SUMMARY: Since Trump’s election, I’ve been in ontological shock and have found it difficult to find purpose or direction in my opposition to this onslaught of fascism, oligarchy, and kleptocracy. It isn’t like Trump 1.0 of 2017. Then, we had some optimism, hope, and the will to fight. Now, it all just seems hopeless and overwhelming. How could everything we did since 2017 seem to matter so little? Help me find some concrete steps to opposing Trump and his minions in 2025.
KEY WORDS: Trump Democracy Resistance Collective Action Disillusionment Insurrection COVID-19 Narcissism Opposition Hope
COMMENT: Let us know how you’re coping with Trump 2.0, the things you’re doing to oppose him, and ideas for how we can all join into the fight.
- Remembering the Resistance of 2017
- 2020: The Final Defeat of Trump and MAGA
- 2024: Obeying in Advance by Corporate America
- The Search for Purpose and a Way Forward
- Image Attribution
As many have observed, 2025 has been a no-good, very bad year so far, and it shows no signs of improving. I hate to admit it, but the ontological shock of Trump’s victory, coupled with his Explosive Diarrhea of Falsehoods and the chilling effectiveness of his propaganda techniques—echoing the strategies outlined in Hitler’s Propaganda Playbook—has really brought me down. So much so that I’ve come to accept that posting more than once a week is beyond me right now.
This Bluesky skeet helped me realize how different 2025 is from 2017.
Remembering the Resistance of 2017
My reply to CJ — who is very worth following on Bluesky, by the way — was that we had done all of that and more in 2017. We had mass rallies and marches! Remember the Women’s March in DC on 21 January with hundreds of thousands more attendees than Trump’s inauguration? Remember the PussyHats? Those seem like halcyon days of a sweeter, simpler, more innocent past, right?
Our candidate had lost, but we knew we were Stronger Together, organizing on Twitter to to do as much as we could to stop the Ol’ Pussy Grabber from grabbing with both hands. We may have lost one battle, but we hadn’t lost the war. There was an optimism then. There was a joy in our coming together and a belief that our country and way of life was worth fighting for — a fight we could win.
The Great Civics Lesson
Amidst all this, Indivisible emerged not only as a beacon of hope, but also as an organizing tool. They showed us that it wasn’t just about marching or exchanging memes on social media, it was about harnessing our collective power to influence government, even without a majority in Congress. The 2016 election became our Great Civics Lesson, awakening a realization of how participatory democracy truly works. We rediscovered ourselves as an electorate, ready to stand up and make our voices heard.
While we struggled to comprehend what Trump was doing to us and the country, there was a palpable sense of purpose. At Ye Olde Blogge, the purpose was to educate about the implications of having a narcissistic personality disorder in charge of the country, the effects of gaslighting on our society, and how shifting social norms around race, women, and violence would affect us.
Understanding and Responding to the Challenge of Trump
Personally, I felt I was providing a vital public service — raising the alarm. I believed that if we could grasp the challenges we faced, we would be better equipped to respond, limit the damage, and ultimately defeat it.
The elections of 2018, 2020, and 2022 seemed to validate this approach. With a clearer understanding of narcissism, gaslighting, and the disturbing changes in our society, we resoundingly rejected Trump and his MAGA agenda.
2020: The Final Defeat of Trump and MAGA
Then came the #COVID19 pandemic, which felt like a dagger through the fell beast’s heart! How could anyone still consider him a serious candidate after allowing a million unnecessary deaths? Then came the 6 January Insurrection. If #COVID19 had pierced Trump’s shriveled heart, the insurrection felt like dragging his writhing corpse into the light and cleansing ourselves with fire.
That was our “never again” moment if ever there were one, right?
With the election of Biden, the quelling of the pandemic, the prosecution of the insurrectionists, and the soft landing of the economy, it seemed like Trump was toast. Only a few lingering hangers-on still took him seriously.
2024: Obeying in Advance by Corporate America
I was so certain that THIS time Trump would lose. Sure, the Republicans HAD to nominate him because McConnell — the dingleberry smeared across America’s underpants — refused to rid of us the horrid grifting monster when he wouldn’t vote to convict. But surely, everyone else in America saw Trump for the threat he was to the future of the entire planet.
That certainty made the ontological shock of his election all the more jarring. I’m still grappling with it.
