To Better Understand the Echoes of What We Do and Say: What Would Happen If We Felt the Rivers of the Earth as the Veins of Our Body?

In a book titled In the Absence of the Ordinary: Soul Work for Times of Uncertainty, the author, Francis Weller, says “we can no longer divide the inside from the outside.” Maybe the pandemic, the climate emergency, regional wars, economic instability, and I’d add, this new administration, have made that illusory division uncomfortable and too painful to live with.

 

Weller thinks we’ve begun to feel there’s no “ordinary” anymore. He describes a felt sense that the continuity of history and our participation in it have altered. Increasingly, we “register in our souls” the sorrows of the world. The sorrow of others, of our planet, is our sorrow. As climate change stresses forests, oceans, the fabric of natural life, social bonds also fray, and clarity of thought diminishes. The world, or at least human civilization, seems to be teetering on an edge. Yet the fate of the world’s climate and history runs right through us. What an unbearable but necessary burden.

 

I hope he’s correct, but I don’t know. How many of “us” now fit Weller’s analysis? Polls show increasing concern about the environment and climate. They show disapproval of the DT administration’s wars, economic policies, and cuts to healthcare. Most of my community of friends, family, and neighbors fit his analysis, but certainly not others. Certainly not the sycophants or supporters of the administration. But will enough of us wake up in time?

 

Dividing up the world, analyzing and breaking down situations and problems, is often necessary and useful, but it yields only partial truths. It can create problems even as it solves others. But dividing ourselves emotionally from the world— never. We need to develop a better awareness of our entanglement with everything around us so we can better understand the echoes of what we do and say.

 

To counter the illusion of a divisive self, Weller recommends we increase our tolerance and ability to descend into the dark mythic underworld, the world of dreams, the unknown. We so often fear or resist the uncertain. We need to allow ourselves to do what we can in this unbearable situation; to let go of much of the life we’ve known so we can step into the unknown. So, we reach into the darkness to find the inspiration and resources to build something new, in harmony with the natural world, and I think just.

 

Weller recommends 5 disciplines to explore and strengthen in ourselves so we can better face the depths of what’s happening.

  1. Deep listening: to sit quietly and listen for the truth spoken and lived by others and the trees, hills, water, around us. Hear what needs to be heard.
  2. Restraint: take a moment before acting to pause, breathe, and reflect.
  3. Humility: look around and become sensitive to how we depend on one another, how enmeshed we all are in each other. And I’d add, realize that we’re all prone to think our view is right and true; so, in order not to be wrong, we must recognize the “right/s” of others.
  4. Embrace not-knowing. Acknowledge we never know what’s going to happen. We don’t even know all that’s really happening right here in front of us. But by acknowledging this, and living it, we can be more open, vulnerable, and humble. We can take in more than possible otherwise.
  5. Let go: Everything is impermanent, always changing. But we can better change in harmony with the world when we no longer try to control all that happens in it.

 

But descending into what Weller calls the dark is, I think, also entering what is always right here, now. It’s just that we don’t look at it or see it. In every perception, there’s not just us and what we look at; there’s the looking, or the awareness itself. When we are aware of awareness, we can be so present. It almost seems unnecessary or repetitive to say it, but when we see another human being, what we experience is not just the person but our awareness of them. That tree, that artwork, has ourselves in it. We are never not of this world. It’s our home. And when we feel this, it can be startling and beautiful. It can awaken the energy needed to dare, to care, to create, and to act.

 

Years ago, I hitch-hiked to the west coast and took a side trip to the Grand Canyon. I stood at the edge of the Canyon, staring into its depths; the strata of soil, stone, and colors seemed to extend forever. Deep at the bottom, a barely perceived blue river. Then a family of 5 parked and exited their car. The woman in the group was maybe 40 years old and totally wrapped up corralling her 3 kids. When she reached the edge near me, her attempt at controlling her children, her focus on anything other than the canyon, was totally forgotten. All she had, or all she was, was an awareness of what was seen and felt. She just looked out at the canyon and it seemed she felt the utter incomprehensibility of everything in front of her. And all she could say was, “Oh, my God. Oh my God.”

 

We need these “Oh, my God” moments, moments of awareness of a reality so startlingly real. And it might not be obvious, but demonstrating with thousands of others for a political cause while thinking with a perspective larger than ourselves alone— acting to save our democracy, healthcare, and planet— ”Oh, my God.”

