Activism

The view from our hotel room in Warsaw, Poland overlooks some of the remaining pieces of the brick walls from the Warsaw ghetto. As I grow closer to the end than to the beginning of my life, I have become more curious about where I have come from than where I am going. I don’t know if it is a universal phenomenon, but the feeling has been compelling for me.

As a second-generation American Jew I know that I should be more aware of where my family came from. Sadly, when I had the chance to talk to living relatives and hear their history, I never asked questions. It turns out that my cousins were equally as ignorant, and now the generation that lived our history have all passed on.

Too many event these days seem improbable and ridiculous. That is because of the influence of one person. It is no secret that our system of government has been trampled on and reconfigured in ways that would have seemed impossible a few years ago. One of the biggest threats to democracy that we now face is the assault on our system of voting.

In the words of the Brennan Center for Justice, “Since day one of his second term, the Trump administration has attempted to rewrite election rules to burden voters and usurp control of election systems, targeted and threatened election officials and others who keep elections free and fair, supported people who undermine election administration, and retreated from the federal government’s role of protecting voters and the electoral process.”

The Vermont Workers’ Center is hosting a rally and people’s fair in Brattleboro, as part of a national day of action coordinated by the Nonviolent Medicaid Army. It will take place on Saturday, Sept. 19, 2026 from 11 A.M. – 2 P.M., on the Centre Congregational Church lawn, 193 Main St., Brattleboro.

We’ll gather to share stories, food, and healthcare resources and to affirm that we deserve a healthcare system that benefits us all and keeps our rural hospitals open. This free gathering will include speakers from Brattleboro and around the state, a community meal, Medicaid and SNAP assistance, NARCAN training from the AIDS Project, basic health screenings, a communal art project, children’s activities, and singing. There will be opportunities to take action in support of universal healthcare and our hospitals, and a celebration of the victory in preserving the birthing center at Brattleboro Memorial Hospital.

There have been a number of small wars/military actions against the U.S. on U.S. soil. The largest war was when King George’s army tried to stop the colonists from breaking away from mother England. Since then, the American public has been mostly protected from the death and destruction that war brings. Of course. 9/11 stands alone, but it is only one incident on one day.

In the modern era, Americans have been protected from having to live with a war in our own towns and cities. For Americans, war has been an action without direct consequences. That is not to make light of the thousands of military people who have died trying to protect this country from afar.

Soldiers make up a small percentage of the American population, but they always are the ones who see what war is really like. They are our proxies and they have to be shipped off to foreign countries in order to fight wars that politicians create because they can’t solve disagreements politically.

Until the Trump era, Canada and the U.S. enjoyed an excellent relationship on many levels. When Trump suggested that Canada become the 51st state he insulted the entire country and the U.S. ended up losing a lot of money in the tourist trade. Things were starting to get a little better this summer until the orange maniac went after Canada again.

His new assault started with a warning to Canadian Prime Minster Mark Carney to stop sending smoke from wildfires to the U.S. That only reinforced Canadian perceptions that Trump is a candidate for involuntary committal to a mental health facility.

Should a municipality use its taxing ability to help bale out a local non-profit hospital?

That is a question that voters in Brattleboro may face if the selectboard’s plans go forward. At a recent selectboard meeting there was a unanimous vote to look into holding a special town meeting to vote on creating a one-time tax, of an undetermined amount, to help the financially troubled Brattleboro Memorial Hospital.

The selectboard’s intentions are good. The hospital board recently announced a plan to close its birthing center in the next six to 12 months. Town government and other organizations quickly rallied to work on a strategy to save the birthing center as it is projected to cause a $4.8 million deficit next year.

Our small community hospital is facing unprecedented financial problems. Sadly, this is a common problem throughout our country. Small hospitals close and a community is left to drive hours and many miles for health care. Our community is fighting to keep our Brattleboro, Vermont hospital open while difficult decisions have to be made.

Most recently, the hospital board decided to close its birthing center because it loses too much money. Projected losses over the next year are over $4 million while facing an overall deficit of $14 million.

Coalition commits to fundraising, state advocacy, and community mobilization to prevent closure within the six-to-nine month window.

BRATTLEBORO, VT — A broad coalition of Brattleboro and Windham County civic leaders, public officials, and business community members announced today a coordinated effort to prevent the closure of the BMH Birthing Center. The group is moving forward immediately on three fronts: community fundraising, state-level advocacy, and public mobilization.

The BMH Board of Directors recently voted to move toward closure of the BMH Birthing Center within six-to-nine months, citing unsustainable financial losses that will require significant external support. The coalition views that window as an opportunity to protect an essential public service in our town and region.

The U.S. is getting ready to celebrate the 250th year of this experiment in democracy. Do we really have anything to celebrate when all of the principles that this country was founded upon have been ignored and desecrated? Do we have anything to celebrate when the people we have elected allow a leader to trample on the rights of citizens and turn this country into a dream come true for a deranged would-be dictator?

What we should be doing on July 4 is having a great national funeral. We should declare a day of mourning and have funeral processions all over this country while we carry coffins containing the Constitution.

