I tell people “I feel like I’m a soldier on the battlefield for our democracy and I’M NOT LEAVING TILL WE HAVE WON, AGAIN!” and they snicker because I’m a 74-year-old great grandmother. But the battlefield is different now and all that’s needed is a brain, the knowledge that humanity is born free and democracy allows the highest expression of freedom, and a phone connected to the internet. I’M NOT LEAVING
74 years old. Great-grandmother. On the battlefield...every single day...with a phone and a brain...and the kind of CLARITY...most people half your age can't find!
You know what that is?
That's the most dangerous kind of soldier there is.
The one who knows exactly WHAT they're fighting for…and...has lived long enough to understand exactly what HAPPENS... when it's lost.
Great timing! Thank you Jack. I’ve had some “friends” back away because I protest and stay involved. Sometimes I cry. Sometimes I am tired. I am not leaving. Just loved reading what Audrey wrote above.
Jane B...the friends who backed away…that's its own kind of loss. Don't minimize it. I know that loss well. It stings.
But...look where you are right now.
In a community of people...who DIDN'T back away. Who cry sometimes. Who get tired. Who protest anyway. Who stay involved anyway. Who show up here at midnight...reading signal... instead of noise...because they refuse to look away.
Audrey's words landed for a lot of people tonight. Including me.
Another 74 y/o grandmother who is not going to look away. I believe we will get thru this no matter how hard it is. We have lived thru Vietnam, civil rights movement, having our children go to wars they should not have to and we are strong women who understand what matters in this world. This is the time to stay not give up. There are more people who do not want what is happening and are not going to die up. Also many of us have spouses closer to 80 y/0 pr older.
Yep, never mess with older ladies, I am pushing 78, we are relentless and unforgiving about betrayal, which is exactly what a big part of our government is trying to pull off.
@jackhopkins you made my day. And my husband who’ll be 89 next month has all the experience from the Civil Rights movement so I get an even longer perspective
Look at this comment section. Look at the people in here...the 74-year-old great-grandmother who isn't leaving. The analyst applying...Snyder's Rule One with surgical precision. The subscriber...who's been awake since midnight watching the Strait. The veteran...who sent this newsletter to his intelligence community colleagues.
Different ages. Different backgrounds. Different corners of this country.
Jack, I’m not going anywhere… not until I take my last breath. I figure there’ll almost always be something I can do. I’m 70 so right up there with the others… but still pretty healthy… and I have children whose lives will be affected by what happens. No grandchildren because both of my children decided this wasn’t a world they wanted to bring them into and that’s sad but right now, as much as I hate it, I understand it.
Oh, I’ll take a break from time to time because I’m a person who feels things deeply and sometimes that’s hard. There are images and stories I’ll never be able to unsee or forget. I think that makes me fight all the harder though until I can’t… but only for a moment. I’ll take a breath and then be right back in the fight.
Thank you for this, Jack.. and yes… you were right… it was time for an article like this. What’s happening is so hard to watch and so unnecessary. So much suffering and death because of him and his minions. It makes me angrier than I’ve ever been in my life… and Congress… not all but far too many. Doing nothing to stop it. So I’m holding fast and holding on until there’s nothing left to hold onto… and hoping it never reaches that point.
Thanks for all you do. You literally keep me sane and I appreciate that more than you might realize.
It is the first rule because it is the most violated. Not by force. Not by threat. By exhaustion. By the private decision, made alone, that the outcome is already settled.
Jack is correct. The feeling of losing is not evidence of loss. It is a mechanism. Historians of authoritarian consolidation note the same pattern across different countries and different centuries: the regime does not need to defeat its opposition. It needs its opposition to defeat itself. The emotional collapse precedes the political one. Always.
This is what “do not obey in advance” means in practice. No officer arrives at your door. No law compels your silence. The capitulation is internal, and it is chosen. The whisper Jack names — it’s over, nothing will change, why try — is not despair. It is preemptive obedience. It is the self administering what the state has not yet demanded.
File the distinction. There is a difference between being defeated and deciding you are defeated. One is done to you. The other you do to yourself. Rule One exists because the second is far more common than the first.
The people who shaped outcomes in the periods we now study did not feel they were winning. The record is clear on this. What distinguished them was not confidence. It was refusal — the specific, daily refusal to make the state’s work easier by doing it themselves.
Is there a book written by someone in 1930s Germany who admits they did not understand or see what was going on in front of them? I am surrounded by people who just don’t see what I’m seeing, it makes me wonder if I have become an alarmist, but then, I see or read about some other antic and I decide I’m not an alarmist.
