#effective action

Phase 1: Apotheosis Denied. Republicans have spent the last 40 years playing a very long game in order to weaken institutions in ways that only benefit them - jerrymandering, weakening institutions at state and local levels, and seizing supreme court, in order to make something like Project 2025 a reality, but it has also led to a critical fracturing of their party. At this point, they are making one desperate gambit to seize power, and if it fails, they will have a critical fracture in their party as the authoritarian wing, now a cult of personality around trump, attempts a second violent coup and is met with the violence of the state and is curbstomped into the dirt. The resulting republican realignment will be frantic, and leave them in a much weaker position - no less fascist, but weaker. Our first step, right now, because we are so far behind, has to be to deny them the apotheosis of their 40 year long game. Phase 2: Parallel Systems. There are multiple components to this one and this is where the government is going to get a little more concerned. This can start NOW, and should start NOW, but continue in tandem with phase 3. Phase 2.1: United Labor - Join the IWW. Join a union. Look into unionizing your workplace. Regardless of how small a difference you think it makes, increasing the power of labor decreases corporate power, full stop.

Phase 2.2: Mutual Aid: Set aside a certain percentage of your income each month - doesn’t have to be a lot, but just a certain amount, that you can budget for each month for helping your community. Make helping other people part of the budget. Creating this simple system, if enough people do it, will limit the reliance on corporate and state control. Do not exceed this - you will expend your resources and wind up needing to rely on others and then overdraw. Keep it to within what you can give.  Further, budget a certain amount of TIME each week to doing something that serves your community (see below as well) and getting to know them. 

Phase 2.3: Community Networking: Engage with your community in real life, outside. Set aside a certain amount of time each week to do this. If it’s working with underprivileged kids or providing childcare, taking care of the elderly, etc. You can go to a sewing circle and start talking to the people there and bring salvaged clothing that you repair and donate and talk them into doing something similar. Work your hobbies into it! Can you sew? Knit? Scarves and ponchos are never a bad thing, and you can show people how to do it - or swap labor for something you need.. Can you do carpentry? Repair furniture for people who need it, and odds are you can give lessons to people for free and put on a workshop - or swap labor for things you need. Start building these networks in your community. Also, anyone who has a yard? Start looking towards native food-bearing plants. If you’re rural, look into ethical hunting and community cookouts. Kill feral pigs, especially. There’s a shit ton of them, they’re invasive, and they’re tasty, and a cookout of them will bring people together. 

Phase 2.4: Community Accountability/Mentoring. Do you have problems in the community with crime? Kids being assholes? Have you considered, rather than calling the cops, giving the kids something to do so they aren’t shitheels? Hooking them up with mentors who can give them skills or help them explore their passions? Providing programs with volunteering? Get involved at your school as well, or form a parent group for it, this will help reduce how many of your kids wind up in the school to prison pipeline. 

Phase 2.5: Community Defense: Arm. Odds are you have at least a few disaffected veterans in the community who know the government screwed them and their families who are willing to train you to defend yourselves and who will be happy to be asked to do so - and easy enough to radicalize if they spend time with other people the state is fucking over. It doesn’t have to be everyone in the community, but realistically, you should have at least a few able-bodied people with guns from every community who are practicing with firearms and tactics to protect their community from the fascists as things escalate. This will allow considerably better protection in the event of a shooting or similar.  Phase 2.6: Community Assets: Every community should develop a battery of people who can provide at least some degree of help in a variety of situations. Become trained in first aid, CPR, etc. You won't be as good as a doctor, but you can still help. Have a community garden or three. Develop a neighborhood mechanic. Develop a neighborhood seamstress or carpenter if you know one. Trade services. Watch each other's kids.

Phase 3: Electoral Counterstroke This phase exists in two parts: Phase 3.1: Divide and Conquer: Further hasten the crumbling of the republican party. While it realigns, it will do so into a number of factions, the one most likely to win is the authoritarian, christian, culture war, racist wing. You have the ability, if you approach gun nuts and "small government" conservatives (which still exist in many areas of the country) to discuss with them their options. They will NEVER vote democrat or green or left - and they will never be leftists. BUT. They will be easy to convince to splinter from fascism and join a right-wing Libertarian party. They won't be on our side, but their defection from the fascists serves us still in that it splits a right wing further and makes a divided left much less of a gamble.

Phase 3.2: Left Surge Okay, so flat out? This year, Jasmine Sherman is not a viable candidate. They should be, by all rights, but they are not. This is partially due to ballot access tampering, but also partially because far-left candidates have a bad habit of starting their homework five minutes before class starts and then wondering why they don't get a good grade. We have four years to figure out how to get them ballot access in all 50 states, and we need to accomplish that goal, and ensure that they actually are on the ballot in all 50 states in 2028. A vote for them in 2024 is wasted, a vote for them in 2028 should not be unless we've all fucked up to a ridiculous degree. (Yes, I know they have it in 48 states. One of the two where they DON'T because both the democrats and the green party bent over backwards to stop them is CALIFORNIA. You know, the state that no left-wing candidate can win without because of our whopping 55 electoral votes. I mean it when I say they need it in all 50. We can get them there by 2028 if we aren't stupid.)

Further, your local elections should be contested. That public defender who tries to keep juvenile offenders out of jail? Push him to run as a judge and rally as much support as possible. Push left wing retired teachers to run for school board and help them run their campaigns. Push librarians who have lost their libraries to right wing culture war nonsense to run for school board. Politics is local and controlling local power controls most of the governing.

In the senate races, the party machines in almost every state have a lock, so what you're going to do is vote the farthest left democrat you can, consistently, and force the dems to move towards us. This will damage the republican obstruction capacity and begin hijacking the democratic party and make us a block the dems MUST appease.

In the House, you vote radicals, and try to encourage other radicals to run. Where possible, vote green or left-wing third party, where not, repeat the strategy in the Senate.

For state legislature, there's more play for independents - check your state races, these vary a lot more, and to be honest I am much, much more aware of my own state's political machinery than I am aware of anyone else's to the point that any advice I gave on this point would really only be relevant to CA.