 

When I was parking my car near a friend’s home several blocks from the location of the last No Kings demonstration, the size and atmosphere of the event became clear. There were so many cars, so many people. It was like a river of people flowing together, a powerful, even joyous river…

 

*To read the whole article, please go to The Good Men Project.

Being Seen and Being Ready for A Revelation: Healthcare USA, 2026

It took 16 months before I could get an appointment with a specialist that I needed for a complex and unusual medical condition. 16 months of increasing symptoms and of not-knowing– or of knowing there’s something living inside me whose face I could not see. 8 months to get the test I needed. Then 8 more months before I could see the doctor to explain the results and formulate treatment plans. Is this an example of a humane and well-functioning health care system in the supposedly richest nation in the world?

 

And there are so many inequities. I have good insurance. I am white and middle class. What might others who are not so privileged face? And so much paperwork, steps to slough through, high insurance payments.

 

The clinic I went to, the Cleveland Clinic, was wonderful. Like the care people report at the Mayo Clinic, the Langone Center at New York University, UCLA Medical Center, or Massachusetts General Hospital, these places are associated with teaching institutions; the doctors see a wide variety of patients and get to learn from a wide variety of fellow practitioners. Each doctor I saw showed not only care but competence. They were also wonderful human beings. Many local doctors are also tremendously compassionate, but they didn’t know what to do with me. As some said, I was a mystery. I did not fit in any of the usual categories. It’s good to stand out, they said, but not this way.

 

And what we can’t understand, we often reject or hide from. When I never got better from any treatments the local doctors offered; and after test after test revealed only peripheral problems, but never the core, some acted as if I, my personality maybe, was the problem. These doctors could think, and think well, but they were limited by their training and experience to only a narrow area of concern. Instead of doing everything they could to truly explore the symptoms wherever they led, many focused on simply checking off a checklist. And they often recognized this. They asked that when I did get a diagnosis, I should share it with them.

 

I know many people complain about doctors and dread going to see them, which I deeply understand. They feel vulnerable, in pain, and don’t like it. But for me, even after all the disappointments, I was still ready for a revelation. Going to the doctor meant there was a possibility of insight and a reduction of pain. So, for each appointment, I was excited. I prepared; I tried to make the visit count. I researched symptoms and possible treatments, wrote out questions and a list of medications. Before entering the office, I focused on my breath, the feel of my feet on the ground, or on the quality of my awareness right then. And finally, at the Clinic, one doctor said he had seen other people with what I had. I had a diagnosis. I felt redeemed.

 

Yet even at the Cleveland and the other Clinics, problems are increasing. They used to employ a multidisciplinary team approach to treating complex illnesses. No longer; they just don’t have the staff. And here, after being hospitalized last year, a local doctor promised they’d form a team to work to diagnose and treat my condition. Never happened.

 

What we in the U. S. are now facing under DT is the seemingly intentional undermining of healthcare. This administration is not only attacking MEDICAID and the Affordable Care Act or any federal health insurance assistance. They’re also attacking our healthcare from multiple directions. For example, there just aren’t enough doctors. This shortage has been getting worse for years, with the pandemic accentuating the problem. Yet DT has cut funding for universities, including medical training. Over a quarter of our doctors are now from other countries, many “third world” countries. Two of the five doctors I saw at the clinic were not born in the U. S.

 

Much of our health care, not only doctors but nurses, technicians, etc. is by immigrants….

 

*To read the whole post, please go to The Good Men Project.

Are We Seeing What Happens When the 7 Deadly Sins Rule a Government? Are they Fighting a War Mostly to Distract from Epstein Revelations?

Would anyone be so self-centered they’d start a war, de-stabilize international relations and the world economy, and kill thousands mainly to distract from potentially devastating revelations and raise his poll numbers? Is that what DT is doing in Iran? And before in Venezuela? And maybe soon with Cuba? Greenland? Is this Greed? Envy? Wrath? Is it self-Indulgence, trying to appear strong, superior to cover a fear of being inferior? Certainly, it’s creating Discord. Are the Seven Deadly Sins aiming to rule America?