I recall Eisenhower reportedly brought in the townspeople to see the nearby concentration camp and those villagers were shocked at what they saw.
Mary E...the book you're looking for is "They Thought They Were Free" by Milton Mayer.
Published 1955. He interviewed ten ordinary Germans after the war...not monsters.
Ordinary people. Who described how it happened so gradually…each step so small…each outrage normalized by the next…that by the time they understood what they were living inside…they were already inside it.
Pair it with Snyder's "On Tyranny." Read them together.
On being an alarmist.
Here's the test Mayer's subjects failed.
They dismissed the people raising alarms...as alarmists.
The fact that you're questioning yourself…checking yourself…staying open to being wrong…is precisely what distinguishes genuine alarm...from paranoia.
Mary, I like to use Goodreads to find books about specific topics. Here are some suggestions with a brief summary:
The German War: A Nation Under Arms, 1939-45 by Nicholas Stargardt: While covering the war years, it heavily utilizes letters and diaries to show how the "people’s community" (Volksgemeinschaft) narrative kept many Germans committed to the regime even as it was failing.
The "Hitler Myth": Image and Reality in the Third Reich by Ian Kershaw: This book explores how the Nazi propaganda machine created a heroic image of Hitler that differed greatly from reality, showing how it fooled many Germans into supporting him.
Hitler's True Believers: How Ordinary People Became Nazis by Robert Gellately: This work examines how ordinary people embraced Nazi ideology, discussing the ways the Führer was viewed and how the regime managed to gain such widespread support without coercion.
Oral Histories are always interesting:
They Thought They Were Free: The Germans, 1933-45 by Milton Mayer: A classic work based on post-war interviews with ten ordinary Nazi Party members in a small Hessian town. Mayer examines how and why they felt they were "free," demonstrating how they were seduced by propaganda and small moral compromises.
What We Knew: Terror, Mass Murder, and Everyday Life in Nazi Germany by Eric A. Johnson & Karl-Heinz Reuband: A comprehensive oral history featuring interviews with over 3,000 ordinary Germans about their life under the Third Reich, what they knew, and how they were fooled or chose to ignore realities.
Broken Lives: How Ordinary Germans Experienced the 20th Century by Konrad H. Jarausch: Based on dozens of memoirs by the generation of Germans born in the 1920s, this book shows how early enthusiasm and belief in Hitler turned to disillusionment, revealing how the younger generation was deceived by the regime.
If any of these pique your interest but you can’t find them, let me know and I’ll see what I can find for you. If you read any of these items, I’d be interested in your thoughts.
I'm too angry to give up. And we don't know how this ends. So I fight every day, and have learned to lead. I don't hesitate so much, the cause is just. I have clarity and purpose. Like-minded friends and neighbors. Adult children and grandchildren who need an example to remember. Life is a great drama, we get to be here and participate.
Virginia, I taught Human Development for years, plus Death & Dying. I always told my students that we role model for our children and grandchildren (if we are parents/grandparents) not only how to live but also how to navigate the end of the journey. One of most important lessons we leave our children is our example of family and community leadership.
Three words. Better than anything a speechwriter could produce. Because it names the strategy exactly right...not fight the hate, not match the hate, not fear the hate.
Starve it.
The flags coming down…the neighbors refocusing…that's not nothing. That's the tide. It moves slowly. It's easy to miss when you're watching the storm.
You're watching the right thing.
Thank you for your service. Thank you for staying. Thank you...for bringing your circle with you.
Veterans who understand what they actually fought for…are EXACTLY the voices this moment needs most. That's a fact.
This newsletter hit some memories. Like when I was in the police academy in a very “pro male” environment and remember thinking “I am not leaving. They will have to literally pick me up and throw me out to get rid of me.”. I left…25 years later with a good retirement at a good rank. I am certainly not leaving now. There is too much at stake.
Alexa - when did you go through the police academy? My late husband was in the Phoenix PD academy in 1972. Out of 25 cadets, only 2 were women. They went on to stellar careers. My husband put in 25 years, too. Thank you for your service! 😊
Diana, Thank you. I was in 1989. In North Florida. 12 women in my class. Not all graduated. I think only 3 made it to retirement. My hat is off to your husband as well for his service. 🫡
In an environment that made clear...from day one...you weren't supposed to stay.
You stayed ANYWAY. Rose through it. Earned the rank. Took the retirement. On your terms.
That's not stubbornness.
