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I agree that the dimwitted, ignorant would be tyrant has all the hallmarks of fascism - cultish followers, authoritarian personality, contempt for the rule of law and, above all, demonisation of the “other”. But I cannot escape the notion Marx put on my head. History repeats itself. The first time as tragedy. The second time as farce. I know you’d say he’s deadly dangerous but he couldn’t organise a county fair. An insurrection will descend into chaos.

The difference this time is that his sworn enemy holds the power. I think he should and will order Trump arrested and shipped to Guantanamo and then fight out the habeus corpus writ for weeks. After all Biden has blanket immunity for official acts.

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Living by the sword?!

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Or maybe sauce for the goose. Certainly appropriate in that Trump is a goose.

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what about the geese, said trump when challenged on his cats&dogs comments; they're eating the geese! No, actually, they are not.

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I had forgotten that!

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Trump’s racism and xenophobia are on full display. That’s what MAGA loves about him. That’s why his base is so steadfast.

MAGAs think racism is cool and aren't embarrassed like they should be. I'll be glad when they crawl back under their rocks!

That's why I enjoy wearing this "Keep the immigrants, deport the racists" shirt in front of them? 👇

https://libtees-2.creator-spring.com/listing/keeplb

We MUST stop Trump. Now more than ever!

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I cannot understand how half the country can support the nation’s most notorious Crook and I'm asking myself again and again "What is wrong with the American people?" I have high hopes for November 5th, but I’m also very scared...

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Ditto. I feel like I’m in an episode of The Twilight Zone 😵‍💫 seeing anti trans legislation start cropping up all over the country is terrifying. There is a 10,000 bounty on us in Texas (bathroom bill) that calls for the public to police their bathrooms. Can you imagine these nut jobs in the bathroom with you causing trouble for whoever they “think” are trans (like the Olympic boxer)?

In Florida they are trying to make a Nazi list of trans people who attempt to change their gender marker and name. What do you suppose they will do with that list?

They started with banning books. Nazis burned the first trans reach center in Berlin by trans people for trans people. We are literally %1 of the population and they started with our most vulnerable, trans kids, whose suicide rate has climbed to %70 percent directly due to their cruel laws that deny medical care that every major health and psychological organization around the world %100 supports.

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Awesome work today. Period.

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Amen. We're watching the Cult of the Grotesque.

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AN ELECTION DAY CAROL

By L.D. Michaels (With No Little Help From Charles Dickens)

[Apologies for the length of this and also to those who may have read this in another Substack]

It should be noted

That I've rarely ever voted.

What difference does one vote make?

Is it really worth my time to take?

I'll devise a lie

Why I passed it by.

So tonight, I'll start a book to say

It mesmerized me right through Election Day.

What better book to read than Dickens

In which each page the plot thickens.

It will divert me till the polls close.

It's the best excuse to interpose.

To get me past November 5th

"A Christmas Carol" is the ideal myth.

As the sunset fades,

I lower my shades

And settle into bed

With this book I've never read

With a faint bedside light

That dims my sight

I begin the first page,

Immortalized by age:

"Marley was dead; to begin with."

This will last past November 5th.

I read on that Scrooge was to await 3 Spirits

That Marley’s ghost told him would visit.

As I read through the pages,

The Spirits emerged from the ages

At the tolling of Scrooge's bell

To lead him to Heaven or to Hell.

Each night as the bell tolled

Scrooge's past and present did unfold

On each visitation, the Spirit let him see

How morally bankrupt his life has come to be.

Over many days of reading,

I cringed at Scrooge's pleadings

To the Ghosts of Christmas Present and Past

Having lived a greedy life in which the die was cast.

Awaiting the Spirit of Christmas Future to appear,

It was the future that Scrooge had the most to fear

When judgment for his sins he would hear.

I continue to read at a faster pace

To learn what sins Scrooge will face.

But I begin to wonder if I were in Scrooge's place

What sins would the Spirit of the Future call upon me to face?

Could Heaven possibly punish me for avoiding to vote?

