Your Summer's Must-Read List Should Include Project 2025

(image found here)

Don't want to read 922 pages of Project 2025 that the convicted felon insists he knows nothing about? Here's a long thread (but much shorter read via ThreadReader) that points out some of the problems that appear superficially "not that bad" explaining why they are, in fact, catastrophic regarding women's rights, discrimination, the environment, diverse families, and much, much more. The author includes examples of false dilemmas ("false binaries") that are insisted upon by the Heritage Foundation as the only options available to solve the issues that make their followers feel icky.

You will find no empathy, compassion, or consideration for a whole heck of a lot of Americans as you read the purposeful aspirations of those who only wish to conquer, and never compromise as outlined in Project 2025. No more melting pot. No more strength in and respect for diversity. No autonomy for women. No more environmental stewardship.

After reading it, I can articulate now that I was filled with grief in 2016 because I realized that I'd been raised to focus on the positive changes that were possible in our country, even if they didn't happen in as timely a manner as many of us hoped. Ever the optimist, I internalized the impression that those changes were somehow permanent. As a student and a young woman, a wife, mother, and teacher, I thought that slavery was abolished ...forever. That women would have the right to vote and have autonomy over our bodies... forever. That white supremacy, genocide, and dictators could never find true footholds in our Union. I thought that we could agree to disagree and yet still continue to evolve for the greater good. That what was bad, wrong, and un-American was agreed upon by the majority. That most of us understood the difference between Springsteen's "Born in the USA" and Greenwood's "God Bless the USA." That others revered or at the very least were willing to respect liberty and justice for ALL, and that those who didn't would only ever be considered fringe groups, serving the purpose of reminding us of what we'd never aspire to as a nation. I thought that those battles had been fought and that generally, we were moving ever forward.

2016 opened my eyes to the realization that the way of life I was living in this country was not what other Americans wanted for me, my family, my children, my neighbors, or my gender, and that they'd happily cut off their nose to spite our collective face by electing one of the greasiest, most foul people to represent them. I have been guilty of taking the goodness of America for granted, but I knew a con man when I saw him. It took my breath away realizing how many citizens thought it would be worth "a little shake-up" or the "entertainment" to elect such a narcissistic, solely self-serving, amoral, non-qualified individual to our nation's highest office so that he could appoint loyalist bulls to accompany him into the china shop of our democracy.

Project 2025 is not filled with new ideas and it will not find its way to the circulating file (for those unfamiliar, a circulating file is a round trashcan) if the democratic nominee wins or the republican nominee lands in jail. There is a good chance that you know someone who believes it will make America great again because of what it returns most of us to as well as several someones who mistakenly or passively believe that there's no point in voting this year because there's only ever going to be Democrat and Republican agendas, ignoring (or unaware of) how much those two binaries have changed over time. If you and they want the chance to do better, to offer more, to contribute innovative solutions, to continue to offer criticism regarding what this nation could do better, and to be included in the dialogue of this country and our place in the world, you must 1) register to vote and 2) show up for EVERY election, local, state, and national.

The U.K. and France have seen the light, and so too, must we.