 

Others have written about this before me: DT acts as if he was taught the deadly sins as his catechism. I was a little unclear on the history and religious doctrine, so I looked it up. According to Wikipedia, the early version listed the sins as: Lust, Idolatry, Avarice, Discord, Indulgence, Wrath, and Pride. In 590 AD, Pope Gregory I changed this to: Lust, Gluttony, Greed, Sloth, Envy, Wrath, and Pride.

 

The changes are interesting. Greed for Avarice, Sloth for Indulgence—easy to understand.

But Gluttony for Idolatry, and Envy for Indulgence are more complex. Of course, a growing church would be interested in stopping idolatry, or the worshipping of false gods, idols of power instead of the one true God, or truth, maybe? Or today, worshipping the idols of cherished beliefs, easy answers, social media rumors instead of science, or reliable facts?

 

So, I’d add ignorance to the list, willfully ig-noring or not seeing what’s there in front of us? And Envy? The Lust for what others possess; the anger over what others have and we do not? The rage for vengeance.

 

And Lust: Have too many of bus forgotten that just months ago, it was reported that DT’s DOJ was scrubbing all the Epstein files to destroy links to the President? Then, after the scrub was mostly lost in the shock and chaos of headlines, news outlets reported there was no evidence in the files of malfeasance on DT’s part, except for bad judgment befriending a pedophile and child trafficker.

 

For months in 2025, DT claimed the Epstein Files were a hoax perpetuated by Democrats and there was nothing worth our attention in the material. He ordered his followers to stop being weaklings and wasting time on the files. But thanks in large part to the courage and persistence of a group of survivors of the crimes, the testimony and other evidence of possible participation by DT and other powerful men in Epstein’s crimes are now being revealed. According to reporting by the New York Times,  DT’s name was mentioned more than 38,000 times in 5,300 of the files. A woman gave testimony saying when she was 13, DT tried to force her to have sex. She wasn’t the only woman to make such claims.

 

In November, Congress passed the Epstein Files Transparency Act which aimed to force the release of all the files. But recently NPR came out with a report showing the DOJ is still withholding evidence. The DOJ claimed to only redact and withhold files to protect the survivors, as directed in the legislation. But victims’ names and personal information were left available to the public while the names of the rich and powerful who made use of Epstein and Maxwell’s services were hidden.

 

And back on May 7, 2024 Stormy Daniels’ gave testimony about having sex with the married DT and his payment to her to be quiet about it. We remember an earlier conviction of DT on charges of defamation and sexual assault of the writer E. Jean Carroll. We might remember Judge Lewis A. Kaplan later clarifying that although the jury did not convict DT of rape according to NY State Penal Law, the trial did show that as people commonly understand the word, he did indeed rape her.

 

And there’s Greed, lots of it. And maybe Envy of what others have? Selfishness. Narcissism? The New York Times reports he has monetized the presidency to a degree never seen before. According to the Brennan Center for Justice, he has taken in at least 3 billion dollars over the last year from linking government policy to his business profits, real estate and microchip deals, selling pardons to drug criminals, etc. Gluttony is not just about food.

 

For Wrath there’s his vindictive attacks, his DOJ going after anyone who opposes, or speaks out against him.

 

And then, the wars. Venezuela and Iran, especially. Certainly, we have here the sowing of Discord. He started a war with no plan or consistent justification….

 

*To read the whole article, please go to The Good Men Project.

The Example of Minneapolis; Our Needs are Only One Line in a Song of Everyone’s Needs

The world, and not just the human world, looks so threatened right now. One thing that gives me hope when hope seems impossible or seems like more of a blindfold than a clear viewing, is the response of the people of Minneapolis to the violent attack on them by our own federal government.

 

Every day in this country, we experience the supposed leader of the “free world” causing new threats, new horrors and shocks. So many lives are being upended and destroyed. This is what DT brings to us. Yet, to change this and survive the assault, I think we must look to what’s happening in Minneapolis. There, in eye-scorching detail, is the affliction– and the cure.

 

The affliction: we see it daily. So many injured and arrested. Two innocent, caring people dead. The US government invading an American city, attacking its own citizens, and lying about what they’re doing and why. 3000 members of DT’s personal army roaming the city streets, obstructing the lives of people, not arresting supposed criminals but anyone brown, black, or anyone who gets in their way. Immigrants are less likely to commit crimes than people born in the US. ICE is ripping people from cars, schools, hospitals, places of work and worship. Acting as if the rule of law never existed or didn’t apply to them. These actions cannot be forgotten or excused just because the DT administration has finally announced they will soon end the ICE invasion in Minnesota.