It's such a minor sin the Lord would never take note.

I tremble with fright awaiting Scrooge's fate

As I strive to stay awake in my half-sleep state.

My reading slows down to a snail's pace,

As I begin to drift off to the sleep I'll embrace.

My mind drifts as I begin to envision

The potential consequences of my own decision.

I continue to read and imagine the worst

Would the Spirit address Scrooge or possibly me first?

THE BELL TOLLS

Did I just read "The bell tolls" on the next page?

Or was it a figment of my old age?

Or did I hear the bell with my own ears,

Or did I dream it from my rising fears?

Am I awake or asleep?

A hooded black-draped vision now appears without a peep.

An unearthly apparition appears before me,

Whether friend or foe I am unable to see.

My blood turns cold.

I must be bold.

Is this ghost as real as he seems?

Or is he a figment of my heat-oppressed dreams?

He offered an outstretched hand,

Which I took as a gesture to stand

To get ready to see the future land.

"I beg thee Spirit to speak to me

So that I can believe what I hear and see.

If you are here for me,

Then tell me my fate

And if I can change it

Before it's too late."

"I've come " said the Spirit "to reveal the future to you

Because without your vote and that of others too

You'll see that what lies ahead

Will be four years of misery and dire dread".

"Touch my robe" to me he then said.

As my left hand clutched the Spirit's black robe

I expected to see the future unfold.

The Spirit took my arm with a cold tight fist,

And off we flew into a thick dark mist.

And when we emerged, it was now the 4th of July,

With Trump at the helm having barely squeaked by

With 1 Electoral College vote more than Harris could supply

Because of low voter turnout no one could deny.

Trump returned to the Capitol his mob had stormed

But this time to be sworn in with a government to form.

He had proven that lies, hatred and bigotry

Were a winning formula for election glee.

Justice Alito gave the inaugural prayer

For which Trump took credit with an egotistical air.

Trump, he said, was to serve as an Apostle of Jesus

Banning all abortions (though with his usual distortions)..

The Gospel of Jesus Trump would spread from sea to sea

To convert our country into a Christian theocracy.

And if successful, Alito agreed to propose

That this con man be deified after he rose.

His inaugural speech went over an hour.

It rambled and rambled and quickly turned sour.

The only real theme was self congratulation

And the size of the crowd admiring his oration.

The rest was babel that revealed his mental deterioration

Which progressively worsened as he promised mass deportation.

All eyes were then on Vance whom everyone believed

Was calculating his chance that Trump would be relieved.

The takeaway on Trump was that he was out on a limb

And would make a deal with Vance to pardon him.

The House and Senate also went red

By only a couple of votes that caused this dread.

The narrowest of margins across the land

Gave Trump and Congress the right to command.

Together they passed the most oppressive laws

Aimed at freedoms to which they now closed the doors.

Trump quickly appointed his lackey AG

Who dismissed all his indictments with alacrity.

He also declared that Trump could do no wrong

Now armed with full immunity and a hit-list 10 yards long.

Having warned the country he would be a dictator

Trump's first six months was a reign of terror.

With revenge against his opponents at the fore,

He rained down arrests, lawsuits and prosecutions galore.

White Male Christian Supremacy was the platform advanced

And implementing Project 2025 was given to JD Vance.

With Vance as Trump's Goebbels and Himmler rolled into one,

Reducing non-whites to second-class citizens he had deftly done

As he denounced all women who produced neither daughters nor sons.

Dripping with smoothness, polish and ooze,

Vance is being groomed to step into Trump's shoes.

Hidden behind a beard and feigned suavity,

He's a rabid champion of White Supremacy.

To enforce the new laws of the land

Trump looks to his faithful January 6 clan.

He sprung and pardoned the entire lot

And recognized over 700 of them to be America's Patriots

(Including those who assaulted or killed Capitol cops.)

To memorialize their heroism on that glorious day

Trump declared January 6 a federal holiday.

Uniformed, armed and reporting only to him

The Proud Boys and others are to serve his every whim.

