Dear friends,
Well, we’re impeaching again, which makes it feel a bit like we’re caught in a temporal causality loop. This week is apparently my opportunity to use my Star-Trek-inflected understanding of time and space to describe my desire to travel at warp speed to the other side of this mess.
The folks at Choose Democracy wrote last night and they readily acknowledged that they are “adjusting to our new political reality” and working on strategy. I have read through their recommendations and here are some specific steps for us:
One of the most immediate steps, which might help to avert violent conflict, is to participate in Shut Down DC: Defend Democracy. The concept is to support Mayor Muriel Bowser’s plan to lock down the city by
calling on every hotel in DC to close from January 15 to 21 and to pay workers to stay home during this dangerous and potentially violent week.
Use the script and phone numbers provided here to help Shut Down DC: Defend Democracy.
By the time I’d finished reading Choose Democracy’s email, Pence’s letter to Pelosi was published; it announced that now, it is finally, suddenly time to “avoid actions that would further divide and inflame” the nation. The frustration involved in pursuing an impeachment trial is that it will not effect Trump’s removal and it will cut into the beginning of the new Administration, which has an Augean stable of mess to clean. The Choose Democracy folks are “intrigued by” the idea of bypassing impeachment, and using the 14th Amendment, section 3
to declare that Trump engaged in an act of “insurrection or rebellion” by encouraging the attack on the Capitol. Under the 14th Amendment, Trump could run for the White House again only if he were able to persuade a future Congress to, “by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.”
While I think there would be value in convicting Trump in the Senate, I might be satisfied with a congressional declaration that the president engaged in an act of insurrection. Then, the courts could have him (oh yes, and his creditors), and we could hustle away from this steaming train wreck to get to our shit-piled stables.
Choose Democracy also supports measures to expel members of Congress who gave aid and comfort, as a means of “cleaning house so the work of Congress can move forward unaided by folks who endorse domestic terrorism.”
Please contact your Congressional Representative and ask them to support Congresswoman Bush’s resolution to expel members who supported the insurrection.
The final items on Choose Democracy’s agenda are to identify participants in the insurrection and to remove police who were involved, while they presumably await prosecution.
One of the resources that Choose Democracy linked to in their letter was some very sound advice for “strengthening our spirits to resist and thrive in these times.” If you have been feeling unsteady, as I have, I commend it to you.
Find Steady Ground with these 7 common-sense recommendations.
Last night, I had the pleasure of watching David Haskell’s extraordinary talk about his new book, The Songs of Trees: Stories from Nature’s Great Connectors. He said many profound things (as well as being funny, political, and delighted by all that he had to teach us). Here is one:
Our task, while we’re here, is to belong to and love this place.
Haskell spoke at length about a street tree, a Callery Pear, that he befriended on a trip to New York, when he had a speaking engagement at AMNH. He recommended to each of us a relationship with a particular tree. I am pairing his advice with the lovely idea to change a tradition we have outgrown: Call on Tishman Speyer to stop the annual cutting down of a giant tree (and displacement of its residents) and instead to plant a tree in Rockefeller Center.
Please sign the petition to ask Tishman Speyer to meet the moment and plant a tree. Watch David Haskell’s talk and stay for the Q & A.
with love,
L