Where We Stand: The Building Backlash and the Ongoing Coup

We're two months into the crisis and the battle lines are being drawn

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The rallies draw thousands. In the case of Friday’s rally in Denver, Colorado, over 34,000 people crowded into Civic Center Park to voice their anger toward our authoritarian sham of a government and cheer for a future where antidemocratic oligarchs give way to democratic will and well-being. To watch these events is to tune into another reality where Democratic politicians are willing to confront the obvious, pressing problems of the moment and rally the restless majority to unite in their common interests.

It’s the equivalent of finally breathing clean, crisp air after choking on acrid, unending smoke.

Those who have read my work know that I maintain hope without tripping into delusion. I recognize that rallies are political theater and, absent action and direction, they serve catharsis over change. I am not here to tell that these speeches will save democracy. But there are signals here and, when connecting the enthusiasm and numbers to larger trends, there is reason for optimism.

Around the country we are seeing outbursts of anger and righteous motivation. The consumer boycott of Elon Musk’s Tesla corporation, as well as moments of individual rage against his disastrous products, communicates something. As do the scenes from Republican and Democratic interactions with constituents. We are seeing citizens of all political persuasions packing the streets and meetings and collectively telling, sometimes indirectly and sometimes in no uncertain terms, “We see what you’re doing and we’re fucking tired of it.

Conversations that I’ve had offline in other work confirm this. There is a bristling energy, a booming disgust and flourishing realization, building with every single day. Groups that have been forced to play defense and, in some cases, hunker down for what they have been made to believe is inevitable defeat, are picking themselves off the ground and dusting off. Hardly a day goes by that I don’t hear from someone who is doing the work. Organizing their coworkers. Pressuring their bosses, administrators, and local leaders. Having overdue conversations about what could be and what should be. I’ve spoken with groups that have just started and are anxious to put their shoulder to the wheel. I’ve spoken with groups that have a history but are ready for something else and are watching their rosters and attendance blossom. It seems like there is a widespread recognition that collective action is our only way out.

Now, in this turbulent and essential time, I want to pause. Look around. See the state of play where it is. Separate noise from reality and take a long breath after nearly asphyxiating on fumes. We live in a purposefully crushing and confusing moment and these kinds of resets are increasingly more necessary.

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The Coup

The kind of thing we’re experiencing right now tends to be both terrifying and dismally underplayed. I know, as a reader and active observer, that you’re aware that things are bad. Every day is another deluge of brutality, authoritarian reach, capitulation, collaboration, and unrestrained corruption. It seems very, very bad.

Unfortunately, it’s worse than that.

What I feared has come true. I’ve been researching the present crisis for a decade now, trying to make sense of it all. In 2016, I hoped a warning would suffice. By 2018, I looked for leaders and journalists to fully grasp the enormity of the threat. By 2020, I understood the undercurrent of capitalism and how it pushed us deeper and deeper into the dark waters. By 2022, I realized we would need to build a countervailing force ourselves. By 2024, I saw the exhaustion of liberal democracy in its totality and I knew where the wind was taking us. Now, when I wake up in the morning, before I grab my coffee, I look with equal parts rage and disappointment.

The Trump Administration, as a front for its oligarchical puppetmasters, has recognized their opening. Our guardrails were either nonexistent or dismantled so thoroughly over time that all they had to do was muster the will and shamelessness to sprint ahead. They’ve taken advantage of the fecklessness, complicity, and cowardice of the Democratic Party. They’ve been assisted by a corporate media apparatus tuned to the whims of the oligarchical class. They’ve enjoyed the inexhaustible resources provided to the think-tanks, institutes, and associations funded and directed by the wealth class in order to create an agenda and strategy designed to finish the job of destroying liberal democracy and realize an illiberal state.

