The Reich Stuff...Robert Reich that is: Some helpful words from the man and my reply
I’m going to do something I don’t normally do. I am snatching something from social media and reprinting it here (without permission, though I doubt the author will mind). What’s below is something Robert Reich posted on social media. It covers a lot of ground while cutting through the bullshit with some very good, solid information. It is perfect for this moment. Please read what Reich has to say (and my response pegged at the end). Ladies and germs, Robert Reich:
I’m not going to sugarcoat this. We’re in the worst national emergency of our lives. It is not coming directly from threats we should be coping with — climate change destroying our planet, another pandemic threatening millions of lives, artificial intelligence taking over our jobs and brains, nuclear proliferation threatening the future of life on earth. No. This national emergency is coming from a madman determined to turn America into a dictatorship and from his crazed assistants, including the richest person in the world.
What can I say that’s even remotely encouraging at this point?
Six things.
1. Voters are furious.
On Tuesday, Democrats flipped a Trump-voting seat in the Pennsylvania state Senate. James Malone defeated a well-funded and well-known Republican, Josh Parsons, in Lancaster County. Malone openly campaigned against Trump and Musk and made sure his opponent was tied to them.
This was a red Republican area that went +15 for Trump in 2024. The last time a Democrat won this seat was in 1889.
Other state and federal districts are showing the same trajectory — away from Trump and Musk.
2. Bernie and AOC are drawing record crowds.
Some 34,000 people turned out at Civic Center Park in Denver to hear Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders and New York Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in a “Fighting Oligarchy Tour.” As Bernie said: “We will not allow America to become an oligarchy. This nation was built by working people, and we are not going to let a handful of billionaires run the government.”
It was the biggest rally of Bernie’s entire career, including his presidential races. Hours later, the two spoke before a crowd of about 11,000 at the University of Northern Colorado in Greeley.
Elon Musk was so spooked he started peddling conspiracy theories about inflated crowd sizes and “paid” protesters.
According to YouGov, Sanders is the most popular politician in the country, with a +7 favorability. (Trump is -5, Vance is -8, Musk is -12, GOP is -15. Schumer is -33, and the Democratic Party as a whole is -35.)
3. April 5 protests are planned everywhere.
On April 5, 2025, Americans are hitting the streets. The “Hands Off!” movement — in response to Trump’s and Musk’s devastation — is the product of a large coalition. You can find the action nearest you by typing in “April 5 demonstration near me” on your browser. General information from one of the sponsoring organizations can be found here.
4. Trump is fumbling on all fronts.
— “Signalgate” — the group chat scandal — isn’t just an embarrassment for Trump and his regime. It also demonstrates that they cannot govern. They can’t even manage the most elementary of steps, like making sure they’re meeting secretly and securely. At best, both Pete Hegseth and National Security Adviser Mike Waltz — not to mention the White House comms operation — are damaged goods. There is no administration in the world, beyond this one, where a blunder of these proportions happens and nobody gets fired or resigns.
Leaders of the Senate Armed Services Committee — Chair Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) and ranking member Jack Reed (D-R.I.) — have sent a letter to the Pentagon’s acting inspector general requesting a formal investigation over “the use of unclassified networks to discuss sensitive and classified information, as well as the sharing of such information with those who do not have proper clearance and need to know.”
— The economy is in deep trouble. Consumer confidence continues to plummet amid growing worries about inflation and recession. Trump’s tariffs — both those already implemented and those proposed — are already raising prices across the board.
— The Trump-Musk DOGE is threatening popular programs. DOGE cuts caused the Social Security website to crash four times in 10 days, leaving millions of recipients unable to log in. Office managers are answering phones instead of receptionists because so many Social Security employees have been laid off. Phone services have been eliminated. Field offices are being cut.
Meanwhile, Trump-Musk DOGE cuts to the Federal Emergency Management Agency are already causing thousands of Americans who have lost their homes in floods and fires to do without any aid.