 

The murders of ICU nurse for the US Department of Veterans Affairs, Alex Pretti, and poet and loving mother of 3, Renee Nicole Good, wake us up to the danger every one of us now faces. Every one of us. But reading about the response by the people of Minneapolis to such violence gives me hope and direction; it rescues me and could possibly rescue all of us from the fear and depression DT seems to purposefully instigate. This is the cure. The people of Minnesota are our neighbors. By nonviolently standing up, in a disciplined and caring manner, to oppose this government ordered violence and destruction, they are standing with all of us. But they aren’t just protesting in the streets.

 

A mother of a newborn baby and a 16 year old girl was picked up by ICE on her way to work, leaving 2 children at home, uncared for by any government agency. The 16 year old did her best, but her sibling was used to being breast fed. She called a neighbor, who was breast-feeding her own child, for assistance. The neighbor stepped in, helping the children with food and sharing her own breast milk with the baby.

 

Despite the raids by ICE interfering with business, ripping shop owners and workers from their stores and homes, several individuals and businesses have been doing what they can to help their neighbors. A family was seized by ICE and held in a facility in Texas. Upon their release, a Minnesota bookstore raised $6,000 to help the family return to their lives. A café in Minneapolis has been offering their neighbors free food until ICE is gone from the state. Doctors are making home visits to those needing medical assistance and who fear exposing themselves to ICE on the streets.

 

As the BBC points out, “Operation Metro Surge,” DT’s invasion of Minnesota began after his racist rant against Somali immigrants. He called them “garbage,” said their country is “no good for a reason.”  The political purpose of his comments and the invasion that followed are revealed by his vicious attacks on Somali Democrat and Congresswoman Ilhan Omar, an outspoken critic of DT. DT divides and divides, setting one against another. No community can exist peacefully inside a wall of hate….

 

*To read the whole post, please go to The Good Men Project.

A Dream of a Revitalized Democracy: An Image of a Conformist State and a Vast Cemetery of Buried Selves

Can you imagine living in a nation where oppression and conformity rules? Where no diversity of thought is accepted? Where people are persecuted and prosecuted for thinking differently than the ruler?

 

This is the DT nation. We are at a critical point right now, or maybe each moment of this administration has been critical, or maniacal, malignant. For years, he’s been threatening anyone who opposes or disagrees with him. Now, it’s clear to most that he’s more focused on revenge and persecution than protecting our nation, more focused on his own greed than the well-being of Americans.

 

Just recently, DT’s DOJ started a criminal investigation of the chair of the Federal Reserve, Jerome Powell, who was appointed by DT himself in 2017. Powell’s “crime”⎼ defending the Federal Reserve’s legal independence from the President. Powell dared to refuse to bow down to DT’s command to lower interest rates quickly and cease caring about the long-term effects on the economy and the American people. The DOJ recently initiated an investigation into a modest overrun in a Federal Reserve construction project as a pretext to frighten Powell into compliance. The threats did not work; Powell has clearly and forcefully spoken out about the true nature of DT’s investigation.

 

At the same time, the cost of DT’s own ego-project of illegally tearing down the East Wing of the White House to construct a palatial ballroom has doubled. The project is largely funded with bribes from corporations.

 

As he promised during his campaign for president, DT has also gone after other political and legal figures like Letitia James, Lisa Cook, James Comey, John Bolton, John Brennan, Jack Smith, Adam Schiff, Elissa Slotkin; and recently, his cronies took aim at Hillary and Bill Clinton. He’s attacked, and often worked to fire entertainers like Jimmy Kimmel, Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Fallon, Bruce Sprinstein. He defunded independent media like the Public Broadcasting Company, inserted himself into mergers, and/or eliminated government permits to force media sources to pull stories that oppose or expose DT’s wrongdoing. He’s attacked universities and  the independence of educational institutions, defunded research and other programs, persecuted student activists. The list goes on and on.

