Dear Friends,
I don’t know when and why it hit me. But I suddenly realized how serious Trump is about changing the country into something that horrifies. I suppose it was the cumulative effect of reading a bunch of emails, as well as a terrific and long article from In These Times focused on Trump‘s agenda for education, which he is already carrying out and making progress. It’s ghastly!
My pal Mark Gordon called. Talking with Mark helped me realize that it is very complicated to figure out how to respond effectively to this. It’s over my head in many ways, but I can’t get it off my mind.
I’m stunned and frightened. I realize that when I die there are too many precious friends who will have to face the consequences of a Trump victory. So it’s my only agenda. Stop him. This comes up at a time when I’m helping to plan an event that honors both Lillian Webber and me. It’s supposed to take place May 10th at City College, which is sponsoring the event. I feel I can’t just talk about education, but maybe I can tie the two together.
But what I’m really saying is that my heart is totally devoted now to stoping Trump, rather than stopping some of the stupid educational stuff that is going on. I happen to also think that it is our educational system that is partly to blame for Trump’s success.
My first thought was that we have to put all other agendas aside and focus on uniting with everybody who’s against Trump and figuring out a common agenda for getting rid of him. Of course I’m talking over my area of expertise so it may not be the best strategy. Maybe we need to focus on what America really needs and unite around that. But all other agendas require getting rid of Trump as fast as we can and getting a majority in Congress as fast as we can. What the courts can do I’m not sure.
You are the people whom I count on and have counted on for many years to help me think through things. We did it casually on the whole, because we were working together on some project. But at this moment, I would like us to figure out, or help me figure out, or each other figure out what we do in the space we have an influence on.
If some of you are aware of plans or a movement to get rid of Trump, please share it with us. Let’s also share our own ideas with each other. Let’s also reach out to others we think might have good ideas. Please feel free to comment on this WordPress site if you some ideas or good links on how we can all engage.
Best, Deb
Deborah Meier on Education 
I do think all those who feel likewise need to make this their top priority until we have removed this evil cabal from power! Thanks Deb.
I am connected to Indivisible, which is a national organizing group who is mobilizing lots of folks. I am on their mailing list. I also subscribe to Heather Cox Richardson, Rachel Solint, and Jay Kuo (Status Kuo). They always have important things to say and often have announcements about elections and demonstrations. Glad to see you are still active; like you I am an Antiochian, class of 1967, and have found myself attending local demonstrations for the first time in 60 years!
It seems that there’s a variety of protests being planned across the USA and around the world for April 5, 2025 https://www.google.com/search?q=april+5th+protest&oq=april+5&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUqDQgBEAAYgwEYsQMYgAQyBggAEEUYOTINCAEQABiDARixAxiABDINCAIQABiDARixAxiABDITCAMQABiDARixAxjJAxiABBiKBTITCAQQABiDARiSAxixAxiABBiKBTIGCAUQRRg8MgYIBhBFGDwyBggHEEUYPNIBCDMyMzVqMGo3qAIAsAIA&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
Disclosure: As a nice Jewish boy from the Bronx who is only 77, I am going to presume much. Forgive me if you can and must.
There might be a Deborah who was brilliantly strategic when she was midwife to a movement about community schools and putting children first. I’m not sure, but I prefer to thing she did not just have 3.14 good ideas and stumbled into those good but difficult years.
In any case, I think about this stuff all the time. Being something of an empath-poet, on Oct. 8, 2023 I knew that Israel would try to flatten Gaza (in my name, of course). So it became not my only agenda, but the focus of my renewed, desperate possibly useless activism. But strategic. Means also that despite humulity and technical insight, we cannoy afford to “stay in our lane”. Not even though battles won and lost have given us particular knowledge and wisdom, possibly soi-dissant expertise.
So: Trump et al. hit harder, faster, and with more depth/focus than anyone expected, and is doing profound damage. (Some friends and family think I betrayed my grandchildren by not voting for Kamala-who-absofreakinglylutely-resfused to disown genocide).
So now the neoliberal erosion of democracy become a kind of technofeudal (cf. the indispensable Yannis Varoufakis) invasion on a zillion fronts, and “we” are unprepared.
Worse, those who erase and deny “the crime of crimes”, along with less foul Democrats, are leading the movement that was born in reaction to the outcome they were unprepared for.
Locally I try to create dialog and possibly synergy with some of thg lower levels of this movement. I am not in an urban center so that many activists know each other whatever their ideologies — from unitarians to DSA to myself and a handful of radicals.
I’ve gone long as usual, so I’ll just add: If you are in shock, get over it, organize with and for — something. Muslims, Chris Hedges et al. get one thing very very right: you do it because you must, with whatever capacity you have, not because you can see just how to win. In the short run we WILL NOT. Palestinians know the price of “sumud” they have and will continue to pay. My Black radical lawyer friend told me over a year ago “Fast genocide now. We have long had slow genocide”.
