Fighting the Rich and Their Two Parties

Following is the livestream of today’s “Fight the Rich and Their Two Parties” conference in Seattle.

Organized by Workers Strike Back, this “organizing conference” features Kshama Sawant, Jill Stein, Chris Hedges and others.





Related Off-site Links:
Fight the Rich – Kshama Sawant (CounterPunch, January 27, 2025).
Jill Stein and Kshama Sawant on the Fight the Rich Movement – Sabrina Salvati (Sabby Sabs, January 26, 2025).
Bernie Sanders Launches Copycat Tour to Stall Third Parties – Sabrina Salvati (Sabby Sabs, February 15, 2025).
One Month of the Trump Administration: The Oligarchy vs. the Working Class – Statement of the Socialist Equality Party (February 20, 2025).
“Democrats Are Never Coming Back After Genocide Support”: An Interview with Butch Ware – Briahna Joy Gray (Bad Faith, February 4, 2025).
Trump Is Unpopular – and So Are the Do-Nothing Democrats – Jeet Heer (The Nation, February 18, 2025).
Defeating the Democratic Party Elites Is Just the First Step – Joseph Geevarghese (The Nation, February 4, 2025).
Why Are the Democrats So Spineless? – Moira Donegan (The Guardian, February 3, 2025).
“Working People Feel Betrayed by Democratic Elites”: An Interview with Marianne Williamson – Rising (January 15, 2025).
Marianne Williamson on Why Americans are Rejecting the Status Quo – NewsNation (December 28, 2024).

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• “The Moment Is Ripe”: Butch Ware on Building a “True Oppositional Alternative” to the Duopoly
• Democrat Talk on the Eve of Trump’s Return
• The Green Party’s Jill Stein and Butch Ware Give Their First Post-Election Interview
• Progressive Perspectives on Where Democrats Went Wrong in the 2024 Election
• What the Republican Party Now Stands For
• The Lamentable Legacy of the Biden Administration
• Jill Stein: “We Give Reasons for People to Come Out and Vote”
• We’re Witnessing a Liberal Meltdown Over Jill Stein
• Butch Ware: “You Can Actually Vote Your Conscience”
• Peter Bloom on the Unmasking of the “Democratic Charade”
• The “Green Smoothie” Option
• Green Party Vice Presidential Candidate Butch Ware in Minneapolis
• When Democrats Undermine Democracy
• History Matters
• Elise Labott on How Third Parties Can Revitalize Democracy
• Something to Think About – August 15, 2024
• Centrist/Corporatist Democrats Have Just Launched “Left Punching” Season
• “Americans Deserve Choices”: Jill Stein on Breaking Points – 4/30/24
• AOC Falls in Line
• The Cassandra of U.S. Politics on the “True State of the Union”
• Will Democrats Never Learn?
• “The Next Step Is a Green Step”: Cornel West Endorses Jill Stein (2016)
• Hope Over Fear: Voting Green

Quote of the Day

These two buffoons [Donald Trump and JD Vance] love to cosplay as warriors, champions of testosterone in a world gone soft. But let’s take a look at what they’re actually doing. Trump, a man who dodged the draft because of imaginary bone spurs, is threatening to withhold federal funding from Maine because its governor won’t bow to his demands. And JD Vance, a man who once wrote an entire book about the dangers of sucking up to elites, is now licking Trump’s boots so hard you’d think they were made of chocolate.

Masculinity, real masculinity, is about strength, courage, and integrity. It’s about standing up for what’s right, even when it’s hard. It’s about protecting the vulnerable, not attacking them for political gain. It’s about facing adversity head-on, not throwing a fit when someone tells you “no.”

By that measure, Trump and JD Vance are about as masculine as a wet paper towel.

Trump can puff out his chest and scream at governors all he wants, but at the end of the day, he’s just a blustering coward who folds under the slightest pressure. JD can cry about the decline of masculinity, but no real man spends his days groveling at the feet of a guy who wouldn’t piss on him if he were on fire.

The irony is that the people they’re attacking – women who stand their ground, LGBTQ people fighting for equality – are showing more guts, more resilience, more true strength than either of these pathetic frauds could ever muster.

Trump and JD don’t represent masculinity. They represent the weak, whimpering, flailing desperation of men who know, deep down, that they are frauds. And nothing is more pathetic than a man who has to constantly remind you how strong he is.

– Closer to the Edge
Excerpted from “The Bully and the Bootlicker:
Trump, JD Vance, and the Cowardice of Fake Masculinity”
February 21, 2025

See also the related Wild Reed posts:
• A Warrior’s Heart
• Vulnerability Is Power
• A Fresh Take on Masculinity
• Manly Love
• Rockin’ With Maxwell
• Reclaiming the Power of Male Touch
• Beloved and Antlered

See also The Wild Reed’s “What a Man!” series:
Ben Cohen | Sean Avery | Hudson Taylor | John Kriesel | Nick Youngquest | Chris Kluwe | Brendon Ayanbadejo | Nick Symmonds | Andrew Ference | Connor Beaton

Related Off-site Link:
The Divine Masculine Principle – The Leveret (September 15, 2018).

Image: Kristen Solberg.

Happy Birthday, Buffy!

– Image: Julie Jocsak (2017)

Trail-blazing and influential singer-songwriter Buffy Sainte-Marie turns 84 today.

Happy Birthday, Buffy!

As regulars readers will know, I’ve long admired Buffy Sainte-Marie and enjoyed her music. Indeed, I find her to be a very inspiring figure. (I even chose her song “It’s My Way” as my theme song when I turned 50 in 2015!)

Left: With Buffy after her August 26, 2016 performance at The Dakota in Minneapolis.

I especially appreciate and am inspired by Buffy’s passion and purposefulness – and by the way she blends her art and social activism.

I’ve seen her four times in concert, and had the privilege of meeting her on three of these occasions. She’s creative, articulate, warm, and funny – a very human human being.

Buffy’s most recent album is the award-winning Medicine Songs (2017), about which Buffy says the following.

