You sum it up so well. Thank you. However, it starts my day making my head spin and my blood pressure increase and that anger hormone surging. How did all of this happen to our America? I spent a lot of time on the first page of the NYT yesterday, and the follow up page where there were copies of tweets that the deniers, the radical right have put out over the years. That was totally scary. If anyone has not yet read that, I advise that you should. It's terrifying that so many think that way, obviously not afraid to say the quiet part out loud; but it's important to know what they re thinking. We must be aware of what we are facing if we want to defend out democracy. And we see that in AZ the GOP candidate for Senate would not say that she would accept a loss. I feat that there will be a flood of election deniers after the midterms if GOP candidates loses. And if GOP manages to get their party into Governor seats and Secretary of State seats, they have the potential to make partisan decisions on the election that defy the votes. And yes, voter intimidation is out there, particularly among marginalized people who tend to vote for democrat candidates. I am scared. Some dems urge us to vote as that is our way to sustain our democracy; but how will our votes be counted. I'm OK in my blue state of NJ, with 2 great Senators and the long beloved Bill Pascrell ruinning as my representative (some redistricting as he used to be my representative and then redistricting brought in the great Rep Mike Sherrill, but now we're back to Bill Pascrell).. However, those of you who live in red states need to worry. And as scary, or even more scary than 45 and his nonsense (great word you used Michael Beschloss), there are so many Americans who bought into the nonsense and continue to believe in the big lie and any lies that 45 put forth. Also, does no one see the inconsistency that 45 denied having any classified documents at Mar-A-Lago, he is now asking to have "his" documents returned to him. He is admitting that he thinks government documents belong to him. He never understood our democracy, which is why is was so bizarre that he ran for office in the first place. But he never did it for our country. His business, handed to him by his father, was getting boring, and also failing; his weird apprentice show was off the3 air. He just wanted a place to be front and center in the new. His ego just needed attention. It was always all about him and never about the people. I know my musings sound very negative; and I apologize for not being able to muster up any positivity and think that we can vote and get our democracy back. But the odds are against us. I'm asking others in this group to give me the answers that I cannot find. The wether here in Nj is rainy and very dreary, so fitting for the state of our country right now. Thank you for this opportunity to vent in a friendly, respectful environment.
It may not matter, but as a resident of Mesa where the incident you refer to took place, I would not that it was a complex that included the main library. So you’ve got all sort of people near this drop box. The men who were armed were across the parking lot. You could go to the drop ballots off, get in the car and not see them. But still they were there.
I don't hear much about Jan. 6th fiasco. None from the public. None from Schumer, a couple of times from Pelosi, occasionally from Biden. A gazillion emails from every Democrat in the Union with scare tactic headlines , how much the Republicans have collected, send money. Period. The only one who reaches out with information condemning Republicans and his opponent is Fetterman, PA. Emails at least 3 times a day, emails from celebrities who support him, even from his wife and , yes, dogs !! I sent him money. The media does trump's work. Yesterday on twitter, a picture of him on his airplane talking to woman lawyer. That was it ! How newsworthy was that? I have seen more information on the British Prime Minister affair than the disruption, destruction wrought by Republicans. If Democrats lose control of Congress,they can look in the mirror.
Somewhat ironic that your comments about the deplorable state of education come our just ahead of the annual "report card" on our 4th and 8th graders: "Test scores across U.S. reveal 'heartbreaking' pandemic declines, with math hit hard" -- LATimes.
Not taught in enough schools is the skill of critical thinking. We are reaping the harvest of that fallow field.
“But as long as the country lacks proper civic education”
This is the crux of the problem. Not only are we not teaching the “whole truth,” to whatever extent that can be determined, we are not teaching students to think, to discern fact from fiction, to read critically.
This situation has been going on for a long time and we see the results: a large swath of our population that is swayed by TV show hosts and shysters
Steven, I’d like to sharpen my civic education (40+ years from a classroom). Could you list 10 books, articles, documents that would constitute a good foundation, pun intended?
The problem is Democrats keep trying to convince morons that they are voting like morons. It's not possible to do that. Elections are won by turning out the base. Republicans get that and act accordingly. Democrats don't.