I write this as the pundit and security class freak out over Atlantic editor Jeffrey Goldberg reporting that he was mistakenly added to a Signal group chat of Trump Administration goons illegally discussing and coordinating a strike on the Houthis in Yemen. There is no end to the pearl-clutching by NatSec diehards and rules-sticklers who have, every step along the way, reacted to the ongoing coup by yelling, “They can’t do that!” while they do that.

Don’t get me wrong. I don’t want to underplay this story. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Vice-President JD Vance, and others, broke the law, and if we lived in a just state there would be a mass resignation and no end to the investigations. However, we do not live in a just state, and spending your time and energy expecting those resignations or investigations is a waste. It’s living in a past reality that was never all that real to begin with. And, deep down, it’s telling that we’re seeing this reaction.

Outrage over the Signal leaks and outrage over the ongoing war between the Trump Administration and the judiciary originates from an ongoing and destruction delusion. There’s a reason why our major media outlets are focusing on these scandals versus the damage the authoritarians are doing to us, our protections, and our very lives. Because what matters, even as this thing worsens, is that the system that serves the wealthy and the privileged, the people who may voice “concern” about Trump while normalizing the widespread brutality, is being challenged, and what matters to them, above all else, is their own fates.

Let us put it succinctly: this administration is disappearing people. Abducting them from their homes in the middle of the night, picking them up off the street. Denying them due process and shipping them to hellish for-profit nightmare prisons in El Salvador and god knows where else or what else. They have relentlessly erased the existence of gay and trans people, people of color, and continue an all-out assault on women, the poor, and immigrants. The oligarchs who own Trump have shredded as much of the remaining social safety net as possible, set the table for eliminating what scraps remain, and are working deep into the night wiring our systems with technology they alone control, thereby completing their total ownership of production and operation. It is a coup. All the while, a mad king of a “president” signs whatever is put in front of him and busies himself settling his noxious scores and petty rivalries.

It isn’t that “SignalGate,” which I’m sure they’ll call it, isn’t a big deal. It’s actually a huge deal. What it represents is the shabbiness and criminality of this regime as it continues to consolidate power and control. It shows us that there is nothing these assholes can do that will really rile up the “opposition” other than mess with national security that is programmed to serve the interests of the wealth class and their political representatives. But it is telling that this, and not the total takeover of the state, the authoritarian attacks on our safety and rights, the ceaseless indignities we suffer as our children are failed, as our neighbors are intimidated into silence, as life gets worse and worse for regular people everywhere.

And, so, what we get is an authoritarian regime carrying out a coup on behalf of the oligarchs. We see it. We feel it. We know it. And, yet, the people who should be standing and fighting for us tell us everything we need to know as their main concerns, the things they’re willing to voice opposition to, is messing with military intelligence, the stock market, and a judiciary that is, and has always been, focused on protecting their property rights and encroachment on their economic freedom.

The Backlash

For these reasons, we are hardly given a glimpse at what is growing. We see videos on social media of the Fight Oligarchy rallies. We get glimpses of people standing outside Tesla dealerships despite attacks by Right Wing zealots and threats by the administration to pack them off to El Salvador. The confrontations at town halls live in shared clips that get tons of traction but little in the way of widespread coverage. It seems rightfully that even those media outlets and personalities and politicians who voice “grave concern” with what’s going on aren’t interested in amplifying these very real expressions and signals of popular resistance.

It is an action, or perhaps inaction, driven by a need to control. There is still an overwhelming desire by those with entrenched power and bountiful privilege to somehow negotiate the Trump threat without risking actual change. We’ve recognized it for years now, but the continued unwillingness in the face of abundant and irrefutable evidence should quiet any doubt.

The good news is that this is a small and dwindling minority. Polls tell the whole story here. The Democratic Party, in the swoon of their capitulation, is historically unpopular and the people are screaming at them to fight for something for once in their goddamn lives. Senator Chuck Schumer has become a pariah. Viewership for the corporate news is nonexistent, save for those people who work in journalism and those who exist in the lanyard zone of Washington, D.C. The vast majority of America sees what is and what isn’t. They don’t need reportage and coverage. They’re existing within the actual reality of the situation.

