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While I'm zooming through the ether to see my son and his wife, I've pre-posted a few things from home. I'm not carting my old laptop with me this time. Trying to keep the weight down in my overhead suitcase!
The other day I finally got to the Trailhead Restaurant and ordered my favorite meal. Fish and Chips. Why I never take a photo of it must have to do with my level of hunger. I'd been craving it for days!
A funny thing happened. I wanted to make sure to mail some cards at the post office before they picked up the last collection at 5 pm. So around 4:45 I pulled into a parking space, and the guy in front of me gets out of his little white pickup. It's none other than an old friend, Tim!
So we hug in the middle of the street, and figure cars can just go around us. (There were lots of really pushy drivers out that evening!)
And we mail our letters and I ask Tim if he wants to go have dinner, and he says yes. He probably wasn't that hungry, which he owned up to, but after we had a refreshing Highland Gaelic Ale each, and talked talked talked, we tried to figure out when we'd last been together.
He helped me move into several of my houses here, he used to fix little things, and was willing for me to give him pottery often. He says he likes my color pallet. I'm not sure what colors that means.
Tim has moved to a nearby town but still works full time doing bookkeeping for several non-profits in Black Mountain. And the biggest news in his life is that he's left the Unitarian Universalist religion and is happy as an Episcopalian. Apparently they are a liberal bunch of Christians in Marion NC, so he's quite comfortable.
I told him I've also moved away from the UU church in Black Mountain and am taking a class in Paganism at the Asheville UU church. It uses a book written by Druids, but is interesting to consider how people experience paganism...which isn't a major arm of UU's, but an off-shoot, you might say.
There are UU Buddhists, Jews, humanitarians, atheists, Christians and agnostics. A small group which is all over the US is CUUPS - Covenant of Unitarian Universalist Pagans. So CUPPS is sponsoring this little class, which includes all 13 of us experiencing some of the practices of pagans.
Well Tim and I didn't exactly figure out when we last had connected. He does post on Facebook every once in a while, and said he's really busy with all these different organizations he works for. So we shall stay loosely in touch.
I told him I was just home from a few days in the hospital with pneumonia, and that I was planning to go see my son and wife in Colorado. So that's where I'm headed today!
The Anti-Authoritarian Newsletter published this this morning:
Authoritarians in the U.S. and around the world are clearly gaining ground rapidly. Their success has caused many to speculate about why and how they are winning, hoping to duplicate or riff on those winning strategies and tactics. In this endeavor, caution is advised, particularly around how we define “winning.” To drive democracy forward, we should focus on the tactics that speak to the longing for security and belonging that people are expressing behind all the political rhetoric, threats, and rejections of political parties and institutions. In actions promoting democracy, we must recognize that sustainable movements require engaging people not just as parts of a larger whole, but as whole human beings.
Here’s a strategy that the authoritarians deployed that we can build upon.
1. The Erosion of Social Capital and the Crisis of Meaning:
Deindustrialization, offshoring, and the shift toward an information-based economy hollowed out traditional working-class communities, particularly in rural and post-industrial areas.
With economic security crumbling, the institutions that once provided social cohesion, unions, local businesses, community organizations, and faith-based networks, began to weaken.
This led to an increase in distrust of government, a loss of a unifying national economic identity, and a broader cultural fragmentation.
2. The Authoritarians’ Strategic Advantage:
The authoritarians understood that this was not just an economic crisis, but a cultural one, one that made people feel unmoored, disrespected, and abandoned.
They built power where social capital was still strong, especially within conservative religious communities, gun culture, law enforcement and military networks, and tightly knit rural and exurban communities.
They framed their movement not around policy, but around identity, grievance, and belonging, turning political participation into a form of cultural solidarity rather than an engagement with governance.
3. The Left’s Strategic Blind Spots:
Left and center-left movements remained focused on issue-based campaigns, advocating for policy solutions that, while crucial, often did not speak to the deeper cultural and emotional crises that people were experiencing.
Many left-leaning organizers built power within cities and academia but struggled to engage rural and working-class communities where social capital had eroded.
Elections became the primary measure of success, leaving movements vulnerable to the short-term thinking and cyclical energy of campaign politics.
1. Rebuild Social Capital Through Local Organizing
Social justice advocates must prioritize movement-building at the community level, not just the national level.