"Be there. Will be wild!" is again Trump's call

To report to duty and give Trump their all.

Trump's first order was to round up migrants and "vermin"

Which the Proud Boys had the discretion to determine.

Trump's "Day of Violence" lasted 10 weeks.

Doors were busted down as they lay in their sleep

Like the Jews in Paris seized by the Nazi elite.

Bloodied families and children were herded into box car lots,

And when the country was outraged, all Trump would say was "So what!"

The unstable huckster showed no end to his iniquities

From filling his Cabinet with sycophants and misfit employees.

To purging civil servants who couldn't prove their MAGA loyalties

To cutting down Medicare, Social Security and other benefits,

To granting tax breaks to the rich that causes huge deficits.

To the elimination of the Department of Education

To enable red state far-right indoctrination.

Finally, to the Spirit of the Future, I quoted Dickens: :

"Spirit - Show me no more. Take me back"

"These things you have shown me - Must they come to pass

or could the future be different?"

"Why show me this if these are the shadows of things that must be

or are they the shadows of things that may be?”

'Why show me this if I am beyond all hope?"

"Spirit. I am not the man I was ! "

That was the last I saw of the ghost.

He vanished into thin air as I awoke.

My eyes opened from a very deep sleep

With Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" at my feet.

I was shivering in a cold sweat

I must have dreamt it all, I would bet.

But the dream was so real

That it made my feel

So cheap that I would sacrifice my vote

To enable a con-man to gloat.

But it was the dream I needed

To show me what I should have heeded

That the right to vote

Carries a duty to vote

If not for my sake

But because our democracy is at stake.

"I am not the man I was ." I kept mumbling

"I am not the man I was !" I started to shout.

"I am not the man I was!!" I shouted even louder

I don't know if I have cause to hope

That I have not missed my chance to vote.

I ran to the window and shouted to a boy:

"What's today, my fine fellow?"

"Why today? It's Election Day" he bellowed.

Then I haven't missed it and replied:

"Ask when the polls close of any driver

And come back in 20 minutes and I'll give you a dollar.

Come back in ten and I'll give you a fiver."

The polls are still open, and vote I will

Freedom loving Americans have a duty to fulfill.

"Never send to know for whom the bell tolls. It tolls for thee." (John Donne, 1572-1631)

EPILOGUE

As I think back upon last night's drama,

It was likely an hallucination that produced my trauma.

But I still churned round and round my dream

As to why it felt as real as it seemed.

Round and round I twisted my ring

As I tried to sort out this curious thing.

As I kept turning my ring back and forth

Appearing under it were threads of black cloth

How curious it was that the hand with this ring

Was the same one I used to help me cling

To the hooded Spirit's black robe

When he transported me into the Future to probe.

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Well, this is a good one.

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GREED!

"Declare, O Muse! in what ill-fated hour"

The Washington Post sacrificed its soul for power

To enable Jeff Bezos to wallow in greed

And display the integrity he'll no longer heed.

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Thank You for reporting on the Truth and the Facts this morning ☕ Oliver, what I still can't wrap my head around is,how trump Projects All of his fascist traits, on to Kamala Harris and Tim Walz? and who's he trying to convince? Himself?! Good read, and will reStack ASAP 💯👍🇺🇸💙🌊

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Your the Best, AI Comic 💪 and will reStack ASAP 💯👍🇺🇸💙🌊🌊🌊

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No YOU'RE the best! 🙂

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Keep Up your Good Works and will reStack ASAP 💯👍🇺🇸💙🌊🌊🌊

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💯 OMM!

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Straight from 1954, mass deportation didn’t go well for Eisenhower. Doesn’t anyone ever learn?

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"sad"

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Lmao

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The GOP’s rhetoric, under Trump’s shadow, has devolved into a relentless attack on every marginalized group, an unyielding propaganda machine fueling bigotry, fear, and division. This is not a party interested in debate or disagreement; it’s a machine for amplifying resentment and stoking hatred.

*The GOP’s Racism Broke AI*

https://substack.com/home/post/p-150895632?r=4d7sow&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

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