Getting Reacquainted with the News

This spirals into a political rant toward the end — fair warning.

Photo by Roman Kraft on Unsplash

I have mostly avoided the news for…a while. I’m not going to tell you how long because it’s embarrassing, but I figured I was getting all the big stuff from my spouse, Jason, and my oldest child — both who follow current events so closely, I suspect they have direct lines to both the White House and the supreme deity of mainstream sports, pro- and college-level.

But recently, I made a well-thought-out decision to follow public events more closely. I reactivated my New York Times subscription because frankly, free news sucks. Every time I want details on some breaking piece of news, all I can find are “articles” that are really just lists of Twitter posts from a bunch of random people and Joe Rogan.

Seriously, I was trying to find out about the weirdly square thing the Mars Orbital Camera spotted on Mars, and I had to dig very deep to get past Joe Rogan’s super-insightful reflection on the photograph in question: “This is fucking wild.” He was quoted again and again, as if this isn’t what every single person on the planet turned and said to each other upon seeing that photo. This is not news. Whatever your opinion of Joe Rogan is, he is not a Mars expert, and his Dude-Where’s-My-Car-level observation is not worth repeating. Point being, that I decided it worth paying for actual news instead of celebrity sound bites.

Side note: I apologize that the above link is to a very short article that does in deed include the nefarious quote, but I try not to link to articles behind paywalls here.

Why follow the news now?

In short, because Trump won the election, and it looks like there will be no fucking around this time — no floundering, half-baked attempts to dismantle government institutions. This time, he and his people have their ducks in a row and ready to launch. (Launch ducks?? Whatever — you get my meaning.)

My reacquaintance with real-time news is keeping me in the know as Trump’s people get confirmed and begin firing, consolidating, and pressuring institutions to pretend transgender people don’t exist. It also led me to an article about liberal people’s curiously quiet reaction to this Trump victory compared to the noise we made after the last one. (I’d link to the article, but now I can’t find it.)

When I read it, I thought — yeah, that’s about right. Last time, I was incredulous. I took my kids to Black Lives Matter protests with homemade signs. I wrote several pieces about white privilege, hoping to shine a light on it for middle class white people who relate to my experiences there and see their own in a new light. I sent money to people I wanted to see elected to office and shared mid-term election info on social media. But this time…

I feel like my outrage is all spent and that it wasn’t worth much the first time around, anyway. I feel myself reading the news — so many people losing their jobs, getting deported, losing access to healthcare — and watching it with curiosity and dread.

Curiosity

I used to think that if I were better read, I would understand the mysterious machinations of the US economy — why inflation happens and what else it leads to and why the stock market goes up and down on an hourly basis. And the more I read, the more I understood that even economists don’t know how it works — their predictions are less reliable than the weather forecast in Central Texas.

Strangely, even though the economy is influenced mostly by human actions, its fluctuations can’t be pinned down. So with the new tariffs on goods brought from Mexico, Canada, and China, I just watch.* Will the price of groceries go through the roof? Will all that Mexican produce we love so much in Austin become scarce? Will this actually force those countries to do any of the things Trump says it will? Will there be a sudden rush to start making all that crap we buy from China in the US now? I DON’T KNOW. and NEITHER DOES ANYONE ELSE.

A leaner government — that’s part of what Trump/Elon Musk are after, which if it were just that, I could get behind. Probably every person in the US has more than one flabbergasting story about navigating the labyrinthine bureaucracy of government offices. But efficiency, in this case, is just a not-even-thinly-veiled plan to cut out not just fluff but dissent — anyone who dares push back or question the rapid-fire directives of the Trump administration. Government red tape is maddeningly inefficient. Oligarchy is fucking scary.

But to a lesser degree, I mostly watch this one with curiosity as well. I can imagine a scenario where this house cleaning sets a precedence for future, more humanitarian administrations to maintain a leaner more nimble organization that can actually get shit done. A little dread creeps in there, though, obviously. A lot hangs in the balance.

Dread

Some of the droplets that come spewing out of this fire hose of presidential executive orders fill the pit of my stomach with a dread that sits in my belly like still smoldering, leaden magma.

The erasing of people.