That's the specific kind of endurance...that ONLY comes from knowing exactly who you are…and refusing to let anyone else's definition of the room override it.
You've already proven you know how to hold when holding is hard.
I understand your feelings - it too often seems like we are living in a version of political hell. When I was going through the personal “hell” of cancer, my daughter gave me a sign by a favorite politician of mine-Winston Churchill. He is credited with saying, “If you are going through Hell, keep going!” 🤗. You got this!!! 👊
Debby Burnett...the tears are earned. Every one of them.
Ten years is a long time to hold. The weight of that…the exhaustion of it…is real. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise.
But...then read what you just wrote.
Ancestors who stood alongside Washington. Men...who enlisted in December knowing what was coming…and went anyway…and gave everything in a Confederate prison in Georgia six months later.
That blood is in YOU.
They didn't know they were going to win either.
They just REFUSED to stop.
You come from people who held when holding was the hardest thing imaginable. And here you are…still holding…still showing up…still fighting…when you could have quietly walked away.
I really, really needed to hear this today. No pressing reason….. just that life seems to be piling up and weighing me down lately. Sleep has alsobeen difficult and lack of high quality sleep literally makes me stupid. Cannot put two thoughts together or make any real sense…. lol.
Your article reminds me of a saying…. It’s always darkest just before the dawn and, maybe even more importantly…. Don’t quit five minutes before the miracle.
I think right now what’s bugging me most is that I can’t much see what’s past this current mess… what awaits us on the other side….? I really don’t know. It’s foggy and we may not recognize ourselves as a country. That’s (as we used to say in the 60’s and 70’s) heavy, man. I guess this passage we’re in now is a little like being born…. Can’t turn around, waaaay too late for that! I guess we all simply need to hold our loved ones close, rest when necessary, take good care of each other and take each step as it arrives.
Thanks for listening and providing excellent information as well as a forum with likeminded others committed to clarity. I appreciate that and you.
Deb, another oldie but goodie from the ‘60s/‘70s is “that’s bitchin’ ” but back then it meant “cool or groovy!” 🤣. Maybe we can tweak it a bit to say, “it’s a bitch!” because it certainly feels like it at this point in time.
What has really kept me from that “heavy” feeling is making an action plan and working it. When I first subscribed to Jack’s Substack I felt that “fog” coming on but after reading a couple of Jack’s articles on developing an action plan on how to prepare for the hard times ahead, I felt energized by what I COULD do instead of risking paralysis by what I couldn’t do. Hold your family tight and take good care of each other.
I’ve been following this for far too long, and far too closely. But in a way, being pushed to and maybe over the edge a little makes it a lot easier to not give two fucks and just tell people as politely as I can that they’re enabling this, either through inaction or being overwhelmed by it all and doing nothing, probably both. And succinctly, as much as a nine pound hammer, informing them what “this” is. As I mentioned in an earlier comment, the reactions are telling: “Whistling past the graveyard” has never been more appropriate. And Jack, you’re one of the sources that has not pegged the needle to one end or the other, just the straight facts, political reality, not polemics.
I’ve had to hear hard things in life, as I’m sure you have as well. What I respect about Jack is that he gives it to us straight and doesn’t sugar-coat it.
I’ve often been told I’m blunt. I can understand why some say that. I will often say, “Am I unkind or disrespectful when I talk to you in a straightforward, adult manner?” After a second or two of stunned silence, the response is usually “I’m not used to hearing the truth!” I’ll take the straight facts any day!!
Something someone said years ago about ‘oh, what a tangled web we weave……’. And given the vagaries of aging, honesty really does work a whole lot better! 🤣🤣🤣
True - I was raised by a narcissist mother who lied just “because.” I’m sure it provided her a sense of power and control. In actuality, it drove her kids, my dad, friends and neighbors away. At 94, she is very lonely because of her past behaviors…..but it’s everyone else’s fault.
My late husband was in law enforcement. I can still hear him saying to our kids, “Just facts. Not what you want them to be or how you think you’ll get farther with your version, just the facts!”
Two out three of our children are “just the facts” chip off the ‘ol block. Unfortunately, DNA found my third child and she is like her narcissistic grandmother. And pushes people away with her web of lies. 😢
Guess I'm in the right place. I'll be 75 in a few weeks. I was suspended from college for my first protest at age 19. I stood in front of my "girls" dorm by myself yelling for others to come out after dorm hours to protest the fact that the "guys" didn't have dorm hours. No one joined me though many agreed with me. I've fought and marched and protested too many times to count since then, but still in the fight. The hardest part is watching progress we made being lost. With all of us still leaning into progress, we must win it back to keep going onward to a more perfect union and future.