[Medicine Songs] is a collection of front line songs about unity and resistance – some brand new and some classics – and I want to put them to work. These are songs I’ve been writing for over fifty years, and what troubles people today are still the same damn issues from 30-40-50 years ago: war, oppression, inequity, violence, rankism of all kinds, the pecking order, bullying, racketeering and systemic greed. Some of these songs come from the other side of that: positivity, common sense, romance, equity and enthusiasm for life.

I really want this collection of songs to be like medicine, to be of some help or encouragement, to maybe do some good. Songs can motivate you and advance your own ideas, encourage and support collaborations and be part of making change globally and at home. They do that for me and I hope this album can be positive and provide thoughts and remedies that rock your world and inspire new ideas of your own.

Above: Buffy and guitarist Anthony King performing at the Big Top Chautauqua, Bayfield, WI on Saturday, August 27, 2016. (Photo: Michael J. Bayly)

Buffy was in the news recently after the Canadian government rescinded its appointment of Buffy to the Order of Canada, the country’s most prestigious civilian accolade. Although no specific reason was given for the termination, it seems to be the result of the October 2023 CBC documentary that challenged Buffy’s long-standing claims of Indigenous ancestry. Today’s post isn’t about any of this, in large part because I’ve addressed the fall-out from this documentary previously at The Wild Reed (see, for example, here, here, here, and here). Instead, I celebrate Buffy’s life and work in their totality today, her 84th birthday.

I start this celebration Buffy by sharing the haunting ballad “Must I Go Bound,” the opening track of Buffy’s second album Many a Mile, released in the year of my birth – 1965. It’s followed by excerpts from Andrea Warner’s Buffy Sainte-Marie: the Authorized Biography, published in 2018.

[Buffy] confronted colonialism in her activism and with her music. On her 1965 album, Many a Mile, she covered several British traditional folk songs [including “Must I Go Bound”], but her originals were deeply rooted in her activism and core beliefs, including “Welcome Emigrante” and “The Piney Wood Hills.” She didn’t always get the credit she deserved as a songwriter, but Sainte-Marie was accummulating professional power. She continued to use the spotlight to talk about Indigenous issues and alternative conflict resolution, but she also began to push her sound away from coffee-house acoustic.

. . . [Many a Mile also includes] two glorious covers – Bukka White’s “Fixin’ to Die” and Patrick Sky’s “Many a Mile.” [Buffy] also recorded what would be her own most covered song of all time: “Until It’s Time for You to Go.” It quickly became a pop standard, and was a hit for everyone from the Four Pennies to Neil Diamond to Elvis Presley.

– Andrea Warner
Excerpted from Buffy Sainte-Marie:
The Authorized Biography
Greystone Books Ltd, 2018
p. 92 and p. 278

Related Off-site Links:
Singer-Activist Buffy Sainte-Marie Stripped of Order of Canada, the Country’s Most Prestigious Civilian Honor – Karen Bliss (Variety, February 8, 2025).
Junos Head Says Organization Faces “Complicated” Questions Around Buffy Sainte-Marie’s Awards – David Friend (The Canadian Press via Rocky Mountain Outlook, February 11, 2025).
Longing and Belonging: Birth Certificate of Buffy Sainte-Marie’s Aunt Indicates “Non-White” Ancestry – Brian Halpin (Before We Were White, March 20, 2024).
Buffy Saint-Marie Documentary, Carry It On, Wins International Emmy Award – CBC News (November 20, 2023).
Buffy Sainte-Marie Says CBC Investigation Into Ancestry Includes Fabricated Evidence: “These Allegations Do Not Shake Me” – Christy Piña (The Hollywood Reporter, November 23, 2023).
Buffy Sainte-Marie Pushes Back Against CBC Investigation Contradicting Claims to Indigenous Ancestry – Kelly Geraldine Malone (The Canadian Press, November 23, 2023).
Buffy Sainte-Marie Says CBC Investigation Into Ancestry Includes Fabrications
– Jessica Wang (Entertainment Weekly, November 23, 2023).
“I Have Never Lied”: Buffy Sainte-Marie Pushes Back On Probe Into Indigenous Ancestry – Kelby Vera (The Huffington Post, November 25, 2023).
What’s the Point of “Pretendian” Investigations? – Michelle Cyca (The Walrus, November 20, 2023).
The Problem With Labelling People “Pretendians” – Drew Lafond (The Globe and Mail, May 28, 2022).
Buffy Sainte-Marie May Not Be Native But She Could Be Jewish – Barbara Aiello (The Times of Israel, November 20, 2023).
Discovering Buffy – David Rovics (This Week With David Rovics, November 6, 2023).
Buffy Sainte-Marie’s Adoption by Indigenous People Vital – Doug Cuthand (The Star Pheonix, November 4, 2023).
“Be Gentle With Yourself': Indigenous Northerners Wrestle With Legacy of Buffy Sainte-Marie – CBC News (November 1, 2023).
Anishinaabe Singer Says Contested Ancestry of Buffy Sainte-Marie “Doesn’t Take Away the Inspiration” – CBC News (October 31, 2023).
Two Indigenous Artists React to the Questions Raised About Buffy Sainte-Marie’s Ancestry – CBC Arts (October 30, 2023).
Revelations About Buffy Sainte-Marie’s Ancestry Are Having a Devastating Impact on Indigenous Communities Across Canada – Lori Campbell (The Conversation, October 29, 2023).
“We Claim Her, End of Story”: Buffy Sainte-Marie’s Piapot Family Hurt by Allegations – Haley Lewis and Melissa Ridgen (Global News, October 27, 2023).