The immediate corporate kowtowing to him, the “donations” to his inaugural committees, the settling of the suits that he brought against media companies, and the turn around on corporate DEI policies all contribute to my utter sense of disbelief. How could the America that elected Biden then turn around and elect Trump?
It still just doesn’t make sense to me.
The Search for Purpose and a Way Forward
It also leaves me feeling utterly defeated and fresh out of new ideas. We tried the mass protests and rallies last time. We organized get out the vote efforts and registered people to vote. We called our Congressional representatives and saved the Affordable Care Act, protected and expanded the rights of vulnerable communities. In short, we did everything we were supposed to do to fight this tyrannical evil over the past eight years. And yet, it still won.
It feels like being a cancer survivor living in remission, only to find out during your latest scan that the cancer has returned.
Indivisible is still here. We have Democracy Docket winning court cases left and right. Bluesky has taken the place of Twitter, so we have a site to help us organize, again. Yet, it feels like there’s nothing we can do.
I know the fascist oligarchs want us to feel overwhelmed by their myriad actions, both big and small. They want us confused, unsure of where to focus our efforts, unable to pick a single fight.
I KNOW it. Unfortunately, I don’t feel it, by which I mean, it is working. The Explosive Diarrhea of Bullshit technique is working. I feel like I’m drowning in the daily deluge of the crap being dumped upon by Trump and his cronies right now.
I’d love to hear concrete suggestions for how we can help save not only our democracy but also our economy and our planet.
If you’ve enjoyed this reflection on my own struggles with coming to terms with Election 2024, then please consider doing one or all of the following:
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Image Attribution
This image was found on Hyperbole and a Half using a DuckDuckGo Creative Commons license search.
The Psy of Life 
Here’s the metaphor on my mind this morning:
We tried hunting Trump like wolves, a pack chasing him. It didn’t work.
It is time to hunt him like cats. Cats are ambush hunters waiting for the prey to be vulnerable and pouncing.
I see this in operation. While the authors of Project 2025 were busy writing the executive orders and memos to go with it, the lawyers on our side were busy writing the legal filings against them. That is why, for example, when Trump signed the spending freeze in the morning, there was a restraining order against it by suppertime.
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Howdy Bob!
You may be on to something there. It is clear that much of the resistance to the fascist take over of our democracy will be fought in the courts and not in the streets. But, it leaves little for us anxious hand-wringing observers to do to feel like we’re helping ourselves, country, and planet.
Huzzah!
Jack
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So, when does the “civilian resistance” pounce? I can think of at least one sentence we are likely to be hearing soon if Trump signs off on those tariffs today; “WTF! This is not what I voted for!”. How to pounce is another question. That’s the one we need to be thinking about. The response to that needs to be empathic, not the infinitely more satisfying snarky, “We told you so.” The hard core MAGAs are pretty much a lost cause until things get way worse, but it is the mass of those low frequency, low information folks that are going to be feeling blind sided and betrayed. It is that feeling that needs to be validated and solidified. This is where we have to hear the advice, “Think of the solution, not the problem.”
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Howdy Bob!
We’ve made nice with these people before. Usually after they’ve been betrayed by the people they elect. It never ends well for us. They calm their racism and misogyny down until the next “populist” comes along and tells them that they really are better the best Black person.
Still, “told you so” gets us no where. The problem with the low-frequency low-information is that they are less likely to act even when things are bad. They aren’t likely to participate in protests or marches unless it is convenient for them to. They aren’t likely to take a risk to produce a change unless, literally, everyone is doing it and they are much less likely to be held personally responsible.
I guess the only thing to do is to flood our social media with a variety of memes and gifs with the message, “you’ve been betrayed, but all is not lost.” Harris tried that route — you’ve got a home in the Democratic Party if for only this election — but the attractiveness of toxic masculinity and outright racism was too much for many.
And, to me, that is the problem. What is the solution? One solution is to work at the state level on big issues, especially climate change. I like it that Canada and Mexico are going to target red states with their tariffs. It is the granular level that we’re left with since the federal level seems to have been completely lost for the time being.
Huzzah!
Jack
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That perennial political question, “Are you better off now than _______?”, is about to become appropriate and increasingly effective. Those who actually did vote for Trump because eggs (among other things) were too expensive are going to have some difficulty blaming anybody but him for shocking price increases. Of course, Trump and company will blame the other countries for not surrendering, as well as all their usual targets. It remains to be seen how that plays.
