If Biden remains in the race, the likelihood that Trump will win is high. It’s not that Americans think Biden is a bad person; it’s that they can’t stand to see a frail looking, slow talking, inarticulate old man leading them and representing them on the world stage. They prefer the signs of vitality, even if the other person is a deeply flawed, bombastic, lying, felon. Too many Americans mistakenly think this is a competition between two old white men, when in fact it is a fight for how this country will treat its citizens moving forward.
I’ve spent many nights lying awake thinking about what it will mean to have our basic rights stripped away. I’ve visited China and Cuba where people are unwilling to answer simple questions for fear of being prosecuted by their government. They fear making any waves and encourage the silence of their family and friends. They steer clear of controversy and perform fake loyalty as a survival mechanism. Even my international students from China were careful of their words and actions because other Chinese students might report them to Chinese authorities. A wrong word or participation in a protest can land them in prison or dead. People in authoritarian countries go along quietly in order to survive until life becomes unbearable. Only then are there protests where protestors willingly sacrifice their lives to make a point. Even then, things don’t necessarily change.
This will be our future under Project 2025 when our government will silence protests using the police and military and the president can order the imprisonment or murder of his political enemies with immunity according to the recent ruling of the Supreme Court. A country where the president has full authority to weaponize the justice department to prosecute those who oppose him. Sounds like Russia or Iran or China because it is exactly like those countries.
Project 2025 calls for only loyalists to retain or assume roles in the administration of our civil service jobs. We’ve seen in authoritarian governments how incompetence, bribery and all manner of corruption are built into such a system. When loyalty is valued over expertise and experience, the entire country suffers, and true talent either leaves the country seeking freedom or is wasted. Historically, our country benefited from the mass exodus of talent from authoritarian governments. Perhaps the world will benefit from an exodus of doctors, teachers, scientists, journalists, scholars, and artists from the former U.S.
Project 2025 calls for the removal of the separation of church and state and the installation of a white nationalist “Christian” state where Muslims are banned, undocumented immigrants are rounded up, pornography is illegal, no fault divorce leaves people trapped in abusive marriages, the wealthy pay less in taxes, environmental science is silenced, monitoring and regulations for public health disappear, history and science are rewritten, gays and transgender lose their rights, overtime pay is discarded, and women no longer have control over their reproductive decisions. The wealthy are given the keys to become even wealthier, welding more power and influence than ever while the poor, women, and minorities will be their footstool, devoid of basic rights and threatened into submission. The gays and transgender will be made invisible like in Russia where Putin claims with confidence that there are no gay people. In Uganda, they simply kill them. Imagine returning to the days when most people have to depend on the charity and good will of the very wealthy for survival? Or the days when women had to depend on men for everything? This is Project 2025.
I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about how to respond if this election is lost to those who favor a new authoritarian government under Trump that is styled according to Project 2025. And I’ve only come up with a few first steps. First, we’ve secured updated passports in case fleeing the country is the best option and we’ve talked about which countries might welcome us. Second, we’ve made sure we have access to liquid funds in case banks are undermined. Third, we’ve stockpiled masks since this will be a government devoid of public health scientists and regulations and a willingness to lie should Covid mutate into a more deadly form, or some new pandemics visit us. Forth, we have both a water and air filtration system. Fifth, we will limit our purchases of goods and services to necessities, and curtail entertainment outside the house, keeping to ourselves. Sixth, we will end all use of social media and turn off all tracking and update privacy settings on our phone. Seventh, we will get a VPN for our computer search engine and watch news reports from outside the country. Eighth, we will get a backup generator for emergency power. And finally, we will increase our efforts to grow our own produce to be completely self-sufficient.
No matter who wins, I suspect there will be violence in the streets and a wise person will not be in those streets unless they are willing to physically fight. We are too old for that. So, we will remain home, supporting the freedom fighters as best we can. I also expect that we are going to experience the exponential rise in homegrown terrorism and cyberattacks from opposing sides, seeking to undermine the next administration and to wreak havoc on the nation. In fact, this past week, the gay furries successfully hacked The Heritage Foundation computer network. Opposition groups are already making their presence and their agenda known to the public. There will be more of that on both sides.
It is difficult to fantom that this is where we are. But here we are, literally sleep-walking into authoritarianism unless something changes very quickly. The biggest change needs to be awareness of Project 2025 among voting citizens. For starters, I don’t think enough people realize just how bad things will be for everyone if our government starts rounding up 15 million undocumented people who are working throughout this country. Not only will it cause personal heartaches and chaos, but with unemployment already low, who do they think will assume the many important jobs undocumented people are currently doing? Be prepared to pay higher prices for just about everything and to see a huge amount of goods and services disappear. And as they fire experienced civil servants and experts, be prepared for a slow and incompetent civil service across all sectors of society.
Many people behind Project 2025 and a few of those who support it have a vision of humanity wherein they believe it is God’s natural order to favor white heterosexual males above everyone else. Others believe it is just Christian males, apart from skin color, who should be on top. Most others who support Project 2025 view it as a means to either remain on top or to stifle competition for power and economic success. These people have convinced themselves that the rest of humanity should exist to revere and to serve them. And they plan to assert their authority as they once did, with violence. It is our collective decision to either stop them, run from them, or submit to them. It will take an even greater amount of resolve and force to stop them, but the alternative looks too horrific to accept.