For The Wild Reed’s special series of posts leading-up to the November 10, 2017 release of Buffy Sainte-Marie’s Medicine Songs, see:
• For Acclaimed Songwriter, Activist and Humanitarian Buffy Sainte-Marie, the World is Always Ripening
• Buffy Sainte-Marie: “I’m Creative Anywhere”
• Buffy Sainte-Marie Headlines SummerStage Festival in NYC’s Central Park
• Buffy Sainte-Marie, “One of the Best Performers Out Touring Today”
• The Music of Buffy Sainte-Marie: “Uprooting the Sources of Disenfranchisement”
• Buffy Sainte-Marie: “Things Do Change and Things Do Get Better”
• Buffy Sainte-Marie’s Medicine Songs

For The Wild Reed’s special series of posts leading-up to the May 12, 2015 release of Buffy’s award-winning album, Power in the Blood, see:
• Buffy Sainte-Marie and That “Human-Being Magic”
• Buffy Sainte-Marie’s Lesson from the Cutting Edge: “Go Where You Must to Grow”
• Buffy Sainte-Marie: “Sometimes You Have to Be Content to Plant Good Seeds and Be Patient”
• Buffy Sainte-Marie’s Power in the Blood


For more of Buffy Sainte-Marie at The Wild Reed, see:
• “The Real Deal”: Maurice Switzer on the Legacy of Buffy Sainte-Marie
• Kyle Irving: Quote of the Day – February 26, 2024
• Buffy Sainte-Marie: “It Is Time for Me to Shine a Light on the Truth, My Truth”
• David Rovics: The “Big Picture” of the Buffy Sainte-Marie Controversy “Necessitates Holding Contradictory Things to Be True at the Same Time”
• A Music Legend Visits the North Country: Buffy Sainte-Marie in Minnesota and Wisconsin – August 2016
• Buffy Sainte-Marie on Indigenous Peoples’ Day: “There’s an Awful Lot of Work Yet to Be Done”
• Buffy Sainte-Marie: The Pope’s Apology Is “Just the Beginning”
• Sweet America
• Carrying It On . . . Into the New Year
• Buffy Sainte-Marie’s “America the Beautiful”
• Two Exceptional Singers Take a Chance on the “Spirit of the Wind”
• Photo of the Day – January 21, 2017
• Buffy Sainte-Marie Wins 2015 Polaris Music Prize
• Congratulations, Buffy
• Happy Birthday, Buffy! – 2016 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2023
• Actually, There’s No Question About It
• For Buffy Sainte-Marie, a Well-Deserved Honor
• Buffy Sainte-Marie: Singing It and Praying It; Living It and Saying It
• Buffy Sainte-Marie: Still Singing with Spirit, Joy, and Passion
• Something Special for Indigenous Peoples Day
• Buffy Sainte-Marie: “The Big Ones Get Away”

Opening image: Buffy Sainte-Marie in concert in 2017. (Photo: Julie Jocsak)

My Daily Mantra of Late

For more on A Course in Miracles at The Wild Reed, see:
• Be in My Mind, Beloved One
• Your Peace Is With Me, Beloved One
• You Are My Goal, Beloved One
• The Beauty and Challenge of Being Present in the Moment
• Resting in the Presence of the Beloved
• I Need Do Nothing . . . I Am Open to the Living Light
• Returning the Mind to God
• Being the Light
• Stepping Out of Time and Resting Your Mind
• In the Stillness and Silence of This Present Moment
• Pollyanna, “Miracle Worker”
• Becoming Miracle Workers
• In the Midst of the “Great Unraveling,” a Visit to the Prayer Tree
• Something to Think About – January 19, 2024
• Dwelling in Peace
• Cultivating Stillness
• In the Garden of Spirituality – Marianne Williamson
• The Mystic Jesus: “A Name for the Unalterable Love That All of Us Share”
• Easter for Mystics
• Christmas for Mystics

See also:
• No Stranger Am I
• What Part of Jesus’ Invitation to “Be Not Afraid” Don’t the Bishops Get?
• Love’s the Only Dance
• Mystical Participation
• Nakhane’s Hymn to Freedom
• Rock of Ages

“It Is Our Responsibility to Make a Third Party Viable”

Briahna Joy Gray’s words that comprise the title of this post remind me of how I’ve long been conflicted between supporting progressive Democrats determined to transform the Democratic Party (folks like Bernie Sanders, Marianne Williamson, and Nina Turner) and supporting alternative parties and candidates such as Jill Stein and Butch Ware of the Green Party; folks who make the compelling case that the Democratic Party is irredeemably corrupt.

Here’s the thing: In 2024 (and at times previously) I found myself supporting both groups at different times in the election cycle.

In a recent segment of her Sabby Sabs podcast, Sabrina Salvati shared her thoughts on a recent conversation involving Briahna Joy Gray, Marianne Williamson and Joseph Geevarghese. This conversation focused on the question: Do we continue supporting and attempting to reform the Democratic Party or do we work to form a genuine left party free of corporate control?

I found both the original conversation and Salvati’s 35-minute commentary on it (below) to be both insightful and compelling. Perhaps you will too.





Related Off-site Links:
“Democrats Are Never Coming Back After Genocide Support”: An Interview with Butch Ware – Briahna Joy Gray (Bad Faith, February 4, 2025).
Defeating the Democratic Party Elites Is Just the First Step – Joseph Geevarghese (The Nation, February 4, 2025).
Why Are the Democrats So Spineless? – Moira Donegan (The Guardian, February 3, 2025).
What to Do – Marianne Williamson (Transform, February 3, 2025).
Democrats Elect Ken Martin, the Party Leader in Minnesota, as Their National Chair – Steve Peoples (AP News, February 1, 2025).
Jill Stein and Kshama Sawant on the Fight the Rich Movement – Sabby Sabs (January 26, 2025).
My Plan for the DNC – Marianne Williamson (Transform, January 14, 2025).
“Working People Feel Betrayed by Democratic Elites”: An Interview with Marianne Williamson – Rising (January 15, 2025).
Marianne Williamson: Democrats Need a “Radical Transformation” – Sky News (December 29, 2024).
Marianne Williamson on Why Americans are Rejecting the Status Quo – NewsNation (December 28, 2024).

UPDATES: Why Democrats Won’t Throw a Real Punch – Dave Zirin (The Nation, February 18, 2025).
Trump Is Unpopular – and So Are the Do-Nothing Democrats – Jeet Heer (The Nation, February 18, 2025).