Liberation is not a dream. But innocence is not for us — only for children and other civilian casualties of a machine — sorry, youcan have the soft or the hard version; one has just reached too many people who tolerated it — that is a Death machine.
Let’s see what comes back from this reflective rant.
DC will have two April 5 protests, both I expect large. Political Muslims and anti-Zionist anti-genocide allies of Palestinian life will mostly
be at this one
https://marchforpalestine.org/
I agree that we need to get rid of Trump. He has normalized racism and used fear to attack the most vulnerable. But the root of the problem is unlimited money in politics and in control of the media. Let’s knock on every door and talk to every friend and relative to get them to vote for democracy!
Dear Deb, I share your feelings and fears, and I wonder if the attached information may be helpful to you and our friends as we reflect on ways to help each other, and the world. Please see below:
The information below is from Public Citizen group. I gather they are a part of helping organize events in support of American communities. I hope this is helpful in opening a real conversation about the current events.
Kindest regards,
Bianca
___________________________________________
Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and MAGA Republicans are ripping America apart piece by piece.
And they think nobody will stand up to them.
On Saturday, April 5, people will be rallying all across America to show the Trump regime how wrong it is.
Visit our Hands Off! coalition website to find a rally near you this coming Saturday.
Public Citizen — along with other major national organizations like Indivisible and MoveOn, labor unions, community and faith-based groups, and others — is leading the way on this nationwide day of action.
Our country is in the midst of an authoritarian crisis. Americans are taking to the streets this Saturday, April 5, to fight back.
There are currently over 950 rallies in the works in all 50 states. Find a rally near you. (Or sign up to host one of your own.)
And please forward this email to anyone you think might want to know about the April 5 day of action.
For progress,
– Lisa Gilbert & Robert Weissman, Co-Presidents of Public Citizen
P.S. For anyone who is not able to attend a rally — and for anyone who missed our recent nationwide town hall or wants to see it again — you can watch a recording of our town hall about how Public Citizen is fighting the Trump regime.
It’s not just Trump, like it wasn’t just Hitler. Although he is the main face of this radical oligarchy taking over, he has empowered many a racist, rich and poor, and the greedy wealthy who wish for more power to come together to destroy democracy. Citizens United which sent a flood of money into politics has led Republicans to silenced compliance, because without him and the other billionaires behind him, Musk, Bezos, Theil, and all those in power now who are afraid to go the path of Liz Cheney, they won’t get re-elected, or at least they fear that they won’t, without their financial backing.
We are living through the enactment of Project 2025 – the culmination of propaganda and misinformation initiated by Paul Weyrich and the Heritage Foundation. Public schools were their first target. Bernie was the first person to put some real spark into resisting the onslaught of the coup. This “organization” looks like a viable umbrella for resistance – https://handsoff2025.com/ We are joining the April 5th protests.
Deb your voice is as incisive, encouraging, and good to hear as ever. I only wish I knew how to answer your call for ideas. –Stuart Grauer
yes… Joe Hill: ORGANIZE!!!
One resource for sending letters to representative is Progressive Secretary. Unlike other such groups, this does not get you on mailing list that send you spam. they just email the letters in your name, and you can edit those letters before you send them as well. Only a few times a year will you get appeals for contributions.
https://progressivesecretary.salsalabs.org/progressivesecretary
-Nick
Please sign these! Support public education
https://www.change.org/EvanstonNorthwesternD65
and impeach, frequently:
https://chng.it/Qv6FRhgtHC
Deb, I just found this! I am on retreat near you at Kripalu this Thanksgiving! (Maybe you remember having a lovely dinner conversation with me some years ago during another of my visits to Kripalu?)
I have a project in mind (very new) to begin…begin!…to research the history of education & democracy in the US in order to maybe contribute to or inspire others to work on articulating how we need preK – 12 education to look when we start to come out of these perilous times. I am planning to start with your work, of course.
Historians, like Heather Cox Richardson (mentioned in another’s comment below) and others, are reminding us that now is the time to gather our forces. History tells us that we do not go back to what we’ve known before after these times of dire threats to democracy; it’s not just a matter of getting rid of the autocrats and going back to ‘normal’. We need to start now to be ready. I have been frustrated because no one seems to be talking about our schools and our children as the ground of democracy right now. I, myself, need to start with the history.
I will be in touch again soon.
Pax
Heather Cox Richardson’s -HCR – Substack, Letters from an American: https://open.substack.com/pub/heathercoxrichardson?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=e39yh
She also does wonderful Politics Chats that often include the ideas I mentioned above. You can find them on YouTube, live at 6pm ET Tuesdays and Thursdays – and they are recorded.
Pax