Polly-I agree! I never thought I’d be re-protesting (not sure this is really a word! 🤣)….but that’s how it feels. So now I do it for the granddaughters I never knew then I would have who now are protesting to keep what we had to fight to get!!! 😡🤬
Jack, did you sneak into one of my Marriage and Family classes or a Parenting class? As I was reading your words of wisdom, it sounded so familiar! For me, if you care about relationships (and I embrace this social contract, called democracy as a “relationship!), then you FIGHT! You don’t have to beat your chest or shout from the rooftops, no, you SHOW UP, in every way you can. Not once, not when you feel like it, but when it’s hard. When you don’t think you can take one more step, draw one more breath.
You don’t give up on your relationships-your significant other, your kids, your responsibilities, your social contracts with our Constitution.
What angers me - it doesn’t “blind” me but it propels me is when people say “No matter what I do, it doesn’t make a difference.” Get over your need for immediate gratification! Your partner, your kids, your relationships, your country needs your commitment. Commitments don’t give you immediate gratification. Relationship commitments are long term “gigs!”
We owe to one another our mutual commitment to human rights, social justice, and a duty to hold our government accountable to uphold the tenets guaranteed in our Constitution and Bill of Rights.
My AZ State baseball team starts soon - my version of walking the dog time for thinking 😊.
Once again my friend your article just hit home. It’s not about giving up it’s about holding on. Taking a step forward every single day. I’ve been knocked down more times than I can count.. but I get salty when I get knocked down and I come up fighting every single time. That’s what happens when you’re the youngest of 6 kids and the older ones beat up on you.. I learned to fight and fight dirty if I had to. But I survived. Learned to watch their signals.. cause there were always signals. Thanks Jack 🤙🏽
Truer words have never been written. I remember when I was in high school and a speaker came in to talk to our debate class and his message was simple. The battles are won by those with the most persistence and determination. Tomorrow I have an opportunity to meet 12 of the most influential independent Journalists in the Asheville NC area. I will speak to each until someone listens enough to let me explain my thoughts on fixing our political party system. I will continue to do this until one of them agrees to help me get the ball rolling toward a political fix. I will summarize my results on my sub stack, "A View From the Cheap Seats."
Jack provided a spark to keep me moving forward. Well done!
I know that I have no control over what this regime does. I do have control over what I do. I will be damned if I’ll ever give up. That’s exactly what they want. I will not give them what they want. F that.
I tell people “I feel like I’m a soldier on the battlefield for our democracy and I’M NOT LEAVING TILL WE HAVE WON, AGAIN!” and they snicker because I’m a 74-year-old great grandmother. But the battlefield is different now and all that’s needed is a brain, the knowledge that humanity is born free and democracy allows the highest expression of freedom, and a phone connected to the internet. I’M NOT LEAVING
Audrey...this stopped me mid-scroll.
74 years old. Great-grandmother. On the battlefield...every single day...with a phone and a brain...and the kind of CLARITY...most people half your age can't find!
You know what that is?
That's the most dangerous kind of soldier there is.
The one who knows exactly WHAT they're fighting for…and...has lived long enough to understand exactly what HAPPENS... when it's lost.
Don't you dare leave!
#HoldFast
-Jack
NEVER mess with 74 year old grandmothers - we haven’t reached this age by accident!
Sincerely,
Another 74 year old grandmother
Outstanding, Diana! Thank you!!
-Jackl
Great timing! Thank you Jack. I’ve had some “friends” back away because I protest and stay involved. Sometimes I cry. Sometimes I am tired. I am not leaving. Just loved reading what Audrey wrote above.
Jane B...the friends who backed away…that's its own kind of loss. Don't minimize it. I know that loss well. It stings.
But...look where you are right now.
In a community of people...who DIDN'T back away. Who cry sometimes. Who get tired. Who protest anyway. Who stay involved anyway. Who show up here at midnight...reading signal... instead of noise...because they refuse to look away.
Audrey's words landed for a lot of people tonight. Including me.
You found YOUR people.
We're here.
#HoldFast
-Jack
Another 74 y/o grandmother who is not going to look away. I believe we will get thru this no matter how hard it is. We have lived thru Vietnam, civil rights movement, having our children go to wars they should not have to and we are strong women who understand what matters in this world. This is the time to stay not give up. There are more people who do not want what is happening and are not going to die up. Also many of us have spouses closer to 80 y/0 pr older.
