If you’re concerned about Trump’s nominations, the most impactful thing you can do is to reach out to your US Senators and voice your opposition. A large volume of brief phone calls do make a difference at strategic times. Immediately after a nomination announcement is one of those strategic times, because they are figuring out how/whether to respond publicly. Democracy must be fought for even after elections have ended.
Contacting Senators from both parties also matters right now. The prevailing message in the media is that Dems need to cater even more to Republicans to win the next election, they need to hear your voice if you disagree with that.
The most effective phone calls take less than a minute: say your name, your city or ZIP code, and what you support/oppose, maybe a sentence on why. You’ll be marked down on a spread sheet that is discussed at the daily office strategy meeting.
Other actions like brief emails, meeting in-person at the district office, meeting in-person at the DC office, can also be effective, but take more time and energy. Emails aren’t always read right away like a phone call must be answered for example. And you generally need to make an appointment for an in-person meeting.
Nazis rose to power in Germany and kept doing worse things because too many people had this defeatist attitude
That’s an incredibly reductionist and ahistorical explanation of how the Nazis overthrew the Weimar Republic…
Not to mention incredibly dismissive to the thousands of people who were literally battling brown shirts in the streets of Berlin leading up to the burning of the reichstag .
The Nazi didn’t rise to power because people had a defeatist attitude, it’s because the Nazi murdered their opposition, were perfectly fine with intimidating voters, and were backed by corporations and a significant portion of the population who blamed socialism for the economic slump of postwar Germany.
If you truly believe this, I highly suggest reading “The Death of Democracy” by Benjamin Hett. Phone calls aren’t going to sway the opinions of someone who fundamentally doesn’t think you should be alive.
This is the hard lesson people will have to learn in the coming years. I hope I’m wrong, but things are about to get very bad for anyone who isn’t white, cis, hetero and male.
Yeap, I’m a product of an interracial marriage who is currently in an interracial marriage with someone who is openly bisexual, in the reddest state in America. I’m probably going to be pulling the rifles out of the attic for a good cleaning this weekend.
Nazi has rose to power in Germany because liberals elected them.
No. No party received a majority in that election. The liberal government (Hindenburg) handed Hitler power. Sound familiar?
Then liberals indirectly elected him
I’m sure tons of people that voted for the liberal party in that election were very unhappy with Hindenburg’s decision to make Hitler Chancellor.
I could be mistaken, but I believe Hindenburg’s party could have formed a coalition government with the Communists/socialists/trade unionists to defeat the Nazis, but instead decided to hand power over to a fascist autocrat. If we had a (superior imo) parliamentary system, we may have had a similar opportunity (and more than two political parties).
So I would continue to make the distinction between the liberal voters, and the liberal government of the Weimar Republic.
It’s too late, buddy; the fascists already control everything.
They do not, Trump’s appointments are not yet in place. It’s never too late to fight for democracy.
As a Canadian looking in, it’s hard not to agree with pearsaltchocolatebar. Although I do love your determination, you might end up having to fight for it more literally.
Resistance to authoritarian regimes takes many forms, I found the book Why Civil Resistance Works to be a very helpful analysis of different resistance movements and their tactics
I haven’t read this book, but I’m pretty skeptical of how they define nonviolent resistance and what makes a revolution “successful”
Are the revolutions they are principally utilizing, and that makes me think this book isn’t exactly the most academically honest study around.
The Iranian revolution had battles in the streets and plenty of deadly clashes with the Shahs regime. It also led the the largest political massacre in the country’s history.
The yellow revolution funded militant groups, featured a helicopter attack on the president’s compound, and only didn’t devolve into a massacre of civilians because a marine commander refused to participate in the wholesale slaughter of tens of thousands of people.
Led to the deaths of over a thousand civilians and is a precursor the the genocide we are currently witnessing.
Started fairly similar to the Philippine uprising, except their military commanders were perfectly fine massacring civilians, with a death toll of 3k-10k people…
I am willing to give this a read, but I would also suggest other people read “Setting Sites” by Scott Crow as a counterpoint.
The book does acknowledge and analyze the violent and nonviolent aspects of the resistance movements in the case studies, and how they impacted each other. Thanks for the suggestion on Setting Sites
I’m not sure why you think his appointments are the issue here.
Because the appointments are the current issue that has some ability to be influenced. It helps to lean into issues that are making headlines, partly because reporters are reaching out to offices for their comments to get their stance on public record
Trump is planning on canceling sessions so he can do recess appointments.
Trump doesn’t have that power, he’s pressuring the Senate to do so. Thus calling Senators to stand up to these shenanigans is important.