 

And now he’s sent 1,000 additional ice agents to join the already deployed 2,000 agents in Minneapolis and other cities in Minnesota. The mission: to attack those protesting the murder of Renee Nicole Good by ICE and the arrest and deportation of brown immigrants, many of whom are citizens. The supposed purpose was to arrest illegal immigrants. They are also citing, without clear evidence, fraud by some Somali immigrants in their running of daycare centers.

The presence of all these masked agents, using tear gas, pepper spray, beatings, shootings, and forceful arrest tactics against protestors has inflamed the situation. Is he purposefully trying to incite the citizens of this democratic-voting state into a violent response so he could invoke the insurrection act, deploy the military on US soil, and further disrupt, hurt, and deprive citizens even further of their rights? According to several sources including The Washington Post, this is exactly his plan. He appears to be laying the groundwork for this in his verbal attacks on the political leaders and protestors in Minnesota.

 

In the same week, DT threatened Iran with some form of intervention for its violent response to demonstrators. According to CBS, possibly 12,000 people were killed in Iran over two weeks of protest. Considering what DT’s doing in Minneapolis and other cities, his claim to care about the fate of protestors is ridiculous.

 

In 2016, campaigning in Iowa, he joked or bragged he “could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose any voters.” The shooting of Renee Good might be such a crime committed to serve his interests….

 

*To read the whole article, please go to The Good Men Project.

Stripping the Border of Agents Is Not the Way to Stop the Drug Trade: A Performance that Threatens the Reality

I was driving home listening to MSNOW. The Attorney General of Arizona, Kris Mayes, was talking with MSNOW newscaster Katy Tur about how DT’s policies were increasing the influx of fentanyl and human trafficking along our southern border. Even though I should be used to such disturbing information, I still get shocked by it.

 

Arizona is at the heart of the drug trade, said Mayes. Yet, DT has moved so many ICE and border patrol agents from the Sothern border to other parts of the nation to carry out cruel and possibly illegal raids and arrests that now border stations lie empty. One of the biggest fentanyl drug corridors into our nation runs on Arizona State Route 82, but it’s now unguarded. Yet, ICE raids in the north and elsewhere net many more carpenters, farm workers, even military veterans than criminals. Mayes said she asked AG Pam Bondi for 50 more agents for the southern border. Instead, Bondi took even more away. Meanwhile, the importation of fentanyl is up 10%. And who knows who’s gaining entry to our country.

 

Unless something is done, this situation will continue to get worse. Mayes commented that DT is apparently more interested in political theatre then in protecting us from fentanyl or other dangerous drugs, or dangerous criminals.

 

And while DT opens the southern border to drug traffickers, he pardons those who have already been tried and convicted in US courts. He gave a full pardon to “Cocaine Juan,”  the convicted former President of Honduras, Juan Orlando Hernandez. Hernandez, known for  bragging about stuffing “the drugs right up the noses of the gringos,” was convicted in 2024 of drug trafficking. He was responsible for helping import more than 400 tons of cocaine into the US, accepting bribes and protecting violent drug cartel leaders from prosecution. DT also commuted the sentence of Larry Hoover, the alleged founder of the Chicago-based Gangster Disciples street gang and Garnett Gibert Smith, a Baltimore drug kingpin. And the list goes on. This is incredible corruption and behavior way beyond irresponsible.

 

The same holds true with DT’s apparent race to war on Venezuela. He has not only destroyed small boats but ordered the blockade of the nation, seizing an oil tanker while claiming their oil is ours. Such a war might somehow serve DT’s personal interests but never serve the stated goal of stopping the drug trade or terrorist operations. Venezuela is only a minor player in the drug trade. According to a 2020 US DEA report, almost three quarters of the cocaine, for example, is trafficked through the Pacific and Mexico. Yet, DT says he’s stopping the drug trade by attacking boats in the Caribbean.

 

Nick Turse in The Intercept published a detailed article on this situation. 20 vessels in the Caribbean Sea were destroyed by Special Operations on DT’s orders. He’s responsible for the summary execution of about 90 people he deemed members of a Venezuelan narco-terrorist organization, yet no evidence has been presented, no legal processes engaged. This operation is a performance, an attempt to appear like he’s competently doing something when he’s actually undermining our nation’s standing and making the drug situation worse.