#HOLDFAST
Teri
Yep, never mess with older ladies, I am pushing 78, we are relentless and unforgiving about betrayal, which is exactly what a big part of our government is trying to pull off.
@jackhopkins you made my day. And my husband who’ll be 89 next month has all the experience from the Civil Rights movement so I get an even longer perspective
Wow! 89. He's seen some things. You BOTH have. I'm so happy to know you are together. It made my eyes a little damp...actually.
-Jack
Well, for a different reason - medical diagnosis - this was a cool post for me to read tonight. All the same things still apply. Thanks, Jack.
Karin...I'm SO glad to hear that...and hope it serves you in the most effective way possible. You're welcome!
-Jack
🤗
Thanks for this, Jack. It is helpful. And good to hear these comments too. Feels like I’m not alone… and have others with me.
I’m never leaving… even if I go down… I’m going down fighting… and someone will take my place. it’s just how this works.
CJ Blair...that's exactly how this works.
You're definitely not alone. Not even close!
Look at this comment section. Look at the people in here...the 74-year-old great-grandmother who isn't leaving. The analyst applying...Snyder's Rule One with surgical precision. The subscriber...who's been awake since midnight watching the Strait. The veteran...who sent this newsletter to his intelligence community colleagues.
Different ages. Different backgrounds. Different corners of this country.
SAME refusal.
That's not nothing.
That's actually everything.
Keep fighting.
#HoldFast
-Jack
Jack, I’m not going anywhere… not until I take my last breath. I figure there’ll almost always be something I can do. I’m 70 so right up there with the others… but still pretty healthy… and I have children whose lives will be affected by what happens. No grandchildren because both of my children decided this wasn’t a world they wanted to bring them into and that’s sad but right now, as much as I hate it, I understand it.
Oh, I’ll take a break from time to time because I’m a person who feels things deeply and sometimes that’s hard. There are images and stories I’ll never be able to unsee or forget. I think that makes me fight all the harder though until I can’t… but only for a moment. I’ll take a breath and then be right back in the fight.
Thank you for this, Jack.. and yes… you were right… it was time for an article like this. What’s happening is so hard to watch and so unnecessary. So much suffering and death because of him and his minions. It makes me angrier than I’ve ever been in my life… and Congress… not all but far too many. Doing nothing to stop it. So I’m holding fast and holding on until there’s nothing left to hold onto… and hoping it never reaches that point.
Thanks for all you do. You literally keep me sane and I appreciate that more than you might realize.
#Holdfast
~Susan
GOOD FOR YOU!
ME NEITHER!💕🗽🦋🇺🇲🇺🇦
Rule One is: Do not obey in advance.
It is the first rule because it is the most violated. Not by force. Not by threat. By exhaustion. By the private decision, made alone, that the outcome is already settled.
Jack is correct. The feeling of losing is not evidence of loss. It is a mechanism. Historians of authoritarian consolidation note the same pattern across different countries and different centuries: the regime does not need to defeat its opposition. It needs its opposition to defeat itself. The emotional collapse precedes the political one. Always.
This is what “do not obey in advance” means in practice. No officer arrives at your door. No law compels your silence. The capitulation is internal, and it is chosen. The whisper Jack names — it’s over, nothing will change, why try — is not despair. It is preemptive obedience. It is the self administering what the state has not yet demanded.
File the distinction. There is a difference between being defeated and deciding you are defeated. One is done to you. The other you do to yourself. Rule One exists because the second is far more common than the first.
The people who shaped outcomes in the periods we now study did not feel they were winning. The record is clear on this. What distinguished them was not confidence. It was refusal — the specific, daily refusal to make the state’s work easier by doing it themselves.
Jack calls it staying in the fight.
Snyder calls it Rule One.
The instruction is the same.
#HOLDFAST
Jane...Timothy Snyder's Rule One…applied with this precision…to this moment…by someone who clearly understands both the history and the mechanism…
This is EXACTLY the analytical framework EVERY subscriber needs to internalize before they open another news alert.
The emotional collapse precedes the political one. ALWAYS.
That line alone...is worth printing...and putting somewhere you'll see it EVERY morning.
Thank you for bringing this here, Jane. Genuinely.
The instruction is the same. Stay in the fight. Do not do the state's work for it.
#HoldFast
-Jack
Love it!