You sum it up so well. Thank you. However, it starts my day making my head spin and my blood pressure increase and that anger hormone surging. How did all of this happen to our America? I spent a lot of time on the first page of the NYT yesterday, and the follow up page where there were copies of tweets that the deniers, the radical right have put out over the years. That was totally scary. If anyone has not yet read that, I advise that you should. It's terrifying that so many think that way, obviously not afraid to say the quiet part out loud; but it's important to know what they re thinking. We must be aware of what we are facing if we want to defend out democracy. And we see that in AZ the GOP candidate for Senate would not say that she would accept a loss. I feat that there will be a flood of election deniers after the midterms if GOP candidates loses. And if GOP manages to get their party into Governor seats and Secretary of State seats, they have the potential to make partisan decisions on the election that defy the votes. And yes, voter intimidation is out there, particularly among marginalized people who tend to vote for democrat candidates. I am scared. Some dems urge us to vote as that is our way to sustain our democracy; but how will our votes be counted. I'm OK in my blue state of NJ, with 2 great Senators and the long beloved Bill Pascrell ruinning as my representative (some redistricting as he used to be my representative and then redistricting brought in the great Rep Mike Sherrill, but now we're back to Bill Pascrell).. However, those of you who live in red states need to worry. And as scary, or even more scary than 45 and his nonsense (great word you used Michael Beschloss), there are so many Americans who bought into the nonsense and continue to believe in the big lie and any lies that 45 put forth. Also, does no one see the inconsistency that 45 denied having any classified documents at Mar-A-Lago, he is now asking to have "his" documents returned to him. He is admitting that he thinks government documents belong to him. He never understood our democracy, which is why is was so bizarre that he ran for office in the first place. But he never did it for our country. His business, handed to him by his father, was getting boring, and also failing; his weird apprentice show was off the3 air. He just wanted a place to be front and center in the new. His ego just needed attention. It was always all about him and never about the people. I know my musings sound very negative; and I apologize for not being able to muster up any positivity and think that we can vote and get our democracy back. But the odds are against us. I'm asking others in this group to give me the answers that I cannot find. The wether here in Nj is rainy and very dreary, so fitting for the state of our country right now. Thank you for this opportunity to vent in a friendly, respectful environment.
All true and yet, here we are. Insane.
It may not matter, but as a resident of Mesa where the incident you refer to took place, I would not that it was a complex that included the main library. So you’ve got all sort of people near this drop box. The men who were armed were across the parking lot. You could go to the drop ballots off, get in the car and not see them. But still they were there.
I don't hear much about Jan. 6th fiasco. None from the public. None from Schumer, a couple of times from Pelosi, occasionally from Biden. A gazillion emails from every Democrat in the Union with scare tactic headlines , how much the Republicans have collected, send money. Period. The only one who reaches out with information condemning Republicans and his opponent is Fetterman, PA. Emails at least 3 times a day, emails from celebrities who support him, even from his wife and , yes, dogs !! I sent him money. The media does trump's work. Yesterday on twitter, a picture of him on his airplane talking to woman lawyer. That was it ! How newsworthy was that? I have seen more information on the British Prime Minister affair than the disruption, destruction wrought by Republicans. If Democrats lose control of Congress,they can look in the mirror.
Somewhat ironic that your comments about the deplorable state of education come our just ahead of the annual "report card" on our 4th and 8th graders: "Test scores across U.S. reveal 'heartbreaking' pandemic declines, with math hit hard" -- LATimes.
Not taught in enough schools is the skill of critical thinking. We are reaping the harvest of that fallow field.
“But as long as the country lacks proper civic education”
This is the crux of the problem. Not only are we not teaching the “whole truth,” to whatever extent that can be determined, we are not teaching students to think, to discern fact from fiction, to read critically.
This situation has been going on for a long time and we see the results: a large swath of our population that is swayed by TV show hosts and shysters
Steven, I’d like to sharpen my civic education (40+ years from a classroom). Could you list 10 books, articles, documents that would constitute a good foundation, pun intended?
The problem is Democrats keep trying to convince morons that they are voting like morons. It's not possible to do that. Elections are won by turning out the base. Republicans get that and act accordingly. Democrats don't.