 

Turse’s article reveals DT has also verbally attacked political organizations and threatened members of Congress and the media with arrest or execution, for the sole crime of speaking out against him. DT called Democratic lawmakers seditious, traitors to be locked up or executed, for the offense of reminding members of the military they’re required by law to not obey illegal orders. DT tweeted, “HANG THEM GEORGE WASHINGTON WOULD!” In the past, he called for executions of the former chair of the joint Chiefs, Gen. Mark Miley, former Rep. Liz Cheney, and demonstrators protesting the killing of George Floyd….

 

*To read the whole article, please click on this link to The Good Men Project.

Opening Doors in Time and Mind: The Bookstore Resistance

It was such a comforting moment. I was reading a book where the main character, a bookseller, was watching a customer reading the classic novel, The Count of Monte Cristo. The man was old and seated in a cushioned chair, at a table, sipping coffee. Books were scattered everywhere, not just on the wood shelves. There was mismatched artwork on the somewhat peeling walls. Lights hung from the ceiling creating areas of clarity amidst the soft darkness. Snow increasingly falling outside as the world turned dark. Yet inside, it was warm. A fire was going in the woodstove. Such a comforting moment.

 

The Book of Doors by Gareth Brown is part urban fantasy, part mystery and adventure, part romance⎼ and partly an examination of the psychological effects of pain and grief. Shortly after the book begins, the main character inherits a magical book that allows them to travel from any unlocked door to any other they can clearly imagine. There are all sorts of magic books in the story⎼ a book of shadows, for example, enabling the holder to disappear and become a mere shadow passing through any space. There’s a book of Illusions, one of luck, destruction, etc.

 

We never know what a book might reveal. They’re all around us or used to be. Like doors. Like places in the mind, or in our homes, schools, or workplace; memories, ignored bits of reality. Places we can step through to taste or digest; or to dwell fully and beautifully. Some with a hidden power.

 

When I was 18 or 19, I walked through an open door into the old Barnes & Noble Bookstore in the Village, on 8th Street & 6th Avenue, in downtown New York City. Back then, it was a smaller, more intimate store, not like the chain stores of today. I was just wandering the aisles, hoping to find a treasure, when I noticed a man and woman, maybe in their 70s, in the philosophy section in the back of the store. They were discussing the French activist and philosopher, J. P. Sartre and his concept of authenticity. They were both dressed in old but expensive clothing. The woman looked sort of regal, the man very professorial. They intrigued me but I respected their privacy and felt too embarrassed to get close enough to listen in on their conversation. So, I moved on.

 

I ran into them 2 more times. One time was at a lecture on Thoreau in an upper middle-class neighborhood on the West Side of Manhattan. Someone at the lecture told me they had escaped from the Nazis in Austria. I don’t know the truth of this, but supposedly she was from a noble family, and he was a professor, but I don’t remember in what field. And later, back downtown on 6th Avenue, I was surprised to see the woman alone on the street, begging for money, and aggressively berating those who pretended not to see her.

 

Another doorway, in a recent dream. I entered what at first appeared to be the home I grew up in, where my parents lived for almost 30 years after I moved out. But in the dream my parents had sold that house. The dream home was slightly different, and in bad shape. The bathroom was not working. I had to sleep on the couch in the living room, not my old bedroom.

 

And my parents were very old. Someone said my mom was near death. My dad was in only slightly better shape. All at once, several people I didn’t know, mostly younger, in their twenties or thirties, came out from the back of the house, talking loudly amongst themselves and crowding the living room. Outside, through a window, I saw someone park, get off a motorcycle, and walk away. One of the younger people claimed the bike had been stolen and now returned. My dad, who had never in his life been on a motorcycle let alone driven one, put on a leather jacket and helmet, climbed on the bike, and tore off. Maybe he had stepped through a doorway to a younger self, as he looked so much younger, with his back straighter than it had been in years…

 

*To read the whole article, please go to The Good Men Project.

 

Caring for the One and Only World We Inhabit: A Community of Hope and Action

When we’re attacked, or the material supports of our lives are threatened, we might turn inward. We might do this not to bring light to our inner life but to shield our whole being. To hide from the attacker. To distance us from fear and pain.