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• “The Moment Is Ripe”: Butch Ware on Building a “True Oppositional Alternative” to the Duopoly
• Democrat Talk on the Eve of Trump’s Return
• Breaking the Mold: Why Progressives Should Push for Marianne Williamson to Lead the DNC
• Inauguration Day Thoughts
• The Green Party’s Jill Stein and Butch Ware Give Their First Post-Election Interview
• Progressive Perspectives on Where Democrats Went Wrong in the 2024 Election
• “A New Chapter of the Democratic Party Needs to Begin”
• What the Republican Party Now Stands For
• The Lamentable Legacy of the Biden Administration
• Jill Stein: “We Give Reasons for People to Come Out and Vote”
• We’re Witnessing a Liberal Meltdown Over Jill Stein
• Butch Ware: “You Can Actually Vote Your Conscience”
• Peter Bloom on the Unmasking of the “Democratic Charade”
• The “Green Smoothie” Option
• Green Party Vice Presidential Candidate Butch Ware in Minneapolis
• When Democrats Undermine Democracy
• Elise Labott on How Third Parties Can Revitalize Democracy
• Something to Think About – August 15, 2024
• Centrist/Corporatist Democrats Have Just Launched “Left Punching” Season
• “Americans Deserve Choices”: Jill Stein on Breaking Points – 4/30/24
• AOC Falls in Line
• The Cassandra of U.S. Politics on the “True State of the Union”
• Will Democrats Never Learn?
• “The Next Step Is a Green Step”: Cornel West Endorses Jill Stein (2016)
• Hope Over Fear: Voting Green

Time to Grow Up . . .

It seems to me that it is a minority that ever gets the true and full Gospel – in any denomination. Most of us just keep worshiping Jesus and arguing over the right way to do it. The amazing thing is that Jesus never once says, “Worship me!” whereas he frequently says, “Follow me” (see, for example, Matthew 4:19).

Christianity is a lifestyle – a way of being in the world that is simple, nonviolent, shared, and loving. However, we made it into an established religion (and all that goes with that) and avoided the lifestyle change itself. One could be warlike, greedy, racist, selfish, and vain throughout most of Christian history, and still believe that Jesus is one’s personal Lord and Savior or continue to receive the sacraments in good standing. The world has no time for such silliness anymore. The suffering on earth is too great.

– Richard Rohr, O.F.M
Excerpted from Yes, and...: Daily Meditations
Franciscan Media (2017)

See also the related Wild Reed posts:
• Marianne Williamson: “We’re Living in Very Serious Times and We Need to Be Very Serious People”
• The King of Love My Shepherd Is
• The Model of Leadership Offered by Jesus: “More Like the Gardener Than the Owner of the Garden”
• Jesus Our Guide to Mystical Love – Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3
• Revolution and Mysticism
• Jesus: Path-Blazer of Radical Transformation
• Adam Eriksen on the Subversive Politics of Palm Sunday
• Palm Sunday: “A Planned Political Demonstration”
• The Mystic Jesus: “A Name for the Unalterable Love That All of Us Share”
• Why Jesus is My Man

Image: Artist unknown.

“The Moment Is Ripe”: Butch Ware on Building a “True Oppositional Alternative” to the Duopoly

“We are going to galvanize
all of those forces that are disaffected
with this corrupt corporate duopoly
that comes in blue or red flavors.”

– Butch Ware
February 5, 2025

Butch Ware, who was Jill Stein’s vice presidential running mate on the 2024 Green Party presidential ticket, recently announced that he is running as a Green Party candidate for Governor of California.

Last Wednesday Butch was a guest on Sabrina Salvati’s podcast Sabby Sabs. Their 30-minute conversation is well worth checking out (below) as it includes Butch’s insightful analysis of the Democratic Party and why it cannot be relied upon to counter the authoritarianism of Donald Trump.

“The moment is ripe,” says Butch, “for a genuine populist progressive alternative . . . because we know that the corporate [Republican/Democrat] duopoly is not serving the people. So we’re going to have to build something that will.”

Continues Butch:

The Democrats are going the way of the Whig Party. . . . They are never going to get up from what they have done to themselves in this last election cycle and in the 30 years that preceeded that. The corporate sell-off of this party – from Bill Clinton to now Kamala Harris – has put the final nails in the coffin of this party. And if you look and zoom out objectively, you see a party that is in utter shambles. It has no capacity to reassemble the base that has departed it.

And so if we show strength and present a true oppositional alternative, you are going to watch people move to a new party. And that’s what I’m trying to facilitate.

. . . We are going to run to win in the state of California, yes. But we are also going to galvanize all of those forces that are disaffected with this corrupt corporate duopoly that comes in blue or red flavors. And we are going to build a [national] movement because you don’t have to be a resident of California to donate or to volunteer to help build this strength. And the more strength we show in this 2026 electoral cycle, the more damage we’re capable of inflicting [on the duopoly] in 2028 and 2032.

So instead of talking about it, be about it. Put your money where your mouth is and help us win in the state of California.

Above: With Butch Ware in Minneapolis – October 14, 2024.
For The Wild Reed’s coverage of Dr. Ware’s September 8, 2024
meet-and-greet event in Minneapolis, click here.

Related Off-site Links:
Butch Ware for Governor – Official campaign website.
Where the Ultra-Competitive 2026 California Gubernatorial Race Currently Stands – Evan Symon (California Globe, November 19, 2024).
Butch Ware, Former Green Party VP Nominee, Announces Next Run for Office – David Doonan (GP.org, November 12, 2024).
Democrats Have “No Hope” of Winning Election Warns Green Party VP Candidate Butch Ware – System Update with Glenn Greenwald (September 20, 2024).
Green Party VP Candidate Butch Ware Talks 2024 Race, 2026 Gubernatorial Bid, and More – Marc Lamont Hill (Night School, September 19, 2024).


UPDATE: Butch Ware: “Democrats Are Never Coming Back After Genocide Support” – Briahna Joy Gray (Bad Faith, February 13, 2025).