Invest in mutual aid, cooperative economics, labor organizing, and localized civic engagement—so that people have tangible ways to feel empowered and connected.
Look beyond transactional activism (signing petitions, making calls) and focus more attention on building durable networks of trust, care, and action.
2. Focus on Cultural Strategy, Not Just Policy Wins
The right won by capturing meaning and identity - not just by passing laws. The left must do the same by creating a culture of solidarity, dignity, and hope.
Support independent media, storytelling, art, and cultural institutions that can compete with the right’s propaganda machine.
Reclaim language like freedom, patriotism, and security, rather than ceding them to reactionary forces.
3. Build Organizing Infrastructure Where the Right Has Gained Ground
Focus on small towns, rural areas, and working-class suburbs where the far right has successfully organized, recognizing the polarization is a two-way phenomenon. Where the far right has polarized communities, there are two sides.
Engage faith communities, military families, and disaffected (and disabled) workers by recognizing their real grievances and the contributions they can make, and working with them to develop alternatives to far right radicalization.
Strengthen alliances with labor unions and working-class organizations, particularly in industries that still have high social capital like healthcare, logistics (transportation, warehousing, inventory management, and order fulfillment), and education.
4. Stop Playing Defense - Go on the Offensive with a Bold Vision
The left has been too reactive to far right attacks. We need to offer our own compelling, forward-looking vision of the future.
This means not just talking about “protecting democracy,” but about expanding democracy - economic democracy, workplace democracy, community self-determination.
Instead of debating the right on their terms, change the conversation entirely -about what kind of society we want to build rather than just what we want to stop.
5. Shift Away from Electoral-Only Strategies
While elections are crucial, they should not be the sole focus of movement-building.
Create permanent organizing structures that persist beyond election cycles, ensuring that political energy does not fade after each loss or victory.
Train people not just to vote, but to organize; building local leadership pipelines and grassroots governance models.
The far right succeeded because they understood that people need meaning, identity, and community, especially in times of economic and cultural instability. If the pro-democracy movement fails to recognize this, we will keep losing ground.
But the good news? We can win this. Because deep down, what the research shows is that most people don’t want a future defined by hate, division, and repression. They want security, dignity, and belonging. It’s up to us to offer them a movement that meets those needs; one that builds a new social fabric, not just defends a crumbling one."
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I have also been thinking how we left-leaning people who want our rights to be honored have many Democrats involved. There was this political race where we kept saying "save Democracy."
And my cousins from the Republican party kept saying..."it's a Republic, and those Democrats don't know the constitution." (I no longer read what they are saying since they decided the opposition to their Tea Party/Extremist Christians/MAGAT ideas meant I was spiritually lacking.)
The mis-information that Republicans kept receiving meant they believed these lies, saying Republicans are for a republic and Democrats are for a democracy.
At first I just laughed off their idiocy at believing such. But the methods used to bring enough millions of people to vote for this authoritarian regime need to be looked in the face.
Today North Carolina has a contest still being kept alive by the losing candidate for a judgeship, where the Republicans have already thrown out several hundred votes, and now are looking to unqualify another 30,000 all over the state. It was clear to everyone that he lost the election. But the machine of evil is still promoting this to the extent all 100 counties' citizens have been asked to make sure their voting eligibility meets the standards needed. And there's a list of those who may be thrown out!
I checked, and I'm not on the list. And then our Democrat Attorney General, or the Democrat Governor said we didn't need to look at our status, as this was a matter of the ballots not being accepted, and it was still in court. I don't have a clue what that meant, but he advised us not to look to be sure we were listed as eligible voters. That means having a valid NC driver's license and the last 4 of your Social Security number on file. Geese!
I think of all the cases that could have been tried by an impartial judge who won the election, that have either sat waiting, or are going to other courts, since November's victory!
Looking east on State St. in Black Mountain.
Text from the Asheville Watchdog, about the "Hands Off" demonstrations in Asheville, NC on April 5, 2025.
The pleasant weather contrasted with the angry call for urgent action to stop Trump’s broadaxe policies, which have paralyzed many of the federal government’s basic services, cost thousands of local federal workers their careers, and left many anxious about turmoil ahead.
“This has been a dark time for us, and I fear it is going to get worse,” said disabled Army veteran Jay Carey, a combat veteran of several wars. He was invited to give the rally’s closing remarks after gaining public notice when he was evicted from U.S. Rep. Chuck Edwards’s town hall meeting in March for protesting the Republican congressman’s failure to fight Trump’s cuts to veterans’ programs.