 

We all need to turn inward sometimes for this, for self-reflection, to be present, to find peace. And to put aside memories, hurts, and traumas. But a fear and threat festers when left for too long inside us. When the time is right, taking action to break that impulse to hide, and instead to reach out to others, to learn more and fight back feels vivifying. It enriches. It might also save our lives. When we act to right a wrong, act to diminish pain and suffering, this can strengthen us, change us.

 

Saturday, 10/18/25, was such an action. The NO KINGS RALLY was a day to remember. One of the largest single days of protest in American history. Not just because almost 7 million of us in 2,600 locations, cities, towns spoke out against this administration’s outright corruption, suppression of the law, brazen infliction of cruelty and inhumanity. But because we the people acted on this day in a manner in stark contrast to DT and his Congressional sycophants. We acted peacefully. We acted lawfully. We acted joyfully. We acted patriotically, to protect the nation from a would-be King, Dictator. We spoke the truth.

 

They lied and said we hated America. But the rally showed something very different: exorbitant love. For the constitution. For the laws that DT blatantly ignores and undermines. For many brown and black Americans and so many others that DT and his ICE agents are abusing, detaining, jailing, deporting. For this earth that makes our life possible. For each other. As reported, with a bit of irony, in the internet news source The Feed, nothing says we hate America more than defending the constitution and exercising first Amendment rights. “No Kings” is literally the founding principle of this nation.

 

My wife and I were a few minutes late. As we walked to the rally site there were so many people on the sidewalk with us, with signs, and going in the same direction as we were. A few were turning toward a main road to share their signs with motorists. When we arrived, we listened to speakers talk about abuses of power, military and para-military agents turned against their own fellow citizens⎼ acts many in the military say they did not sign up for and deplore.  We heard talks about the impacts of firing of thousands of government workers. Heard the facts about how DT’s tariffs, and destroying the lives of working immigrants are raising the costs of living for all of us.  Heard how his super awful legislation is undermining our health. Heard how money approved by Congress for MEDICAID, for medical and scientific research is now going to the super-rich.

 

The people around us were neighbors and friends. Coworkers. Former students. Shopkeepers. A carpenter who worked on our house. A doctor who treated us. People smiled at us. We enjoyed the clever creativity of the signs people held. We felt empathy for the hurt that so many here and elsewhere have experienced at the hands of DT’s administration of cruelty. This is our home.

 

DT inflicts fear on the nation, hate and vengeance against anyone who speaks against him.  He attempts to make us feel isolated and powerless, that we have no future but the nightmare he’s creating….

 

*To read the whole article, please go to The Good Ken Project.

If We don’t Exercise It, We Lose it: No Kings and Protecting Our Right to Speak Truthfully

Is there any end to DT ‘s malignant corruption? We have a government shutdown. It’s lasted almost three weeks. Instead of negotiating and talking with Democrats and Independents, he attacks. He tries to hold us, hold our nation hostage. He says, you won’t go along with my taking money from your healthcare, undermining Medicaid, Medicare, hospitals, health insurance for millions? Raising your cost of living? So, I’ll undermine your healthcare even more. I’ll fire government workers who look out for your (our) well-being.

 

For example, DT fired workers from the Health and Human Services and the Education Departments. He fired employees at the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. He fired workers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention who respond to infectious disease outbreaks, who help those with chronic diseases and pain, help those with awful injuries. He also fired workers from Homeland Security and Energy.

 

And he doesn’t hide his power-hungry intent. He says the lay-offs will be “Democrat-oriented,” meaning aimed at Democrats. This isn’t politics as usual, or politics as an occupation created to serve us, we the people. Instead, he’s attacking all of us, trying to manipulate the news so we blame Democrats. But it’s clear to see DT is the villain here. He’s even pressured the GOP Speaker, Mike Johnson, to refuse to bring the House of Representatives back to legislative session and work to end the shutdown. The House GOP aren’t even pretending to do their jobs.

 

When we can stand it, and we hear the latest news⎼ when we hear about this and other outrages, hear about a president invading American cities that elected Democrat mayors, hear about DT trying to punish us for opposing him by firing those who protect us from forest fires, help us recover from floods, research how to cure illnesses, and enforce the rule of law, or rule of the constitution. So many of us, millions, are fed up.

