Over the last 100 days we have had an attempt by the administration to intimidate or destroy any individuals, institutions, or organizations deemed to be liberal or pro minority/women, or opposed to their attempt to establish a monarchy in the most successful Republic of the last thousand years.
In what seems like several thousand days, many of us have felt that our Republic was being destroyed. We have gone through emotions similar to some of Kubler-Ross’ five stages of grief that are: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance.
In one way or another we have all felt some or all of these emotions. But It is certain that most of us will not go through the fifth stage that is ‘acceptance.’ It took a while, but we see daily examples of disgust with, and rejection of, this administration whenever we doomscroll or read stories from independent and impartial newspapers, wire services, public radio and television.
As a practicing, practical pessimist, I have often felt this Republic is headed for a waterfall in a canoe, but I also have contrarian leanings. If nothing else, this administrative incompetence has led me to think about important components of our lives in different ways. So I’m asking if there is any good that has, or could come out of this mess? Here are three thoughts.
Continuity. Beto O’Rourke wrote a piece here on Substack recently about a cold, hard hike up Hillsboro Peak in New Mexico that he did with his kid called Lessons from the Gila. His message was that things usually turn out all right. But I also saw the continuity of American life in the piece, and a celebration of community.
Because of the omnipresence of bad news in our lives, we often feel everything around us is right on the edge of crashing into the rocks below. It hasn’t. In fact, most of our lives have gone on as usual, most of us untouched by the cruelty perpetrated on federal workers, migrants, and LGBTQ folks.
Does this sound like I have gone through positivism conversion therapy? Nope, but as I write this, the thought of “good Germans” comes to mind. These were the people who ignored the fact that their Jewish friends and neighbors were being rounded up and shipped to concentration camps by thugs. But while we are seeing migrants being rounded up and flown out of the country, we’re not close to the fearful obliviousness of good Germans.
In reaction to the chaos, we have been energized to strengthen our communities and actively oppose The Red Asset and The Enablers (a phrase that instantly suggested the name of a mediocre country and western cover band) in any way we can. Just as Beto suggested in his essay, most of us will survive this bad time in the history of the Republic and move on to better times.
Community. While this may come as somewhat of a surprise to some, Boulder is not representative of most of the towns of 100,000 in the Republic. I sometimes speak of my town as a bubble of beauty in the relentless urban sprawl of the Front Range that spreads from Fort Collins in the north through Denver and down to Colorado Springs in the south. In Boulder our median home price is $1.1 million and our streets are littered with high-end cars that cost more than my seven years of undergraduate studies, and are driven by the privileged and entitled.
But the collateral damage from this exercise in willful cruelty and Constitutional contempt, not to mention incompetence, has had the effect of pulling us closer together in Boulder.
City and County leaders are tightening their budgets in anticipation of the loss of some or all federal funding (we are, after all, a sanctuary city). We have protested funding cuts for the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences and the Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research here in our federal buildings, and we are giving additional support to our food banks because many of the migrant families here are hunkered down in fear of the storm troopers from ICE, and not working as much as they used to.
But more, there is a sense here that once threatened, we really do need to pay more attention to those things at the local level where we may have some influence. That’s a good thing that wouldn’t have happened were there not administrative chaos, congressional spinelessness, and Supreme Court collusion. (see: Trump v. United States, July 1, 2024.)
Budgets. I understand that some don’t have any other resources to cover their retirement expenses besides medicaid/medicare and social security. Because of that, I hesitate to write about what those of us who have additional resources are doing with our retirement nest egg because it seems like virtue signaling at best, and in bad taste at worst. But I’m going to proceed anyhow, because I believe it shows a collateral benefit from the chaos.
The unintended damage of the chaos is that literally billions of dollars in retirement accounts have been wiped out. Our IRAs are down about 10%. The first thing we have done in response is sell off enough of our stocks to give us a two-year cash cushion. The remainder of our portfolio contains solid stocks, funds, and bonds that all pay decent dividends.
The second thing is that we have cut expenses. There is no new expensive travel planned, we intended to defer major house maintenance, e.g., furnace, kitchen countertops, garage and driveway cement replacement as long as we can. Our vehicles are in good shape and we are watching week-to-week expenses. Best guess is that we are spending 20% less per month than we were in November. We can tighten our belts more if need be, easily by 10% more.
While we are not making lemonade out of lemons, we are learning from the chaos, making adjustments, moving forward by making sure our own houses are in order and resisting in every non-violent manner that we can.
All good.
END
There are a number of other good changes that will come out of this chaos. Remember that I am not an optimist. At best, I’m simply an observer who would like to hear from you.
What good changes do you think have or will come out of this chaos?
For business reasons I suppose, Substack allows only paid subscribers to comment here. So if you would like to add a positive change to the list, send me a note at alanbearstark@gmail.com. Paid subscribers use the button below please.
There are intrinsic rewards to writing essays for Substack, such a breaking through the blank page/screen syndrome and the associated excuses for not writing.
And then there is the rereading of golden words that flew across the page yesterday, only to find the next day—that what was written, is absolute dross. But there is a good sentence embedded in the dross that leads somewhere.
How about the fear of posting and having the entire internet seeing the writing as inept at best, and drivel at worst. But posting anyhow, because someone out there might enjoy the writing.
Through all these trials and the occasional rewards, two key points stand out and keep the words flowing: First, comments from readers—good, bad or ugly—because a comment says someone loved, liked, disapproved of, or hated what was written enough to take the time to respond. Second, subscriptions that simply say, “Thanks for what you have written, I would like to see more of your writing.”
I’m alanstark1@substack.com. Thank you for reading my stuff.
I find it terribly important to try and find some good or at least some areas of this chaotic hell which force us to look a little further into our own negative ways in which we contribute to some of the chaos or at least how we can not support the people who are leading the charge in the chaos. Also I feel we are leaning towards more community connections which help with the feeling off overwhelm at times. Thanks for writing.
It’s good to see a positive angle. We do have excellent representatives like Neguse, Crow, Bennett and who have been speaking out and fighting for the poorest among us and the disabled whose funds are on the chopping block for billionaires. Hickenlooper is defending public lands.
Go team!