See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• Butch Ware: Quote of the Day – January 30, 2025
• Something to Think About – December 8, 2024
• The Lamentable Legacy of the Biden Administration
• The Green Party’s Jill Stein and Butch Ware Give Their First Post-Election Interview
• Progressive Perspectives on Where Democrats Went Wrong in the 2024 Election
• The “Green Smoothie” Option
• Jill Stein: “We Give Reasons for People to Come Out and Vote”
• We’re Witnessing a Liberal Meltdown Over Jill Stein
• Jill Stein in the Twin Cities
• Anti-Genocide Presidential Candidate Jill Stein Reflects on the First Anniversary of Israel’s Genocide in Gaza
• “This Is a Tragic, Heartbreaking Moment in the History of Humanity”: Butch Ware on the Gaza Genocide
• Green Party Vice Presidential Candidate Butch Ware in Minneapolis
• Butch Ware: “You Can Actually Vote Your Conscience”
• Butch Ware: “I’m Not Here as a Spoiler . . . I am Called Into the Fight for the Struggle for Freedom in Our Time”
• Peter Bloom on the Unmasking of the “Democratic Charade”
• When Democrats Undermine Democracy
• “Americans Deserve Choices”: Jill Stein on Breaking Points – 4/30/24
• Progressive Perspectives on the Presidential Nomination of Kamala Harris
• Progressive Perspectives On an American Coronation
• Demolishing the False Narrative About Jill Stein and the 2016 Election

The Wild Reeds of Diamond Lake

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• The Wild Reeds of Wood Lake
• Saaxiib Qurux Badan – October 13, 2024
• October Vignettes (2024)
• Wood Lake – August 18, 2024
• The Sun in the Reeds
• The Now
• Photo of the Day – December 13, 2022
• Sunlight and Reeds
• Photo of the Day – January 26, 2017
• Brigit Anna McNeill on “Winter’s Way”
• Winter . . . Within and Beyond (2020)
• Winter . . . Within and Beyond (2019)
• My Saaxiib Qurux Badan at Diamond Lake – March 29, 2019
• Winter . . . Within and Beyond (2017)
• Photo of the Day – September 21, 2013
• In This In-Between Time
• “Everything Is Saturated With the Sacred”
• The Oak and the Reed

Image: Michael J. Bayly (Diamond Lake, Minneapolis, MN).

“To Be a Rib in This Body of Our Country”

Related Off-site Links:
Meditations in an Emergency – Rebecca Solnit (February 2, 2025).
Fighting for Justice Doesn’t Have to Be a Big Dramatic Act. It Ban Be Small – Rebecca Solnit (The Guardian, February 2, 2025).
What to Do – Marianne Williamson (Transform, February 3, 2025).
How to Organize Under Authoritarian Creep in a Closing Civil Society – Nadine Bloch (Waging Nonviolence, January 30, 2025).
Trump’s Neofascism Is Here Now. Here Are 10 Things You Can Do to Resist – Robert Reich (The Guardian, January 24, 2025).
Can Nonviolent Struggle Defeat a Dictator? This Database Emphatically Says Yes – George Lakey (Waging Nonviolence, January 8, 2025).
A Time for Bodhisattvas – Lion’s Roar (November 6, 2024).
A Lighthouse for Dark Times – Maria Popova (The Marginalian, November 6, 2024).
Grassroots Organizing Wisdom Will Be Crucial With a Fascist in the White House – Schuyler Mitchell (TruthOut, November 6, 2024).

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• Venice Williams on How We Get Through the Next Four Years
• Active Hope
• Why “Revolutionary Love” Gives Michelle Alexander Hope

“An Extremely Clever Ruse” by and for the Rich: Owen Jones on Elon Musk’s Coup

British journalist and activist Owen Jones posted a video commentary today that provides a timely and informed appraisal of the coup that’s currently taking place here in the U.S.

It’s being called an “administrative coup,” a “plutocratic coup,” and a “soft coup.” Regardless of the descriptor, it’s a coup – an illegal and overt attempt to subvert democracy and destroy government so that those orchestrating this subversion and destruction can enrich themselves and those loyal to them.

So if you need to get up to speed on how this is all playing out in the U.S., Jones’ 10-minute commentary is a good place to start.





NEXT:
“To Be a Rib in This Body of Our Country”

Related Off-site Links:
Stating the Obvious: The Replacement of Our Constitutional System of Government With the Whims of an Unelected Private Citizen Is a Coup – Heather Cox Richardson (Letters From an American, February 4, 2025).
Signs of a New Anti-Trump Opposition Amid Elon Musk’s Coup – Joan Walsh (The Nation, February 4, 2025).
Unions Sue to Revoke Musk Cronies’ Access to Critical Payment System – Jake Johnson (Common Dreams, February 4, 2025).
Musk Intensifies Government Spending Attack With Push to Cut All Regulations – Robert Tait (The Guardian, February 4, 2025).
It’s a War. Do Democrats Get That? – David Corn (Mother Jones, February 4, 2025).
Elon Musk Has Plunged America Into a Constitutional Crisis. He Must Be Stopped – Will Stancil (Zeteo, February 3, 2025).
“It’s a Coup”: Musk’s DOGE Granted Access to Treasury System That Pays Out Social Security – Olivia Rosane (Common Dreams, February 2, 2025).
Trump and Musk Have All of Washington on Edge – Just Like They Wanted – Philip Elliott (TIME, February 3, 2025).
“Americans Were Sleep-Marched Into Fascism”: Signs of Creeping Authoritarianism We Can’t Miss Again – Chauncey DeVega (Salon, February 3, 2025).
Musk’s DOGE Blitzkrieg Should Infuriate the Nation – Ann Wright (Common Dreams, February 3, 2025).
“Solidarity Is the Antidote to Fascism”: Progressives Organize Treasury Protest Over Musk Takeover – Charles R. Davis (Salon, February 3, 2025).
The Fu*king Nightmare – Robert Reich (RobertReich.com, February 2, 2025).
We Must Create a Broad Anti-Fascist Movement to Fight Back Against Trump 2.0 – C.J. Polychroniou (Common Dreams, February 2, 2025).
Fighting for Justice Doesn’t Have to Be a Big Dramatic Act. It Can Be Small – Rebecca Solnit (The Guardian, February 2, 2025).
Did You Hear About the Friday Coup? – Marisa Kabas (The Handbasket, February 1, 2025).
Call It by Its Name: A Coup – Robert B. Hubbell (Today’s Edition Newsletter, February 1, 2025).
Dictator Donald Thinks He’s Invincible; He’s Not – Ralph Nader (Common Dreams, February 1, 2025).
Top Treasury Official Out as Musk Cronies Demand Access to Payment System That Funnels Trillions in U.S. Funds – Julia Conley (Common Dreams, January 31, 2025).
“DOGE-Affiliated Goons” Accused of Locking Career Civil Servants Out of Key Databases – Brett Wilkins (Common Dreams, January 31, 2025).
Trump’s First Week: “Designed to Destroy the United States From Within” – Chauncey DeVega (Salon, January 30, 2025).
Trump’s First 7 Days: The Framework for Presidential Dictatorship – Socialist Equality Party (January 27, 2025).
How to Organize Under Authoritarian Creep in a Closing Civil Society – Nadine Bloch (Waging Nonviolence, January 30, 2025).
Trump’s Neofascism Is Here Now. Here Are 10 Things You Can Do to Resist – Robert Reich (The Guardian, January 24, 2025).
Can Nonviolent Struggle Defeat a Dictator? This Database Emphatically Says Yes – George Lakey (Waging Nonviolence, January 8, 2025).


