It Feels Awful to be Right by Frank Kashner

How Kochs destroy US

The most deaths and the greatest economic destruction

I feel a little like Cassandra, the mythological woman whose curse was to see the impending future but have nobody believe her.  I saw the future because historian Nancy MacLean, in her book Democracy in Chains, accurately portrayed what has been happening in the United States over the past 100 years.  She showed that a vast network of billionaires led for the last 50 years by industrialists Charles and David Koch, AKA the Koch network, have been working effectively and secretly to destroy the government of the United States of America. 

The Covid-19 virus has exposed the shell of a government that remains after the Koch network effectively spread the Libertarian ideas that government is inept  and everything should be left to corporations to run. Starting with Ronald Regan, and the idea that “the government is the problem”, president after president, Democrats as well as Republicans, have underfunded or unfunded health care, education, environmental protection, voting rights, social security, and shredded the rest of what was considered the social safety net.

By gaining control over the Republican Party, and the acquience of enough Democrats, the right wing network has also gained control over the Supreme Court, numerous state governments, and the US Senate.  (See UnChainDemocracy.org) It was left to Donald Trump to destroy what remained. 

We get to watch, daily, as defunct or diminished parts of government are exposed as unable to fulfill basic functions of coordination and management of the Covid-10 crisis.  Notable missteps, misdirection, and failures lately have been the office responsible for pandemic preparedness, the CDC, and FEMA.. Republican governors ignorantly expose millions of people to the virus by refusing to order social distancing.  Testing, protective gear, and respirators remain unavailable, and Trump uses national media to campaign daily with lies and misdirection including now attacking the World Health Organization and pushing dangerous “cures” like Hydroxychloroquine that risks fatal heart complications.

The United States, under Republian leadership, has the worst Covid-19 response in the industrialized world, resulting in the most deaths and the greatest economic destruction.

It is up to all of us to support our health care workers, truck drivers, health care aides, garbage collectors, grocery store workers and the other millions of people at the bottom of our economic heap who are keeping what remains of our society and economy running. 

We can support groups like the Working Families Party that conducted the on-the-ground organizing that led to the recent victory in Wisconsin of the Democrat judicial candidate.

We can participate with Indivisible in getting our own elected officials to press for benefits to poor and working people instead of to millionaires and billionaires.

We can help Common Cause in protecting the US Constitution from a Koch network attempt to dismantle democratic rights and lock in our domination by a small minority of libertarian extremists.

We can assist Swing Left   “By focusing on 12 “Super States,” we can work on flipping the White House, the Senate, and the State Houses key to rolling back Republican gerrymandering—all at the same time.”

We can work with UnKoch My Campus and join their webinar on Monday, April 20th to discuss: 

  • The people, institutions, and tactics involved in Koch’s climate denial machine; 
  • The history of Koch Industries’ environmental crimes; and 
  • How campaigns to promote climate misinformation fit into other misinformation campaigns led by the Koch network
  • Understanding & Disrupting Koch’s Climate Denial Machine Webinar 
  • Monday, April 20th at 1:00pm ET

We can support GreenPeace

Payback Project: https://www.paybackproject.org/

Vote Forward: https://votefwd.org/

Justice Democrats: https://www.justicedemocrats.com/

The harm that’s been done to our country by forty-plus years of undermining by the Kochs and their like-minded corporate allies is great, but it’s not irrevocable. Just as we are each social distancing to limit the spread of a deadly virus we must all come together to work together now to restore democracy and rebuild a government that promotes the common good including building a social safety net, funding universal health care, supporting public schools, reversing global warming, and restoring the independence of the three branches of government. Once we look back to see what’s been undermining democracy and eviscerating government, we can be clear-eyed about what we must do to save our future. The next time a pandemic threatens to wreak havoc with our lives we want a robust and trusted government with a strong

1 thought on “It Feels Awful to be Right by Frank Kashner

  1. Dear Precious Friend Frank,

    Thank you for this message, it reinforces hope.
    Please note my new email address

    Stathi

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