When discussing this, I feel the need to provide some caveats. Again, rallies are spectacle. Much of what is happening with Sanders and AOC touring the country is about the inner-battle within the Democratic Party. The divide between party apparatchik, which is attempting to retain control for neoliberal moderates while keeping billionaire donors tied to the Democrats, and members grasping the enormity of the moment and the call of the people, drives so much of what we’re seeing. It is a jockeying for position. Now, we see repellent figures like Gavin Newsom normalizing the Far Right in order to run for president and revealing who they actually are. Now, we see neoliberals rallying for more Neoliberalism, even though it has led us to this precipice. Now, we see institutionalists like Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries attempting to keep their entire project from collapsing. And then, we have actual leaders who see the Democratic Party, in its current iteration, for what it is. Who are meeting the people in the moment.

From these rallies, I would like to see mobilization and organizing. More than words and promises to fight. I have heard rumblings of groups organizing behind the scenes, at the periphery, and building rolls as it rumbles forward. This is encouraging. But we, as people, as democratic citizens, must not simply revel in the catharsis of expression and spectacle. Regardless of what Sanders, AOC, and others actually speaking the truth, do with this, we must remain vigilant and dedicated to the hard work of actually organizing on our own. Sometimes it is difficult to see the future. To have faith that it can become reality. But we must buttress ourselves against these strong, angry winds and maintain a sense of faith that we can do the work and we can deliver that better future.

Watching and remaining on the sidelines isn’t an option. Our bosses and administrators have and will betray us. Political representation has failed us. Our media has failed us. Believing they will “wake up” and fight the fight is akin to what Schumer, Nancy Pelosi, and Joe Biden told us about the Republican Party. We knew that was bullshit then, and we know this is bullshit now.

Again. Keep fighting. Keep talking. Keep organizing. And, above all else, keep hoping and dreaming and risking looking like a fool for believing in something better.

Resources

• What the Hell is Going On: Here is an explainer regarding our present circumstances for anyone who has had a feeling that the traditional Democrat / Republican / Red / Blue narrative was hiding something. Here, we go through the problems in the United States and how the wealth class has effectively put itself in a position to totally takeover our government.

• The Oligarchical Order: A primer on how to give up conventional and failed political understandings in favor of seeing how capitalism directs the course of events and where it is leading and what to expect.

• Authoritarianism and the Crisis of Meaning: Here we get into how consumerism represents an addictive drug that has hollowed out our sense of purpose, leaving us to take this as a moment of self-reflection, recognize that we have effectively been made to hate and doubt ourselves, thereby keeping us from realizing we deserve better.

• A Thoroughly Confused Country: Americans have little in the way of class consciousness, which was an intentional state desired by the wealth class. This primer gets into the class makeup of the United States, including contradictions and motivations, that will be crucial in understanding as we do our work.

• Authoritarianism as Clarity: As authoritarians take power, the world becomes a lot clearer. We can see who we can trust and who we shouldn’t. This episode gets into the history of Vichy France and the lessons we can learn on how to operate as individuals within an authoritarian environment.

• Fostering Hope in Hard Times: Some thoughts on how to maintain hope as authoritarianism sweeps in.

• Understanding the Enemy: A guide through the evolution of capitalism from free markets to its current evolving form - oligarchical authoritarianism, as well as insights into how our politics has made this change happen and moments in which the evolution has been curbed.

• Get Ready: Preparing for the incoming ICE / federal immigration raids with resources for immigrants and allies.

• They're Trying to Crush You: I discuss the emotional toll of the beginning onslaught of the Trump Administration and how it is a strategy for demoralizing us before we can begin resisting.

• A Coup in Plain Sight: An explainer detailing what is happening with Musk, DOGE, and the takeover of the government.

• The Birth of a Monster: A history of how the oligarchical class came to be and what their ideology reveals about what a future under their control would entail.