 

So, what can we do? Well, let’s start with the October 18 No Kings rally. March. Speak. Join others. Some think marches do nothing. But they get us energized for more targeted actions later. They connect us, help wipe out a sense of isolation. Get us ready to first protect and then work to get out the vote in 2026. Assert our commitment that there be No Kings in this nation! No dictators.

 

And this rally is scaring DT and his enablers in the GOP, because it gets right at the heart of what we the people are struggling for and he wants to stop⎼ our right to speak freely, our right to be heard and for our lives to be valued. Our right to speak the truth. Our right to mobilize the vote. DT is trying to criminalize dissent and the truth. This is clear in so many ways, like his pressuring networks to cancel Stephen Colbet and Jimmy Kimmel. And then there’s his investigations and indictments against the DOJ officials, former members of his cabinet, prosecutors, politicians, etc. who spoke out against or prosecuted him for his crimes:  Letisha James, Jack Smith, James Comey, John Bolton, Adam Schiff, Mayor Ras Baraka,  etc.

 

The Brennan Center for Justice said that DT “authorizes punishments for even tenuous connections to speech he doesn’t like….

 

*To read the whole article, please click on this link to The Good Men Project.

Feeling Stuck in Someone Else’s Nightmare: The Dangers of a Would-Be Leader at War with Himself, and Us

Lately, I often feel like I’m stuck in DT’s mind and can’t find a way out. It’s horrifyingly unpleasant, a daytime nightmare. Then I step back and breathe, momentarily at peace again.

 

We all create a world in our mind. Our world. Each person’s perception is slightly different from anyone else’s⎼ the depth of color, what we focus on and ignore, what we listen to and hear, what we respond to or bury. What a scene calls to in our memory.

 

We all, to varying degrees, shape the physical and social world around us to fit our way of perceiving it. In a way, whatever we see is us. We perceive and experience what our senses and brain make possible for us to sense.  We never see or hear exactly what another person sees or hears; or what a dog or a bat sees and hears.

 

And the moment-by-moment play-by-play that most of us hear in our minds is unique to us yet shares so much with the experience of others. But we can learn to step away from the recording. We can enjoy and be fascinated by, maybe even love, what eludes our play-by-play; we can welcome what is bigger or other than what we’ve ever perceived before.

 

But not DT. He seems to be one of the very few who feel they must control, manipulate, fabricate everyone and everything until other people only walk, talk, and appear as they would dress them. Only a very few feel they can’t feel secure, maybe can’t breathe unless there’s no one or nothing but themselves in their world shaping it. They’re just too ignorant about controlling themselves they try to make up for it by controlling others.

 

For example, look at DT’s response to the killing of Charlie Kirk. In a way, this murder was both awful and a perfect opportunity for him and his sycophants. It provided a chance to fertilize the delusion, hate, and division they’ve been growing for years, for lying about and demonizing “the left,” which in their definition is anyone who opposes their lust to turn this nation into a racist dictatorship they control.

 

Charlie Kirk was an outspoken conservative activist. Oliver Willis, writing for Daily Kos, said it seems many have been forgotten that he was also “a bigot, misogynist, and a racist who regularly excused the very sort of gun violence that ended his life.” Kirk said, in 2023, “It’s worth to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the second amendment.” Did he mean to excuse 47,000 killed by guns in 2023 alone? How about 27 killed in 2012 in Sandy Hook Elementary School or 19 killed in Robb Elementary School in 2022? What about 47 school shootings so far this year?

 

Kirk’s killer, Tyler Robinson, comes from a Republican, Mormon, church-going family. He has no criminal record. He turned himself in to police after being encouraged to do so by his parents and a retired police officer who knew his family through their church. He even took responsibility for the vile murder on his social media platform, saying “im sorry for all of this.” He was dating his roommate, a transgender person, and the revelation of this relationship set up a tsunami of speculations, lies, and distortions led by DT himself.

 

Instead of using this awful event to bring people together in the face of violent death, DT used it to manipulate a violent reaction against Democrats, LGBTQ+, immigrants, and his opponents. “The radicals on the right are radical because they don’t want to see crime…” he said. This ignores the fact that for the last 40 years especially, most politically motivated violence came from the right. “The radicals on the left are the problem – they want men in in women’s sports, they want transgender for everyone, they want open borders…”

 

He said…

 

*To read the whole article, please go to The Good Men Project.