Carey told Asheville Watchdog after the rally that he expects Trump’s actions will trigger widespread rioting in the coming months.. The rioting would enable Trump to declare martial law and take dictator-like control of the government, he said.
“I’m not even thinking about [coming elections] because I’m not sure we’re going to have any,” said Carey, who served overseas in Iraq and Afghanistan and was awarded a Bronze Star for valor. In his remarks to the crowd, Carey drew loud applause and an eruption of sign waving when he raised his fist and cried: “Fight by any means possible! We are the people we’ve been waiting for!”
The Asheville protest was one of an estimated 1,100 across the nation, including in all the counties of western North Carolina, according to organizers. The nationwide chain was expected to be the largest single-day demonstration against Trump since his inauguration in January.
It clearly met that standard in Asheville as local organizers said it was the largest protest to be held in Pack Square for more than a decade. Asheville Police Department spokesman Rick Rice said no official crowd estimate was made, though he said it was “in the thousands.” He said there were no incidents that required police intervention.
The rallies across the country were organized by a coalition of many groups, most unaffiliated with the Democratic or other political parties, but with interests in a range of issues threatened or attacked by Trump’s policies.
The principal organizer of the Asheville rally was Good Trouble WNC, named for the motto of the late civil rights leader John Lewis. The coalition included Indivisible Asheville, a nonpartisan voter-rights initiative; the Western Circle Poor People’s Campaign; Sunrise WNC, a climate-change activist group; Third Act WNC, an environmental group; Asheville Food & Beverage United; and the leftist NC Workers Party.
Brenda Murphree, a founder of Indivisible WNC, said the coalition’s members and the event’s speakers were selected because they lacked partisan affiliation. “We are slipping into autocracy and it doesn’t matter which party you may belong to,” she said in an interview.
Murphree repeated a line from Democratic U.S. Sen. Cory Booker’s 25-hour filibuster speech last week, saying, “ ‘It’s not about right or left; it’s about right and wrong.’”
The speakers were led by Buncombe County Commission Chair Amanda Edwards, a Democrat, though she made no mention of the party in her brief address. Others were invited to speak about specific issues threatened by Trump, including his attacks on federal employees in such fields as veterans affairs, Social Security, public health, public education, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the U.S. Postal Service, and local agriculture.
Shanna Peele, special education teacher and head of the Buncombe County teachers’ union, touched a common nerve with a call to the crowd to become active in a resistance movement.
“This is a billionaire-imposed crisis,” Peele said, “and its victims are our children. Let history record that when everything was on the line, we did everything we could.”
Retired Marine Corps infantry combat veteran Will Nugent told the crowd that he struggled with homelessness and mental health issues after he left the military. He came to Asheville for treatment at the VA hospital and credited that with enabling him “to start a new life.” But Trump’s massive cuts to the Veterans Affairs Department will leave other veterans without help as they age, Nugent said.
“The millionaires employed in the White House are the ones who inflict the most pain and destruction on hard-working Americans,” he said. “There is a divine spark in each one of us, and that spark is being diminished and put out with a lack of empathy, a lack of compassion, and a lack of unity.”
Whether the size and energy of Saturday’s protest will be channeled into a defeat for Trump’s Republican Party allies in the 2026 elections is a question without an answer. Robin Lively-Summers, president of Indivisible and introducer of the speakers, seemed at a loss when asked the coalition’s plan for building on the rally’s success to create substantive change in policies.
“That’s a really good question and I’m not sure I can answer it,” Lively-Summers told The Watchdog. “We’re trying to get as many people as possible engaged to resist the Trump madness, to show up at events like these and to take action.”
“That’s kind of nebulous,” she conceded, but indicated that mass protests similar to the Hands Off! Event would likely be a future tactic and preparation is underway.
“We’re going to be talking about training people to understand what active resistance looks like, what civil disobedience looks like and what people need to know who engage,” she said.
But it was warm enough for runners in shorts going around the lake. I see another redbud waay over on the other shore. I should go greet it and take a few photos, shouldn't I!
Maybe tomorrow...
Today's quote:
Mostly mules and a donkey...unknown place with covered wagons about to set out for some great opportunities.
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 "Down in Breckenridge, Texas, Where Horses Ride in Fords." |