Is there a book written by someone in 1930s Germany who admits they did not understand or see what was going on in front of them? I am surrounded by people who just don’t see what I’m seeing, it makes me wonder if I have become an alarmist, but then, I see or read about some other antic and I decide I’m not an alarmist.
I recall Eisenhower reportedly brought in the townspeople to see the nearby concentration camp and those villagers were shocked at what they saw.
Mary E...the book you're looking for is "They Thought They Were Free" by Milton Mayer.
Published 1955. He interviewed ten ordinary Germans after the war...not monsters.
Ordinary people. Who described how it happened so gradually…each step so small…each outrage normalized by the next…that by the time they understood what they were living inside…they were already inside it.
Pair it with Snyder's "On Tyranny." Read them together.
On being an alarmist.
Here's the test Mayer's subjects failed.
They dismissed the people raising alarms...as alarmists.
The fact that you're questioning yourself…checking yourself…staying open to being wrong…is precisely what distinguishes genuine alarm...from paranoia.
Alarmists don't question themselves.
Witnesses...DO
You, Mary E...are a witness.
#HoldFast
-Jack
Mary, I like to use Goodreads to find books about specific topics. Here are some suggestions with a brief summary:
The German War: A Nation Under Arms, 1939-45 by Nicholas Stargardt: While covering the war years, it heavily utilizes letters and diaries to show how the "people’s community" (Volksgemeinschaft) narrative kept many Germans committed to the regime even as it was failing.
The "Hitler Myth": Image and Reality in the Third Reich by Ian Kershaw: This book explores how the Nazi propaganda machine created a heroic image of Hitler that differed greatly from reality, showing how it fooled many Germans into supporting him.
Hitler's True Believers: How Ordinary People Became Nazis by Robert Gellately: This work examines how ordinary people embraced Nazi ideology, discussing the ways the Führer was viewed and how the regime managed to gain such widespread support without coercion.
Oral Histories are always interesting:
They Thought They Were Free: The Germans, 1933-45 by Milton Mayer: A classic work based on post-war interviews with ten ordinary Nazi Party members in a small Hessian town. Mayer examines how and why they felt they were "free," demonstrating how they were seduced by propaganda and small moral compromises.
What We Knew: Terror, Mass Murder, and Everyday Life in Nazi Germany by Eric A. Johnson & Karl-Heinz Reuband: A comprehensive oral history featuring interviews with over 3,000 ordinary Germans about their life under the Third Reich, what they knew, and how they were fooled or chose to ignore realities.
Broken Lives: How Ordinary Germans Experienced the 20th Century by Konrad H. Jarausch: Based on dozens of memoirs by the generation of Germans born in the 1920s, this book shows how early enthusiasm and belief in Hitler turned to disillusionment, revealing how the younger generation was deceived by the regime.
If any of these pique your interest but you can’t find them, let me know and I’ll see what I can find for you. If you read any of these items, I’d be interested in your thoughts.
I'm too angry to give up. And we don't know how this ends. So I fight every day, and have learned to lead. I don't hesitate so much, the cause is just. I have clarity and purpose. Like-minded friends and neighbors. Adult children and grandchildren who need an example to remember. Life is a great drama, we get to be here and participate.
Virginia, I taught Human Development for years, plus Death & Dying. I always told my students that we role model for our children and grandchildren (if we are parents/grandparents) not only how to live but also how to navigate the end of the journey. One of most important lessons we leave our children is our example of family and community leadership.
Thank you, Jack. Every day I see one less maga flag flying, one more neighbor refocusing back in with reality.
As a retired veteran, my circle includes other Vets. None of them have ever endorsed this hatred or lack of governence.
We're here for the long haul. Focus on the good in us. Starve out the hate.
We were botn for so much better than this.💙🙏
Nancy..."starve out the hate."
I'm keeping that one!
Three words. Better than anything a speechwriter could produce. Because it names the strategy exactly right...not fight the hate, not match the hate, not fear the hate.
Starve it.
The flags coming down…the neighbors refocusing…that's not nothing. That's the tide. It moves slowly. It's easy to miss when you're watching the storm.
You're watching the right thing.
Thank you for your service. Thank you for staying. Thank you...for bringing your circle with you.
Veterans who understand what they actually fought for…are EXACTLY the voices this moment needs most. That's a fact.
We were born for better than this.
We still are.
#HoldFast
-Jack
Nancy - may I borrow the “starve out the hate” sentiment? I love it!!
