering what may be lost, thinking about this can be stressful to the point of traumatic.
Trying to figure out how to resist can also seem overwhelming. When I look at all the potential actions there are for us to take, such as are laid out in the Personal Action Toolkit – especially when I follow all the links there – there seems far more to do than I can do. I think “I don’t have the strength or energy to do all this”. It keeps occurring to me that it might be easier to give up, put a bubble around myself, and ignore what is happening. But I’m not going to withdraw. Certainly, I need to protect my health, and some issues have come up there. But I think it’s going to be pretty hard to live in bubbles from here on out, because what they are doing is going to keep bursting them – they will keep violating our values on an increasingly intimate level because in part that is how they generate power, through division.
So I’d just like to encourage everyone to take care of your health first of all, find or organize those activities in which you can meaningfully participate, and keep pulling together. We are facing a bulging fascist plutocracy, and it will take a lot of sustained pulling to return decency to the political center.
Take care of your health first and foremost. The toolkit has lots of options and no one will do all of them. Pick the actions that fit your interests/capacities, but think in terms of pushing your comfort zone, too. the best thing anyone can do is to use the SwingLeft tool and reach out to friends in other states. Be well.
Hi Paul,
First, thanks for all you and Roxanne do. The Retake Blog and the recommended actions have been an important part of sanity retention for the past few months.
I have a question which I hope you can answer. Today I attended the ACLU People Power training at a private home and our group decided to compare the City of Santa Fe ‘Sanctuary City’ ordinance to the ACLU recommendations with an eye toward asking the County to implement something similar which includes all of the ACLU recommendations. As far as we can tell, no one is putting pressure on the County to enact such an ordinance but I am having the devil of a time finding the recently passed ordinance on the city website, perhaps because it is so new. Can you tell me either the City of Santa Fe ordinance number (2017-??) or how the ordinance was renamed once all references to ‘sanctuary’ were removed? It will help tremendously when I trek over to City Hall to try to get a copy. Thank you for your help.
Catherine (ddwore@gmail.com)
I haven’t actually examined the bill closely, but reached out to Marcela Diaz and asked her if the Welcoming City resolution covered the same pieces as the Freedom Cities ordinances. She indicated that Santa Fe’s resolution covered “90%” of what is included in the Freedom Cities bill. She also indicated that the county jails were models in not cooperating with ICE. But having said that, I think Retake folks would be delighted to read a point-by-point analysis comparing Freedom Cities and City and County policy. Would you be willing to take this on?