Immigrants stripped of temporary protected status instantly and shipped off where we can forget they exist. Language in thousands of online documents that refers to transgender issues, gender dysphoria, etc, simply eliminated, so no one has to feel uncomfortable about the idea that gender may not be the end-all be-all polarizing trad-wife bullshit thing they think it is. These terms are used in a document that strips citizens’ right to be identified by gender — a move that should alarm you, even if you aren’t and don’t personally know people who are trans because if they are willing to do this, your right are next:

“restoring biological truth to the federal government”

“defending women from gender ideology extremism”

These phrases make me want to throw up in my mouth, then hold it while I navigate the security line at ABIA and make my way to the White House lawn where I spew it all over the first staffer I see.

But I won’t. That would be juvenile, unproductive, and a waste of my precious time on this earth.

So sit and I watch, and I feel dread, and then I try to go do something else that makes me feel good for a while and sometimes… sometimes that helps. I don’t want to look away, but as I advised a friend recently, we don’t owe it to anyone to make ourselves anxious over all the terrible news. That doesn’t help anyone, and those of us who don’t have jobs or hold political office where we can be of any direct help…what can we do?

We voted. We talk to our kids about this stuff. I write about it. Though none of it seems to matter much. Stewing on the injustices until we are sick to our tired stomachs isn’t going to help, either. And neither is sticking our heads in the sand. I’m staying abreast of issues so at least I won’t be surprised if our country falls in the economic and humanitarian toilet. And because perhaps, as I do, I will see some way I can be of real help.

The news has helped me get clarity on some things.

I think I now understand the fundamental difference between me and Donald Trump and those close to him. Between me and Elon Musk, aside from a vast gap in wealth and power.

Trump, et. al. is interested in power — for themselves and for the United States (in so much as the US’s power confers on them more individual power globally.) With that as a directive, everything they do makes sense. It consolidates power. And if that is your ultimate goal, it’s easy to send thousands of migrants back to their unstable countries to live in fear and poverty. It’s easy to impose taxes that the bottom half folks of the US economic stratum will likely end up paying. It’s easy to undermine rights and services for people in your own country who are gender queer, gay, women. They do not give a shit about people. Really. (Maybe this is not news to you, but it has taken me a long time to truly understand this.)

Elon Musk’s prime directive is to colonize Mars. He also thinks we all need to have more children to avoid population decline which theoretically leads to the fall of modern civilization. (It might, but I’m not sure that’s all together a bad thing. I’ll spare you my ideas on population decline for now.) I know this sounds like Musk cares about the population, but I’m willing to bet that, whatever lies he tells himself, it boils down to self-absorption.

People who are single-mindedly focused on one thing — power, Mars, whatever — make headway toward their goals fast. If I could find that kind of laser focus — god, I would BE a god. I can’t seem to finish a novel or publish this newsletter regularly because my attentions are so divided. Because my kids are important and keeping my job is important and exercising is important… If I could just say “fuck it” to everything except ONE THING, I’d achieve it. If I could embrace “the end justifies the means,” I’d be knocking out goals like punching babies (I don’t know).

When Curly says to Mitch, the secret of life is “one thing,” I don’t think he meant oligarchy. (City Slickers, 1991)

Point is, I’m always trying to find balance, and these fuckers don’t do that. They stomp all over anyone in the way of their power dream or Mars dream and DO NOT FEEL BAD ABOUT IT. I do not think they question themselves ever — ever have a quiet moment where they wonder if they’ve got it all wrong, if perhaps their priorities have been backward.

It’s not going to change. Elon is going to keep cutting and slashing until the US government is just the way he wants it for his own personal vision and Donald is going to keep doing whatever consolidates his power. And I’m going to keep going to work, and taking care of my kids, and bemoaning the state of the union with my friends, and not doing a whole lot that significantly affects how the country is run — just like most people.

But if you find a balance — one that sits somewhere between complete ignorance and doom-scrolling obsession — you can keep tabs on what’s going on without being overwhelmed by anxiety and depression. I still believe, cornily, that knowledge is power, even if you can’t see how to use that power just yet.

*I started writing this Monday morning and by Monday night, it was already outdated — that’s how fast shit is happening right now. Canada and Mexico got a 30-day reprieve from the tariffs. Go get the popcorn.