Flooding the zone on social media, not only with memes and gifs, but with posts of the text of the orders and memos, and first person stories from those effected. Will the platforms be ordered, or preemptively comply, to start blocking those posts, or even shut out those posting? We will see.
It does help a little bit to remember how small the margins of the Republican majorities are in both houses. Any intra-party crack in the lockstep unity must be exploited.
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Howdy Bob!
Not only are their margins in Congress small, but the margins of many of the elections were small. No one is more aware of that than the politicians running in the elections.
I am not shocked at how fast Trump is moving right now. They had all of this prepped long before the election occurred. I’m not shocked at how chaotic and shambolic most of it is. It is Trump and his team. I’m just shocked that it is happening at all and there seems — seems is the operative term here — to be very little being done to stop it.
I think and I hope that there is a lot happening that isn’t being reported in the for-profit press. I’m beginning to see a little more of it in my social media feeds.
I will be shocked if the 2026 election is actually anything other than a pseudo-democratic one-party election.
Huzzah!
Jack
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I tend to agree with the observation that what Trump and the gang, especially Musk, are doing is throwing all the fascist, dictatorial, “Imperial Presidency” spaghetti they can find at the wall to see what sticks. As for being well prepared and organized, some of it is so over the top and ham handed, I’m not impressed. To them, as opposed to the Project 2025 brain trust, flooding the zone and moving fast and breaking things are more important and fun than systematically following a planned step by step series of chess moves.
Notice too that he has now backed off twice (as of 4:30 PM EDT of 2/3) on two tariff threats, on Columbia and Mexico, with almost nothing in the way of submission to his will to show for them. In the Mexico case, that may have had something to do with the major stock market indices dropping by a full 1% in the first hour of trading today. I happened to be downloading 1099s from my broker’s web site about 10:30 this morning, and my balance had fallen that much since the opening. That is a message from the markets that a president ignores at his peril.
As for Team Musk, there is this today from WIRED: https://www.wired.com/story/elon-musk-government-young-engineers/?utm_source=nl&utm_brand=wired&utm_mailing=WIR_Daily_020325&utm_campaign=aud-dev&utm_medium=email&utm_content=WIR_Daily_020325&bxid=5bd6730124c17c1048004ec8&cndid=31950619&hasha=f928381c17165d018c0bf4c042428f4f&hashc=ebe61e290ff5f6dab2702263b67c4c485180ab2deb59e026490fcd63c88404f5&esrc=AUTO_PRINT&utm_term=WIR_Daily_Active
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Howdy Bob!
I think the stock market is one of the few guardrails left for Trump. He is exacting his revenge on the US and the world for his 2020 election loss. He really does mean to destroy everything. He wants the US and the world to become Russia. It is the Age of Global Oligarchy.
He wants to sow as much chaos as possible to keep us guessing and off balance. It is one way for him to feel powerful and like he is assuaging his narcissistic wound. But, when push comes to shove, destruction is more important to him than stock market indices.
Huzzah!
Jack
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And those who expect to be there to pick up the pieces and rule the world don’t understand that when he runs out of things and people to punish and destroy, he will turn on them too.
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Right. He’s Don Quixote with the nuclear codes, command of the greatest military force ever assembled, and a fully weaponized and politicized DoJ.
Jack
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And many of his windmills are hallucinations.
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At this point, Trump and his inner circle believe they have won, and since he does not (one way or another) have to run for reelection, they can throw the rank and file MAGAs away and under the bus. The sheer incompetence of virtually all of his appointees for anything other than going fast and breaking things is going to have consequences that hurt and piss off huge numbers of people. All of his appointees have to be regarded as fall guys in waiting, but blaming them and having churn and chaos can only protect him so far. And the past ten days have been of obvious overreach and trying to do everything all at once, almost all of which have brought law suits or the threat of them.
And today we are waiting for the beginning of the Great Tariff Trade War of 2025. I am hoping that the retaliatory tariffs are as targeted and savage as they need to be. His obsession and ignorance of tariffs has to fail utterly and obviously, so much so that even Fox “News” can’t cover it up.
As I commented in my Indivisible group’s FB group, he is not on a winning streak. He hacked down from the threats to Columbia and allowed them to come get their people. The spending freeze had to be dropped. And other actions will be tied up in court for years.
Maybe the way forward is to wait for them to f-up and pounce.
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Morning from South Mississippi….
All we can do is just keep pointing out his BS and hope people will pay attention……chuq
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