See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• “This Is Essentially Viktor Orbán’s Playbook”
• Timothy Snyder on Resisting the Oligarchs’ “Logic of Destruction”
• Marisa Kabas: “We’re Witnessing a Coup By an Unelected Billionaire Propped Up By a Felonious President”
• Inauguration Day Thoughts
• Democrat Talk on the Eve of Trump’s Return
• Signs of the Times: The 2025 People’s March
• How Empires Are Built and Rebellions Are Born
• Neoliberalism vs Neofascism: Cornel West on the State of U.S. Politics
• Progressive Perspectives on Where Democrats Went Wrong in the 2024 Election
• What the Republican Party Now Stands For
• Venice Williams on How We Get Through the Next Four Years
• Progressive Perspectives on Kamala Harris’ Faltering Presidential Campaign
• Marianne Williamson: “We’re Living in Very Serious Times and We Need to Be Very Serious People”
• Chris Hedges on the End of the American Empire
• History Matters
• Progressive Perspectives on the Crisis in U.S. Electoral Politics
• Will We Let Fascism Come to America?

Image 1: Donald Trump and Elon Musk at SpaceX’s launch site in Boca Chica, Texas – November 19, 2024 (Photo: Brandon Bell/AP)
Image 2: Donald Trump and Viktor Orbán in New Jersey – August 2022. (Photo: Source)

“This Is Essentially Viktor Orbán’s Playbook”

Waleed Shahid is a political strategist who has worked as spokesperson for Justice Democrats and adviser for the campaigns of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Jamaal Bowman.

Earlier today Shahid was interviewed by Amy Goodman of Democracy Now about his latest piece on Substack entitled “Elon Musk Is Staging a Coup.”

Following is some of what Shahid had to say.

If this story was taking place somewhere in Central Asia or in Africa [then] the United States media, the United States State Department, and international institutions would likely refer to it as a coup.

[Elon Musk] a billionaire industrialist who donated $300 million to [Trump’s presidential] campaign is installing his personal loyalists in key parts of the federal bureaucracy. This is essentially Viktor Orbán’s playbook.

And we need to know: Why does a billionaire industrialist, with millions in government contracts and military contracts for his private companies, need the Social Security numbers of every American, needs to know every single check that the U.S. government gives out to businesses and to charities? Why does this billionaire need to know this information?

He was not vetted or approved by the U.S. Senate. He has a history of corruption, for using public resources for private gain. He’s one of the wealthiest men in the world. In any other situation this would be called state capture, and people around the world would be condemning it. But in the United States we are not used to this kind of level of creeping authoritarianism, of plutocracy, of oligarchy so explicit.

. . . The Democratic Party in Washington is largely asleep at the wheel. They are acting as if they’re kind of a librarian shushing noise in a crowded room. They are still believing in the normal procedures, normal decorum; [still believing] that everything here is the normal transition of power. And they still believe that what Elon Musk and Donald Trump are doing is just a libertarian reform of the government, not an oligarchic, plutocratic takeover by a private billionaire who is potentially seeking to know what his competitors might be doing with government contracts. . . . But the Democratic Party is not able to put forward an opposition message right now, because they feel like this is normal.

And that’s why it’s so important for concerned citizens all across the country to twist the arm of your Senate Democrat. Go to their office. If you go to Indivisible.org today, you can find a way to join your local chapter all around the country, whether your senators are Republican or Democrat or independent. They need to hear from concerned citizens, because the Democratic Party doesn’t move on issues of oligarchy, of plutocracy, of taking action, unless their constituents show up in person and demand that they hold hearings . . . [and] grind the Senate to a halt until we know why Elon Musk, someone who was not elected, has this information.

– Waleed Shahid
Excerpted from “Is Elon Musk Staging a Coup?
Unelected Billionaire Seizes Control at
Treasury Department and Other Agencies”
Democracy Now!
February 3, 2025

NEXT:
“An Extremely Clever Ruse” By and For
the Rich: Owen Jones on Elon Musk’s Coup