5. Trump’s polls are plummeting.
As a result of all of the above, Americans are turning on Trump. Although I’m not a huge believer in individual polls, I pay attention when every major poll shows the same thing:
YouGov poll taken 3/22 to 3/25, Trump’s disapproval (49 percent) exceeds approval (48 percent).
Reuters/Ipsos taken 3/21 to 3/23 is even worse. His disapproval is 51 percent and approval only 45 percent.
Morning Consult poll taken 3/21 to 3/23 shows his disapproval at 50 percent and approval at 47 percent.
American Research Group poll taken 3/17 to 3/20 shows his disapproval at 51 percent and approval at 45 percent.
An NBC News poll taken 3/7 to 3/11 shows that a majority of Americans (52 percent) are disappointed with Trump’s appointees — a higher percentage than at the start of Trump’s first term, or at the start of Obama’s, George W. Bush’s, or Clinton’s.
6. The courts continue to hold Trump and Musk in check, but for how long?
Federal judges are requiring that Trump reinstate 25,000 federal workers he fired; blocking the Trump regime from banning transgender people from the military; stopping ICE and the Department of Homeland Security from detaining several international graduate students for participating in demonstrations or adding their names to dissenting publications; and stopping ICE from deporting people without due process of law.
All told, there are more than 130 cases pending against Trump and his Administration challenging the legality of their actions. More than 40 injunctions have been issued and more than a dozen rulings have already found that the Administration has either violated, or probably violated, the law.
Another case is expected to be filed soon challenging Trump’s executive order issued Tuesday, requiring proof of citizenship before voting. This could prevent millions of eligible citizens from voting in future elections. The Constitution gives the states and Congress – not the President – the power to regulate elections and voting. Trump’s EO is unconstitutional.
The massive pushback from the federal courts has led Trump to threaten federal judges. It has also led Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson to suggest potentially defunding, restructuring, or eliminating the federal courts altogether. “We do have the authority over the federal courts, as you know. We can eliminate an entire district court,” Johnson said.
***
These six morsels of hope are small relative to the damage Trump and Musk are doing, but I wanted to let you know that all is not lost; there is push-back against them.
The damage is likely to accelerate in weeks to come.
Trump is gearing up his attacks on lawyers and law firms that during Trump’s first term challenged him or offered pro bono services to nonprofits that challenged him.
His Justice Department is just beginning to target his enemies.
His mass raids on alleged undocumented workers and deportations are just getting started.
His (and RFK Junior’s) campaign against vaccinations is already costing lives, including those of children who were not vaccinated against measles.
America has never been subject to this degree of cruelty, incompetence, and disregard for democratic norms.
My hope is that this horrific experience will lead to a new era of fundamental reform — of our economy, our democracy, and our commitment to social justice and the rule of law.
I hope this is not too much to hope for.
Soriano here: I agree with Reich’s point that, because the Trump horror show is so unpopular and not what even most Trump voters wanted*, when we beat them back, we will have a great opportunity to turn this country around and get what we want and need. If they damage Medicare and the ACA, we can push for single payer hard. We can use their anti-trans hate, their efforts to reestablish American apartheid, their attack on women, etc. to make a case for expanding civil rights for everyone. RFK Jr.’s insanity makes a great case for pandemic preparation and vaccinations (as well as universal healthcare). Trump and Musk’s attack on environmental protections will only highlight our need for them, especially when the next wave of tornados, hurricanes, flooding, and wildfires hit.
