Comments

  1. Nullifidian says

    Too bad about the “god” reference, but otherwise, a timely reminder of how we should behave.

    There are other things that could be added to the list, such as speaking out against injustices that one witnesses. There’s going to be an increase in that. (# 7, 12, & 19 go some way towards addressing that.)

  3. Silver Fox says

    No nice. No ‘Let Him Govern’ bullshit. No acceptance. No capitulation. He’s NOT my president. I’ll be in DC on Jan. 20 wearing my old Navy Corpsman uniform with anti-Trump and anti-Nazi buttons on the lapels. I’ll be on the side of the protestors. I’ll be part of the Resistance. This won’t be a grand old Kumbaya moment like ’08. Things could get really ugly, really fast.

  4. a_ray_in_dilbert_space says

    It seems to me that nice has nothing to do with politics. That went out even before Joe Wilson yelled out, “YOU LIE!” during Obama’s first address to Congress, less than a month into his administration.

    The right have done an excellent job giving us tutelage as to how the “loyal opposition” could comport themselves, as well as providing the valuable information that the Supreme Court doesn’t really need a 9th justice to function.

  5. johnson catman says

    Number 5, “Be calm when the unthinkable arrives”, is especially noteworthy. With The Orange One as the president, he is almost assuredly going to draw the ire of some terrorists. We must not let the authoritarians take more of our rights away for our “protection”.

  6. says

    I’m taking this advice to heart:

    […] 8. Believe in truth. To abandon facts is to abandon freedom. If nothing is true, then no one can criticize power, because there is no basis upon which to do so. If nothing is true, then all is spectacle. The biggest wallet pays for the most blinding lights. […]

  8. says

    Also, fuck nice. I am not about to be nice to people who really wouldn’t have much of a problem beating me up, killing me, or tossing me into a camp for several different reasons. No. We are now living in a time where white supremacists are in a position of unprecedented power. I grew up in the lingering effects of the McCarthy era. That was nothing compared to now. We all have a target on us, and I’ll be damned if I just stand there and take it. We must be part of the resistance, always watchful, always active.

  10. inflection says

    Hey PZ, ya heard about this one? From morningconsult…

    President-elect Donald Trump on Monday announced the addition of four transition team members who will help shape the Treasury Department under the next administration. Here’s what we know about the new additions.

    William Walton

    Walton is chairman of Rappahannock Ventures LLC, a Washington, Va.-based private equity firm. He is also vice president of the right-leaning Council for National Policy and a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute, a think tank advocating the “intelligent design” theory of human biology.

  11. Tethys says

    I went through angry, out the other side, and landed in a strange new place called Pantsuit Nation It is full of people who just woke up to all the sexism and racism that is inherent in our culture and are also way beyond angry. We are banding together and organizing coordinated efforts against this farce. I can’t imagine that the recounts aren’t going to lead to further unprecedented events. Why else would the narcissist be so threatened by double checking the results? The quiet, non-confrontational MN women ( and a bunch of men!) have transformed into feminist social-justice Valkyries overnight. I am shocked, but absolutely delighted to suddenly gain a nationwide horde of many fierce, smart allies. #dumptrump

  12. says

    The recommendations are fine, but seem a bit individualistic to me. First of all, I think fascism will take a very different face today than it did in the period Snyder references. A good reference to prepare for the ideological challenges of the new right is Roger Griffin’s “Fascism”, particularly the last chapter. Or this interview with Robert Paxton:
    http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/interrogation/2016/02/is_donald_trump_a_fascist_an_expert_on_fascism_weighs_in.html

    Other than that, I’d recommend building up organisations now, and looking to the radical left for organisational experience. They know right-wing structures intimately, because they’ve been studying them for years. They know how to protect yourself from police violence, how to establish support structures in terms of health, legal and financial support, the do’s and don’ts of demo participance and so on.

    If there’s any lesson to learn from the historical rise of fascism, it’s that the fragmentation of the left (social democrats seeing communists as the real threat, while communists called social democrats “social fascism”, which needed to be faught before actual fascism, liberals hating both) enabled the rise of fascism.

    I’m sure it won’t look like fascism or even tyranny. Trump doesn’t have jackbooted uniformed thugs running through the streets beating up jews and communists (and even that was normalized by a lot of people back then). There’s going to be a lot of people who are privileged enough and shielded from the consequences of the rule of the new right that they will think “well, it’s not that bad, and all those people calling Trump a fascist were just crying wolf.” It’s important to remind them that the story about crying wolf ended with an actual wolf in the village.

  14. slithey tove (twas brillig (stevem)) says

    *shit*
    my mind has been so poisoned by our POTUS-elect, that I heard most of the lyrics in that video as what Drumph has been saying. “I’m mad as hell and won’t wait anymore…too late…won’t do as I should… as you think I should…”
    *spit* *gargle* *spit* *gulp*
    shit
    I know what the video says and it expresses my feelings at Drumph quite well. FOKE him up the aspirin. (ass-per-in)
    k-rap

  16. lostbrit says

    Hmm – not really my position to impact the US’s political direction, but I thought the article by Timothy Snyder was one of the most moving things I’ve read about modern day politics.