It's time to get serious about saving our country

It's been a rough week. I think we can all agree on that. 

A disastrous showing by the person we are relying on to save us from the brink of totalitarianism. The most corrupt Supreme Court in our nation's history deciding to pour gasoline onto a raging dumpster fire. Some of the most beloved figures from my childhood dropping like flies – as if they all decided it was time to get the hell out of Dodge before the real shit goes down.

To me, this feels like the early days of the lockdown, when all there was to do was play Yahtzee and drink heavily. 

But this is different. There wasn't much you could do back then besides hunker down.  But you can do something now. You can start by sharing information with people who are either blithely unaware of the category 5 shitstorm on the horizon, or think it will have no material impact on their daily lives. 

You are unlikely to convert people who've "done their own research," and refuse to believe anything that hasn't already been injected into their brains by their (dubious at best) information sources of choice. But you might reach one or two who can be pried away from whatever reality TV show/true-crime podcast/celebrity Insta account is currently tickling their limbic systems.

I know, I know. This column is already enough of a downer for many of my readers – posts about the robot apocalypse coming to a town near you will do that. And I usually try to steer clear of politics. But these are desperate times. 

So, like a lot of other people right now, I'm going to talk about Project 2025.

Gonna party like it's 1899

I will start by assuming that most of my readers have heard about this 900-page blueprint for rolling back all of the social gains made over the past century and enabling the dictatorship that 48% of likely voters (and six Supreme Court justices) apparently long for. 

Published by conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation, the document is a joint effort by more than 100 of the most wingnutty groups of deplorables to ever crawl out from under a basket. If you haven't read it, or don't really know what's in it, please read on.

Since John Oliver is so much better than I am at delivering bad news in a way that is still highly entertaining, I am sharing his entire episode from June 20, where he talks about this at length (with occasional tangents into "MILF Manor").

If you don't have the time or inclination to watch that 29-minute clip (though it's quite funny), allow me to summarize the low lights:

• Project 2025 would eliminate tens of thousands of civil servants in the federal government and replace them with Trump loyalists. The folks who currently process your Medicare payments (HHS), deliver accurate weather forecasts (NOAA), approve or disapprove new drugs (FDA), monitor your air and water quality (EPA), protect your efforts to form unions (NLRB), or any of the other millions of small actions federal employees perform each day on our behalf will be replaced by people hired on the basis of how many MAGA tattoos they have on their ass.  (Groups supporting this project are already compiling lists of 'enemies' in fed agencies who might oppose Trump's policies. They're ready to hit the ground running.)

• That in turn will help Trump turn the DOJ and FBI into his own private law enforcement agency. Exactly what you should fear most from a guy who loves to talk about revenge and retribution.

• It will attempt to outlaw abortion at a national level, taking an 1873 law designed to prohibit the distribution of 'indecent' literature (The Comstock Law) and applying it to abortion medication, while also withholding billions in Medicaid reimbursements to state insurance plans that pay for the procedure. 

• It would prevent states from implementing stronger environmental protection laws, while at the same time gutting the EPA. Because who couldn't use a little more lead in their drinking water? 

• It would eliminate the Department of Education and the Federal Reserve. Who needs people who know how to read, write, or count money? We've got computers for that.

• It would create camps able to imprison 100,000 undocumented immigrants per day and hold them indefinitely, while using the military and national guard to undertake deportations on a massive scale. 

• And, oh yeah, more tax cuts for the rich, while implementing a 'consumption tax' that impacts low-wage earners disproportionately. 

There's more. [1] But isn't that more than enough?

Nice little democracy you had there...

This is the conservative wet dream that's been in the works since Ronald Reagan was last seen drooling in his chair behind the Resolute Desk while watching reruns of "Bedtime for Bonzo." [2]

They're this close to getting everything they've always wanted. And they're not being quiet about it. That's how you can tell they think they're going to win.

Even if a certain presidential candidate dies while choking on a cheeseburger, suffers a massive coronary while 'dancing' to "YMCA," gets sucked out of his private Boeing 757 when one of the doors flies off at 30,000 feet, or any of the other terminal outcomes that provide me a fleeting moment of solace in these dark times, these policy goals will remain, ready for the next tin-man tyrant to put them into action. 

In other words, Project 2025 doesn't die when the orange stain does. 

That's what you're voting about (and, hopefully, against). It's what you want your friends, colleagues, business associates, social media posse, and family members – the ones you're still speaking to, anyway – to also vote against. Forget about the old dude who stutters. This is what matters. This is what the conversation over the next four months needs to be about.

So here's what you can do. Find someone in your life who doesn't know or care about Project 2025 and share this blog post with them. Or at least the John Oliver clip. If we all can bring one person into the light, we'll be doing something positive while alleviating some of our despair. 

At the very least, it beats playing dice and day drinking.

How are you dealing with your existential dread for the future of our democracy? Share your mental health tips in the comments below or email me: [email protected].

[1] The plan also intends to outlaw all forms of pornography. Bet that will sit really well with all those horn-dog Republicans. Matt Gaetz, the FBI is on Line 1. 

[2] Speaking of somebody who was clearly too old to be in the Oval Office, and was never that sharp to begin with. You don't hear any Republicans talking about that, though, do you?