Resistance Is Not futile

THE BERNHARD PERSPECTIVE

RESISTANCE IS NOT FUTILEYou are meant to feel powerless. That is what a strongman wants, to make you feel as if nothing can stop his taking autocratic control. This is Donald T****’s strategy, it is what he is counting on. No less than our way of life hangs in the balance.

Our democratic institutions rely on the compliance of its citizens and leaders with and within the law. They are not capable of dealing with the existential threat of tyrannical defiance. Our Founding Fathers presumed and relied on the intentions of good men to hold the reigns of power and authority.

But Donald T**** is not good man.

The 1st Amendment guarantees our right to free speech and to petition the government for a redress of grievances. We must continue to exercise that right, to continue to fill the streets across the country by the millions and make our petitions with loud, strong language.

It is in the country’s best interests that we are peaceful. As John Lennon observed, “When it gets down to having to use violence, then you are playing the system’s game. The establishment will irritate you – pull your beard, flick your face – to make you fight. Because once they’ve got you violent, then they know how to handle you. The only thing they don’t know how to handle is non-violence and humor.”

And it works.

In Chicago and Portland, T**** did all he could to unhinge the population. He sent masked, armed agents in caravans to invade peaceful communities where they provoked violence and created chaos. They chased people down in the streets, parking lots and even into businesses. They beat helpless victims before arresting them and exercised indiscriminate use of tear gas. They arrested people as they came and left courtrooms. They claimed absolute authority.

In response, people in those cities created organizations to monitor and warn people at risk by phone and with whistles when ICE squadrons were seen patrolling their neighborhoods. They had observers on scene to document ICE assaulting and arresting helpless victims, and their lawyers in the courts. In some cases, street demonstrations intimidated T****’s brownshirts, forcing them to retreat.

Mocking their tormentors with eloquent humor, Portland demonstrators in Halloween costumes lined up opposite armed, masked ICE thugs. Costumed protestors marched by the hundreds, and the image of a defiant frog became the symbol of that city’s resistance.

The good people of these American cities creatively channeled the essence of Dr. Martin Luther King and John Lennon. Damning “optics,” bad press and spirited, peaceful protest succeeded in blunting the effects of T****’s private army. ICE is now abandoning these cities and has moved on. The people in their new target cities already know what to do, and they’re doing it.

T**** wants us to feel powerless to stop him. He must see that we are not.

Our strongest weapon in defense of our country, our liberty and our freedom is first and foremost our concerted action against the president’s quasi-military occupation of our cities. And second, we must continue to exercise our right to speak our minds, to organize, to fill our nation’s streets by the millions and express our righteous anger.

We must continually remind Donald T**** that it is the people and only the people who are sovereign in this country. He does not make laws for us nor is he above them. And if he endeavors to become so, he must see that we can and will bring him down.

And we have the way to do that. We have one path forward to fight against this madman’s lust for power. We have the ballot box, we have our voices and we have our ultimate weapon:

Resistance.