It’s not a matter of if but when. The Republicans are poised to take some degree of a beating in the mid-term elections in November and Trump is already trying to manipulate the outcome. No surprise.

Elections are controlled by states so Trump’s options are limited, but that hasn’t stopped him from trying to use the U.S. Postal Service to rig the vote-by-mail system.

The Brennan Center for Justice has analyzed a Trump executive order that they point out is illegal. Breaking the law is something Trump does well because he never has to be accountable for his actions.

Although Trump’s ratings are in the toilet, that does not necessarily translate into support for the Democrats. That is a political problem that the Democratic party needs to work on, among others. If they do not find a way to become more vocal and more powerful and make a case that they can run the country better than Trump then we will end up with Trump III and that will be the final blow that kills our republic, its constitution and the rule of law.

The Democratic party is not doing well in terms of favorability. Most polls that I have found show unfavorability above 55%. That is alarming. The question to be answered is who will people vote for if they don’t like either party. Will they stay home in large numbers from the mid-term and next presidential election?

Every day we wake up to yet another action by a severely mentally ill president and feel helpless to do anything. The frustration has been building for a long time, and it is causing a type of anxiety never before experienced by people all over the world.

Not enough people in this country, or around the world, are willing to do what it will take to bring him down, so we all continue to suffer and watch as the entire world becomes more and more unstable. Not exactly news, but the frustration level is so high that people are forced to figure out how to preserve their sanity.

Protests make people feel like they have some control, but they do not have enough of an impact on the course of events. In other countries, when a leader becomes an out-of-control dictator, the people rise up and rebel. There are a number of places in the world where civil war has raged off and on for a long time.

The war in Iran is merely an expression of the deranged ego of the United States President. There may never be such a thing as a good or justified war, but the military action in Iran makes no sense from a military, economic or political perspective. Then there is the obscene amount of money that this country is spending to do something that very few people believe should even be happening.

The U.S. has spent $51 billion in the first 28 days of the Iran war. Where is this money coming from and how will this ridiculous spending affect other government programs? According to the Institute for Policy Studies, “Daily operations in and around Iran for these major military systems are costing taxpayers an estimated $59.39 million per day. That $59.39 million a day could instead cover the daily costs of Medicaid for more than four million Americans, or SNAP (food stamps) for more than 9.5 million Americans. Both programs were subject to significant cuts under last year’s H.R. 1, with millions of Americans at risk of going hungry and without healthcare as a result.”

There should be no doubt in most people’s minds that the President of the United States is severely mentally ill. Other world leaders have described him as unhinged, or worse, based on his erratic behavior and lack of any sense of ethics or morality.

Some politicians are talking about using section 4 of the 25th amendment to remove Trump from office. It is a flawed amendment because it requires politicians close to the president to determine that he is unfit for office. It says, “Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President.”

I can hear the cries of six million souls pleading to the living to make sure what happened to them never happens again. Yet, our world today is facing a threat too similar to the one that was faced when Hitler and his team of murderers tried to wipe out an entire race of people and dominate the world.

Maybe people who think they understand history do not know what it meant when the Jews who survived the Holocaust told the world that they must be vigilant and never let a tyrant wantonly kill people while removing any possibility of peace.

Trump is a modern day version of Hitler, Mussolini and all of the mentally deranged generals in history who have preceded them.

Most countries in the world that attack other countries expect some degree of retaliation on their own soil. But the United States has engaged on multiple fronts and has seemed to be safe from any major retaliatory attack. There was 9/11, but that was not in response to us starting a war.

Trump has been attacking countries all over the world and, when he does so, he puts U.S. military bases and their personnel into the line of fire, but our country has not been attacked. The question in my mind lately is whether or not Iran is going to be satisfied with killing a few American soldiers in response to the no-reason attack on their country.

It just may be possible that the reason for this newest incursion into international law-breaking and senseless murder has more to do with Trump’s personal issues than any international political problem. Talks were in process with Iran and there surely was no imminent threat to the U.S. or Israel. So why start a war now?

Here is my analysis that may seem a stretch, but keep in mind that we are dealing with a president who is showing more severe signs of mental illness every day. When he bombed Venezuela and kidnapped Maduro and his wife the media was focusing more and more on the details of the Epstein case. It is clear that Trump most likely committed serious crimes during his friendship with Epstein. If any situation is capable of bringing down Trump it is his behavior in the Epstein world.

The Venezuela incursion forced the media to change focus. That lasted for awhile until more of the Epstein files were released and a New York Times reporter found out that files relating to Trump had mysteriously gone missing.

In our world of celebrity worship, you can garner mainstream media attention if you are famous or a close relative of a famous person. That means that ordinary people who are not considered newsworthy by the media can wallow in obscurity even if they suffer indignities that media attention could help relieve.

Case in point is the incessant media attention that the kidnapping of Nancy Guthrie, mother of news celebrity Savannah Guthrie, is receiving. She was kidnapped on February 1 and, as of this writing, she is still missing. There are few clues to her disappearance, but the mainstream media and law enforcement have given her case an inordinate amount of attention.