In Minneapolis, after 2 months of Federal occupation, disappearances, threats and daily terror, anonymous agents of ICE murdered 2 US Citizens. Public opinion, that most fickle of creatures, has turned against them. Governor Walz wondered if this was our Fort Sumter moment.
If Trump were to leave the Presidency tomorrow, little would change. JD Vance, our Nazi curious VP, owns as despicable a character, is as desperate a liar and as contemptuous of much of the American citizenry as Trump. The Republican Party would continue in their lockstep support of MAGA delusions and hatreds. If dominance and cruelty are part of your DNA, you cannot change.
We should not be deceived. More murders are coming and more State terror will be directed toward opponents of this regime. The catastrophes are in their early stages.
In Svetlana Alexievich’s book on Soviet veterans of their Afghan war, Zinky Boys, one wounded survivor, in speaking about his experiences says, “In these conditions, good men get better and the bad get worse.” We are now governed by terrible people who are afraid of a loss of power or their own culpability in the machinery of corruption and repression that has been unleashed on orders from Trump. It is foolish to believe that such people will not use every tool … any tool … to keep themselves safe. Two headlines from Saturday’s papers should convince you of their intent to build an American Gulag and to push harder to give ICE the powers of a secret police.
However, one more Saturday story tells you that evil does call forth goodness. At great risk to themselves, ordinary people have been defending their neighbors and continue to do so. The lessons learned in Minneapolis are spreading on-line, in person, friend to friend, stranger to stranger.
There are lots of metaphors swirling around trying to describe what Minneapolis means — a Gettysburg moment, our Archduke Ferdinand moment and Walz’s Fort Sumter reference — whatever forms a national fracturing takes, there are millions upon millions of fellow citizens who will choose to oppose tyranny. That is the good news of this awful January.