This newsletter hit some memories. Like when I was in the police academy in a very “pro male” environment and remember thinking “I am not leaving. They will have to literally pick me up and throw me out to get rid of me.”. I left…25 years later with a good retirement at a good rank. I am certainly not leaving now. There is too much at stake.
Alexa - when did you go through the police academy? My late husband was in the Phoenix PD academy in 1972. Out of 25 cadets, only 2 were women. They went on to stellar careers. My husband put in 25 years, too. Thank you for your service! 😊
Diana, Thank you. I was in 1989. In North Florida. 12 women in my class. Not all graduated. I think only 3 made it to retirement. My hat is off to your husband as well for his service. 🫡
Alexa...twenty-five years.
In an environment that made clear...from day one...you weren't supposed to stay.
You stayed ANYWAY. Rose through it. Earned the rank. Took the retirement. On your terms.
That's not stubbornness.
That's the specific kind of endurance...that ONLY comes from knowing exactly who you are…and refusing to let anyone else's definition of the room override it.
You've already proven you know how to hold when holding is hard.
This is just a different room.
Same skill.
We're glad you're here!
-Jack
Jack-
This one had me fighting back tears
Because this is how I’ve felt… defeated
And ready to ask “why”
“Why are we beating our heads against the immovable wall of MAGAism that has turned our lives upside down for 10 years now…”
I needed your words tonight more than ever
I will stay
I will not leave
I will not let this insanity defeat me—
Some of my ancestors fought alongside General Washington
Some enlisted in the Union army in December and died 6 months later in a Confederate prison in Georgia
The very least I can do is to
#HoldFast as you say
Namaste
Debby,
I understand your feelings - it too often seems like we are living in a version of political hell. When I was going through the personal “hell” of cancer, my daughter gave me a sign by a favorite politician of mine-Winston Churchill. He is credited with saying, “If you are going through Hell, keep going!” 🤗. You got this!!! 👊
Debby Burnett...the tears are earned. Every one of them.
Ten years is a long time to hold. The weight of that…the exhaustion of it…is real. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise.
But...then read what you just wrote.
Ancestors who stood alongside Washington. Men...who enlisted in December knowing what was coming…and went anyway…and gave everything in a Confederate prison in Georgia six months later.
That blood is in YOU.
They didn't know they were going to win either.
They just REFUSED to stop.
You come from people who held when holding was the hardest thing imaginable. And here you are…still holding…still showing up…still fighting…when you could have quietly walked away.
They would recognize you.
Stay, friend. We need you here.
#HoldFast
-Jack
🙏🏼🫶
Thank you, Jack.
I really, really needed to hear this today. No pressing reason….. just that life seems to be piling up and weighing me down lately. Sleep has alsobeen difficult and lack of high quality sleep literally makes me stupid. Cannot put two thoughts together or make any real sense…. lol.
Your article reminds me of a saying…. It’s always darkest just before the dawn and, maybe even more importantly…. Don’t quit five minutes before the miracle.
I think right now what’s bugging me most is that I can’t much see what’s past this current mess… what awaits us on the other side….? I really don’t know. It’s foggy and we may not recognize ourselves as a country. That’s (as we used to say in the 60’s and 70’s) heavy, man. I guess this passage we’re in now is a little like being born…. Can’t turn around, waaaay too late for that! I guess we all simply need to hold our loved ones close, rest when necessary, take good care of each other and take each step as it arrives.
Thanks for listening and providing excellent information as well as a forum with likeminded others committed to clarity. I appreciate that and you.
Deb, another oldie but goodie from the ‘60s/‘70s is “that’s bitchin’ ” but back then it meant “cool or groovy!” 🤣. Maybe we can tweak it a bit to say, “it’s a bitch!” because it certainly feels like it at this point in time.
What has really kept me from that “heavy” feeling is making an action plan and working it. When I first subscribed to Jack’s Substack I felt that “fog” coming on but after reading a couple of Jack’s articles on developing an action plan on how to prepare for the hard times ahead, I felt energized by what I COULD do instead of risking paralysis by what I couldn’t do. Hold your family tight and take good care of each other.
I’ve been following this for far too long, and far too closely. But in a way, being pushed to and maybe over the edge a little makes it a lot easier to not give two fucks and just tell people as politely as I can that they’re enabling this, either through inaction or being overwhelmed by it all and doing nothing, probably both. And succinctly, as much as a nine pound hammer, informing them what “this” is. As I mentioned in an earlier comment, the reactions are telling: “Whistling past the graveyard” has never been more appropriate. And Jack, you’re one of the sources that has not pegged the needle to one end or the other, just the straight facts, political reality, not polemics.
