Surprise! You are now a Trump Facebook friend! Even if you don’t want to be!
Trump is trying to bring massive harm to America, to our allies, and to you, too.
Issue #793 The Choice, Thursday, January 23, 2025
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So here’s what happened, right? A couple of days ago, pretty much immediately after the Inauguration, I saw a post on Facebook asking if anyone else discovered that they were suddenly “friends” with Trump on Facebook, even though they never wanted to be his “friend.” As I read the responses, more than a few folks essentially said, “Damn, that happened to me too!”
Later that morning, I asked my wife if she had heard about this at all. Not only had she heard about it, but it had happened to her. As well as to friends of hers.
Shit.
So then right away, we check my Facebook account, and…nope. I am still not Facebook friends with Trump. Yet. Meanwhile, my wife, along with everyone else we know of who this happened to, promptly dumped Trump. So at least we know, at least at this point, that Facebook – Zuckerberg – has not decided to make friendship with Dear Leader a mandatory membership sort of thing.
Love Trump or leave Facebook. Oh, and don’t answer the door.
On the surface, this might seem like a somewhat insignificant post-inaugural development. After all, we’re all bracing for mass deportations, the end of Social Security and Medicare, the total collapse of government, etc. So who cares if Trump is trolling for friends on Facebook with the full blessing of Zuckerberg? And without the permission or knowledge of all those instant friends?
You should. Because even if you didn’t watch the Inauguration (my hand is raised too), you should have seen the photo by now of all the tech giants seated in the front row at the event: Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook), Jeff Bezos (Amazon), Sundar Pichai (Google), Shou Zi Chew (Tik Tok), Elon Musk (X), Tim Cook (Apple).
Connecting the dots yet? No? Then I’ll spell it out; if Zuckerberg is already so willing to sign up his customers for a friendship with Trump that they never asked for and never wanted, then what else is he willing to do? Or maybe we should be wondering what else he has already done. And the same goes for all those other Tech Titans. Just what exactly are they prepared to do to our lives? Are they just playing defense, trying to protect their companies by any means necessary? Or are they standing by, awaiting orders?
Here's the thing: I see the posts from everyone leaving Facebook and Twitter (X) for other platforms elsewhere. And I get it. I haven’t yet signed up for BlueSky, but I probably will soon. But the truth we really need to face is that, at least currently, there isn’t any safe space where we are completely OK. Because even if you have left X and Facebook, how’s it going without Google?
If you’re deadset against using Amazon, have you taken the time to check out all the products you use to make sure companies owned by the Koch brothers don’t produce them? How about the gas you put in your car? Have you considered who owns the companies that produce that product? And who they voted for? If you ride your bike, do you know who makes the tires?
My point is not at all to say resistance is futile. Never. In fact, if we don’t resist then we are pretty much extinct. But we also need to understand the full size and scope of what we’re up against. Because only when we recognize the full size and shape of the beast will we be able to build a resistance that is sustainable and does what we need it to do, namely dismantle – or at least severely cripple - the entire problem, not just one corner of it.
For years, we have been feeding our own destruction because we had no reason to question it, and that’s because our destruction and our survival seemed synonymous. And now it’s gotten to the point where, truth be told, we can’t live our lives without the beast because it is now seemingly everywhere and woven into everything we do.
But remember, it wasn’t always like this. When Dwight Eisenhower was president, the wealthiest were paying close to 90% of their income in taxes – the highest tax bracket - beginning in 1944 when Franklin Roosevelt was president through 1963 during the Kennedy/Johnson administration. To the eternal dismay of the rich and powerful, President Franklin D. Roosevelt essentially created the social safety net. And President Teddy Roosevelt became known as the “trust buster”, using the nation’s first anti-trust bill, the Sherman Anti-Trust Act, which was passed on July 2, 1890, by President Benjamin Harrison, to end business monopolies.
We did it before. We can do it again. It won’t happen overnight, but we can make it happen if we stay engaged.
Let us know your thoughts.
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