I’m not saying that Trump’s carnage is a good thing, rather that every disaster can be built on if we recognize the moment and are willing to work for change. It is a message Rebecca Solnit has been pushing for decades (see A Paradise Built in Hell). We aren’t talking hope and dreams, but opportunity, recognition, and resourcefulness
Note the deep unpopularity of Chuck Schumer and the Democratic Party compared to Bernie Sanders standing as the most popular politician in America. Schumer is a centrist, as are the rest of Democratic leadership. Centrists are making a big move to marginalize progs and lefties, but they do so at the party’s peril. No one wants their moderate bullshit. No one wants more capitalism to “fix” the ills capitalism has brought us. Americans – as dim witted as we can be – see through all that. We’ve voted in centrist Democratic presidents and waited and waited and waited…to get screwed once again. And, yes, I wish these assholes would either lead the fucking charge or drop out, but if they are going to be an obstacle to resistance and change, let them not escape public scorn. Those dire poll numbers is public scorn.
Bernie Sanders is not a centrist. He bills himself a democratic socialist. Right-wingers call him a Marxist and paint him as a cartoon commie from the 1940s. Listen to the man and what he proposes and it is clear that Sanders is a Roosevelt liberal or, in European terms, a social democrat. Sanders believes that housing, food, and healthcare is a basic human right and should not be treated as profit centers. He advocates spreading the wealth, something that the NFL, NBA, MLB, and NCAA all do (it’s called revenue sharing). Unlike Marxists, Sanders is sympathetic towards decentralization and does not push a “dictatorship of the proletariat” or anyone else. He not only broadly supports civil rights; he is a strong civil libertarian. Sanders supports a rules-based foreign policy, one that elevates diplomacy and civil rights over war and oppression.
What Sanders wants for America is what most Americans want for America, when the what is presented above is stated as clearly as I just did. And the thing is, far more Americans support Sanders’ agenda than Donald Trump’s or the centrist Democrats’. There’s a reason why: What Sanders (and AOC) is pushing is not ideological or radical. It is practical and sensible.
Sanders and AOC look at the state of the country and its people, assess the needs, and come up with common solutions that have proved successful in other countries and, for a time, in the United States. By contrast, Trump and Musk look at America as if it is a target of acquisition, something to be bought and sold for their own personal profit. They justify their actions with stupid, ideological arguments like “Give greedy rich people more money and they will share it with you” and “Let profit-driven businesses regulate themselves and they will work in the public interest.” Trump/Musk are extreme ideologies, deep cynics, and apex predators. There is nothing that they want that will benefit the whole of the USA.
Americans see this, which is why Bernie Sanders runs laps around Trump, Musk, and centrist Democrats (who have their own problem with ideological rigidity and elitist impracticality). It is why if Sanders ran against Trump right now, Bernie would win in a landslide, snatching a lot of votes from Trump, even some MAGAs. Democratic leadership refuses to acknowledge the popularity of Sanders and his ideas by marginalizing Democrats who echo Bernie’s message, a pain in the ass but not so much a bad thing as it gives us a clear view as to who is and is not working for the greater good of most of us.
Now, the important part: Reich can hope, but I don’t want to rely on hope or anything else except ourselves. We are the ones that have to make this happen. We have to seize this opportunity and go hard at the Dems, backing the ones already in the fight, pushing those who are a bit timid, and punishing those who refuse to fight back (because at this moment, if you aren’t working with us, you are working against us).
I’ve written this many times before: Do not doubt that we are strong. We aren’t just strong, we are very, very strong. What we are lacking is organization, coordination, and a bit of courage. But if when we come together and treat this moment with the immediacy and seriousness that AIDS activists had in fighting everyone from the government, the medical establishment, churches, and the regular mess of bigots, and then came out of the crisis having greatly advanced gay and civil rights, revolutionizing medical research, and becoming a powerful political block…if we are as dedicated to saving our lives as the gay community was in saving theirs, we will beat these fuckers and make this country a better place.
*Trust me, most of them do not want Social Security and Medicare to go away, or National Parks to be sold off, etc. I abhor what is going on right now and see no upside to it. That said, I am not one to wallow in misery and complain about the shit cascade without doing something to change things. I don’t want to sit in sorrow forever. I want more, I want more for all (except those who have too much) and I want it now.