Related Off-site Links:
Elon Musk Has Plunged America Into a Constitutional Crisis. He Must Be Stopped – Will Stancil (Zeteo, February 3, 2025).
“It’s a Coup”: Musk’s DOGE Granted Access to Treasury System That Pays Out Social Security – Olivia Rosane (Common Dreams, February 2, 2025).
Trump and Musk Have All of Washington on Edge – Just Like They Wanted – Philip Elliott (TIME, February 3, 2025).
“Americans Were Sleep-Marched Into Fascism”: Signs of Creeping Authoritarianism We Can’t Miss Again – Chauncey DeVega (Salon, February 3, 2025).
Musk’s DOGE Blitzkrieg Should Infuriate the Nation – Ann Wright (Common Dreams, February 3, 2025).
“Solidarity Is the Antidote to Fascism”: Progressives Organize Treasury Protest Over Musk Takeover – Charles R. Davis (Salon, February 3, 2025).
The Fu*king Nightmare – Robert Reich (RobertReich.com, February 2, 2025).
We Must Create a Broad Anti-Fascist Movement to Fight Back Against Trump 2.0 – C.J. Polychroniou (Common Dreams, February 2, 2025).
Fighting for Justice Doesn’t Have to Be a Big Dramatic Act. It Can Be Small – Rebecca Solnit (The Guardian, February 2, 2025).
Did You Hear About the Friday Coup? – Marisa Kabas (The Handbasket, February 1, 2025).
Call It by Its Name: A Coup – Robert B. Hubbell (Today’s Edition Newsletter, February 1, 2025).
Dictator Donald Thinks He’s Invincible; He’s Not – Ralph Nader (Common Dreams, February 1, 2025).
Top Treasury Official Out as Musk Cronies Demand Access to Payment System That Funnels Trillions in U.S. Funds – Julia Conley (Common Dreams, January 31, 2025).
“DOGE-Affiliated Goons” Accused of Locking Career Civil Servants Out of Key Databases – Brett Wilkins (Common Dreams, January 31, 2025).
Trump’s First Week: “Designed to Destroy the United States From Within” – Chauncey DeVega (Salon, January 30, 2025).
Trump’s First 7 Days: The Framework for Presidential Dictatorship – Socialist Equality Party (January 27, 2025).
How to Organize Under Authoritarian Creep in a Closing Civil Society – Nadine Bloch (Waging Nonviolence, January 30, 2025).
Trump’s Neofascism Is Here Now. Here Are 10 Things You Can Do to Resist – Robert Reich (The Guardian, January 24, 2025).
Can Nonviolent Struggle Defeat a Dictator? This Database Emphatically Says Yes – George Lakey (Waging Nonviolence, January 8, 2025).
The Hungaryfication of the USA – Thomas Klikauer (Other News, January 9, 2025).
I Watched Orbán Destroy Hungary’s Democracy. Here’s My Advice for the Trump Era – Gábor Scheiring (Politico, November 23, 2024).


UPDATES: Unions Sue to Revoke Musk Cronies’ Access to Critical Payment System – Jake Johnson (Common Dreams, February 4, 2025).
Musk Intensifies Government Spending Attack with Push to Cut All Regulations – Robert Tait (The Guardian, February 4, 2025).
It’s a War. Do Democrats Get That? – David Corn (Mother Jones, February 4, 2025).
Marianne Williamson: “This Will Not Stand” – Piers Morgan Uncensored (February 4, 2025).
Elon Musk Stages Coup d’etat – Owen Jones (Owen Jones Talks, February 4, 2025).
Stating the Obvious: The Replacement of Our Constitutional System of Government With the Whims of an Unelected Private Citizen Is a Coup – Heather Cox Richardson (Letters From an American, February 4, 2025).


See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• Timothy Snyder on Resisting the Oligarchs’ “Logic of Destruction”
• Marisa Kabas: “We’re Witnessing a Coup By an Unelected Billionaire Propped Up By a Felonious President”
• Inauguration Day Thoughts
• Democrat Talk on the Eve of Trump’s Return
• Signs of the Times: The 2025 People’s March
• How Empires Are Built and Rebellions Are Born
• Neoliberalism vs Neofascism: Cornel West on the State of U.S. Politics
• Progressive Perspectives on Where Democrats Went Wrong in the 2024 Election
• What the Republican Party Now Stands For
• Venice Williams on How We Get Through the Next Four Years
• Progressive Perspectives on Kamala Harris’ Faltering Presidential Campaign
• Marianne Williamson: “We’re Living in Very Serious Times and We Need to Be Very Serious People”
• Chris Hedges on the End of the American Empire
• History Matters
• Progressive Perspectives on the Crisis in U.S. Electoral Politics
• Will We Let Fascism Come to America?

Image 1: Donald Trump and Elon Musk at SpaceX’s launch site in Boca Chica, Texas – November 19, 2024 (Photo: Brandon Bell/AP)
Image 2: Donald Trump and Viktor Orbán in New Jersey – August 2022. (Photo: Source)

Timothy Snyder on Resisting the Oligarchs’ “Logic of Destruction”

The federal government has immense capacity and control over trillions of dollars. That power was a co-creation of the American people. It belongs to them. The oligarchs around Trump are working now to take it for themselves.

Theirs is a logic of destruction. It is very hard to create a large, legitimate, functioning government. The oligarchs have no plan to govern. They will take what they can, and disable the rest. The destruction is the point. They don’t want to control the existing order. They want disorder in which their relative power will grow.

. . . The gap between the oligarchs’ wealth and everyone else’s will grow. Knowing what they themselves will do and when, they will have bet against the stock market in advance of Trump’s deliberately destructive tariffs, and will be ready to tell everyone to buy the crypto they already own. But that is just tomorrow and the day after.

In general, the economic collapse they plan is more like a reverse flood from the Book of Genesis, in which the righteous will all be submerged while the very worst ride Satan’s ark. The self-chosen few will ride out the forty days and forty night. When the waters subside, they will be alone to dominate.

. . . In [this] logic of destruction, there is no need to rebuild afterwards. In this chaos, the oligarchs will tell us that there is no choice but to have a strong man in charge. It can be a befuddled Trump signing ever larger pieces of paper for the cameras, or a conniving Vance who, unlike Trump, has always known the plot. Or someone else.

. . . [T]the men currently pillaging the federal government . . . see themselves as the servants of the freedom of the chosen few, but in fact they are possessed, like millennia of tyrants before them, of fantastic dreams: they will live forever, they will go to Mars. None of that will happen; they will die here on Earth, with the rest of us, their only legacy, if we let it happen, one of ruins. . . . The attempt by the oligarchs to destroy our government is illegal, unconstitutional, and more than a little mad. The people in charge, though, are very intelligent politically, and have a plan. I describe it not because it must succeed but because it must be described so that we can make it fail. This will require clarity, and speed, and coalitions.

. . . The logic of “move fast and break things,” like the logic of all coups, is to gain quick dramatic successes that deter and demoralize and create the impression of inevitability. Nothing is inevitable. Do not be alone and do not be dismayed. Find someone who is doing something you admire and join them.