Randy,
I’ve had to hear hard things in life, as I’m sure you have as well. What I respect about Jack is that he gives it to us straight and doesn’t sugar-coat it.
I’ve often been told I’m blunt. I can understand why some say that. I will often say, “Am I unkind or disrespectful when I talk to you in a straightforward, adult manner?” After a second or two of stunned silence, the response is usually “I’m not used to hearing the truth!” I’ll take the straight facts any day!!
Amen! Just give me the facts, straight up. Honesty is much, much appreciated.
Plus the bonus, Deb, is you don’t have to remember “who” you told “what” to! 🤣🤣🤣
Something someone said years ago about ‘oh, what a tangled web we weave……’. And given the vagaries of aging, honesty really does work a whole lot better! 🤣🤣🤣
True - I was raised by a narcissist mother who lied just “because.” I’m sure it provided her a sense of power and control. In actuality, it drove her kids, my dad, friends and neighbors away. At 94, she is very lonely because of her past behaviors…..but it’s everyone else’s fault.
My late husband was in law enforcement. I can still hear him saying to our kids, “Just facts. Not what you want them to be or how you think you’ll get farther with your version, just the facts!”
Two out three of our children are “just the facts” chip off the ‘ol block. Unfortunately, DNA found my third child and she is like her narcissistic grandmother. And pushes people away with her web of lies. 😢
Jack, you invariably seem to sense the right time and the right words that encourage just one more step, one more phone call, just one more . . .
Thank you!!!
Guess I'm in the right place. I'll be 75 in a few weeks. I was suspended from college for my first protest at age 19. I stood in front of my "girls" dorm by myself yelling for others to come out after dorm hours to protest the fact that the "guys" didn't have dorm hours. No one joined me though many agreed with me. I've fought and marched and protested too many times to count since then, but still in the fight. The hardest part is watching progress we made being lost. With all of us still leaning into progress, we must win it back to keep going onward to a more perfect union and future.
Polly-I agree! I never thought I’d be re-protesting (not sure this is really a word! 🤣)….but that’s how it feels. So now I do it for the granddaughters I never knew then I would have who now are protesting to keep what we had to fight to get!!! 😡🤬
Jack, did you sneak into one of my Marriage and Family classes or a Parenting class? As I was reading your words of wisdom, it sounded so familiar! For me, if you care about relationships (and I embrace this social contract, called democracy as a “relationship!), then you FIGHT! You don’t have to beat your chest or shout from the rooftops, no, you SHOW UP, in every way you can. Not once, not when you feel like it, but when it’s hard. When you don’t think you can take one more step, draw one more breath.
You don’t give up on your relationships-your significant other, your kids, your responsibilities, your social contracts with our Constitution.
What angers me - it doesn’t “blind” me but it propels me is when people say “No matter what I do, it doesn’t make a difference.” Get over your need for immediate gratification! Your partner, your kids, your relationships, your country needs your commitment. Commitments don’t give you immediate gratification. Relationship commitments are long term “gigs!”
We owe to one another our mutual commitment to human rights, social justice, and a duty to hold our government accountable to uphold the tenets guaranteed in our Constitution and Bill of Rights.
My AZ State baseball team starts soon - my version of walking the dog time for thinking 😊.
Once again my friend your article just hit home. It’s not about giving up it’s about holding on. Taking a step forward every single day. I’ve been knocked down more times than I can count.. but I get salty when I get knocked down and I come up fighting every single time. That’s what happens when you’re the youngest of 6 kids and the older ones beat up on you.. I learned to fight and fight dirty if I had to. But I survived. Learned to watch their signals.. cause there were always signals. Thanks Jack 🤙🏽
Truer words have never been written. I remember when I was in high school and a speaker came in to talk to our debate class and his message was simple. The battles are won by those with the most persistence and determination. Tomorrow I have an opportunity to meet 12 of the most influential independent Journalists in the Asheville NC area. I will speak to each until someone listens enough to let me explain my thoughts on fixing our political party system. I will continue to do this until one of them agrees to help me get the ball rolling toward a political fix. I will summarize my results on my sub stack, "A View From the Cheap Seats."
Jack provided a spark to keep me moving forward. Well done!
I know that I have no control over what this regime does. I do have control over what I do. I will be damned if I’ll ever give up. That’s exactly what they want. I will not give them what they want. F that.
Thank you Jack! As always you provide the clarity of vision when it is needed most. You named it before: #HoldFast!