What is a country? The way its people govern themselves. Sometimes self-government just means elections. And sometimes it means recognizing the deeper dignity and meaning of what it means to be a people. That means speaking up, standing out, and protesting. We can only be free together.

– Timothy Snyder
Excerpted from "The Logic of Destruction
. . . And How to Resist It
Thinking About
February 2, 2025

NEXT:
“This Is Essentially Viktor Orbán’s Playbook”

Related Off-site Links:
“It’s a Coup”: Musk’s DOGE Granted Access to Treasury System That Pays Out Social Security – Olivia Rosane (Common Dreams, February 2, 2025).
The Fu*king Nightmare – Robert Reich (RobertReich.com, February 2, 2025).
We Must Create a Broad Anti-Fascist Movement to Fight Back Against Trump 2.0 – C.J. Polychroniou (Common Dreams, February 2, 2025).
Fighting for Justice Doesn’t Have to Be a Big Dramatic Act. It Can Be Small – Rebecca Solnit (The Guardian, February 2, 2025).
Did You Hear About the Friday Coup? – Marisa Kabas (The Handbasket, February 1, 2025).
Call It by Its Name: A Coup – Robert B. Hubbell (Today’s Edition Newsletter, February 1, 2025).
Dictator Donald Thinks He’s Invincible; He’s Not – Ralph Nader (Common Dreams, February 1, 2025).
Top Treasury Official Out as Musk Cronies Demand Access to Payment System That Funnels Trillions in U.S. Funds – Julia Conley (Common Dreams, January 31, 2025).
“DOGE-Affiliated Goons” Accused of Locking Career Civil Servants Out of Key Databases – Brett Wilkins (Common Dreams, January 31, 2025).
Trump’s First Week: “Designed to Destroy the United States From Within" – Chauncey DeVega (Salon, January 30, 2025).
How to Organize Under Authoritarian Creep in a Closing Civil Society – Nadine Bloch (Waging Nonviolence, January 30, 2025).
Amid Confusion, Panic and Backlash, Trump’s White House Rescinds Funding “Freeze” on Grants and Programs – Chris Walker (TruthOut, January 29, 2025).
Think Trump’s Tyranny Can’t Be Opposed or Stopped? Think Again – Jeremy Brecher (Common Dreams, January 29, 2025).
In High-Speed Power Grab, Trump Seeks to Remake the Federal Government – Don Kettl (The Bulwark, January 29, 2025).
The Hostile Takeover of the United States by Corporate Raiders Has Arrived in Full – Thom Hartmann (Common Dreams, January 29, 2025).
Trump Is Clearly Moving in an Authoritarian and Potentially Fascist Direction – John Ripton (Common Dreams, January 29, 2025).
What Trump’s Pardons and Retribution Say About His Fascist Threat – Chuck Idelson (Common Dreams, January 29, 2025).
“Trump Is Trying to Collapse Our Economy”: War on “Woke” Revealed as a War on All Americans – Amanda Marcotte (Salon, January 29, 2025).
“We Do Not Consent” Says Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Illegal “Power Grab” as Judge Halts Trump Order – Jessica Corbett (Common Dreams, January 28, 2025).
Trump Tries a January Coup – Again: The President Wages War on the Separation of Powers – The Ink (January 28, 2025).
Trump’s Most Lawless Action Yet – David Dayen (The American Prospect, January 28, 2025).
Trump’s First 7 Days: The Framework for Presidential Dictatorship – Socialist Equality Party (January 27, 2025).
Energized Neo-Nazis Feel Their Moment Has Come as Trump Changes Everything – Ben Makuch (The Guardian, January 26, 2025).
Donald Trump Is the Empire Unmasked – Caitlin Johnstone (CaitlinJohnstone.com, January 21, 2025).
Can Nonviolent Struggle Defeat a Dictator? This Database Emphatically Says Yes – George Lakey (Waging Nonviolence, January 8, 2025).


UPDATES: Is Elon Musk Staging a Coup? Unelected Billionaire Seizes Control at Treasury Department and Other Agencies – Democracy Now! (February 3, 2025).
Elon Musk Has Plunged America Into a Constitutional Crisis. He Must Be Stopped – Will Stancil (Zeteo, February 3, 2025).
Trump’s Trade War, Authoritarian Power, and the Oligarchs – Robert Reich (Common Dreams, February 3, 2025).
Unions Sue to Revoke Musk Cronies’ Access to Critical Payment System – Jake Johnson (Common Dreams, February 4, 2025).
Musk Intensifies Government Spending Attack with Push to Cut All Regulations – Robert Tait (The Guardian, February 4, 2025).
It’s a War. Do Democrats Get That? – David Corn (Mother Jones, February 4, 2025).
Marianne Williamson: “This Will Not Stand” – Piers Morgan Uncensored (February 4, 2025).
Elon Musk Stages Coup d’etat – Owen Jones (Owen Jones Talks, February 4, 2025).
Stating the Obvious: The Replacement of Our Constitutional System of Government With the Whims of an Unelected Private Citizen Is a Coup – Heather Cox Richardson (Letters From an American, February 4, 2025).


See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• Marisa Kabas: “We’re Witnessing a Coup By an Unelected Billionaire Propped Up By a Felonious President”
• Inauguration Day Thoughts
• Democrat Talk on the Eve of Trump’s Return
• Signs of the Times: The 2025 People’s March
• How Empires Are Built and Rebellions Are Born
• Neoliberalism vs Neofascism: Cornel West on the State of U.S. Politics
• Progressive Perspectives on Where Democrats Went Wrong in the 2024 Election
• What the Republican Party Now Stands For
• Venice Williams on How We Get Through the Next Four Years
• Progressive Perspectives on Kamala Harris’ Faltering Presidential Campaign
• Marianne Williamson: “We’re Living in Very Serious Times and We Need to Be Very Serious People”
• Chris Hedges on the End of the American Empire
• History Matters
• Progressive Perspectives on the Crisis in U.S. Electoral Politics
• Will We Let Fascism Come to America?

Image: Artist unknown.