How's that 'Shock and Awe' treating you?
It doesn't look so good from where I sit
I promise to you that I have waited a good, long time to try to write this post. I didn’t want to write while I was angry, lest I be accused of being a hot-headed Mediterranean savage unable to control their emotions.
Guess what? I waited almost two weeks and I am unable to calm down.
My dear United States of America, I am not okay. I don’t know when I’ll be okay and if I wait until I am, then I may not write for a very long time and that seems counterproductive at this point. Somebody has to say something. And, maybe you are on Substack, too, following all of the greatest minds of our generation, spitting breaking news at you every day. But, maybe you are not, and you are just watching cable news of your choice and still reading the newspapers of record, in which case, I’m worried about you.
I’m not going to bury the lede, my dear readers–we are just over the five-month mark of this cruel Regime and let me be the first one to say that there are authoritarian leaders across the world who are looking at this scene with the greatest envy. No one has been able to destroy so much of the basic fabric of society in so little time. No one.
It was sometime after the November election and before Inauguration Day that I had a falling out with one of my oldest friends in North America because he refused to understand or even feign some sympathy for my worries about the possibility of being “denaturalized.” We had multiple text exchanges and phone calls, in which my friend tried to tell me what exactly my status in this country is–”You are a citizen,” he kept telling me, over and over. “They are only going to come after the ‘illegals,’ you are fine,” he kept saying. In one of our last phone conversations, I pleaded and begged him, “No human being is illegal, please stop saying that.” I think he called me a ‘Libtard,’ or a ‘Cuck for liberals,’ or some such Joe Rogan BS. I knew right then and there that I could not have this person in my life, no matter how much I loved him, for so long as a brother of mine.
Fast-forward to June 11, 2025, when the inevitable directive from the Office of the Attorney General of the U.S., finally was released on the 10 categories of ‘priorities for denaturalization cases.’
Number 10 is especially riveting:
“Any other cases referred to the Civil Division that the Division determines to be sufficiently important to pursue.”
And just that they were very clear about the vagueness of these powers, this little addendum at the end seals the deal: “These categories are intended to guide the Civil Division in prioritizing which cases to pursue; however, these categories do not limit the Civil division from pursuing any particular case…”
Oh, swell.
This little memo didn’t even see the light until after SCOTUS decided to kneecap the lower court judges, or deem “due process” a headache.
And immediately after that, we went straight into the Big Ugly Death Bill saga. Oh, the MSM was so sure that we were going to have some brave GOP souls to save the nation’s soul. Ha! That was a great 48 hours of aging I didn’t know I needed.
Of course, the bill passed. And it is terrible. And it is every bit of the “death panel” stuff they accused Obama’s Affordable Care Act back in 2009, but hey, this is the United States of America, who has long-term memory going that far back?
It gets better–the “Kill Your Grandma” provisions of the bill will not go into effect until 2027, conveniently, after the midterms, if we have them (I hear Carville is worried about whether we will have elections at all, isn’t that darling of that Gumbo Boi from Louisiana? I just ADORE how relevant his opinion is these days).
But you know what will go into effect immediately? The tax breaks for the billionaires and the massive budget for ICE. The money they have appropriated for ICE is off the charts. It’s ridiculous. It will make ICE the greatest paramilitary organization, better-funded than save like 15 military forces of the world. Breathe with me, and for sure, fact-check me on Snopes or something and come back to tell me how I am wrong.
I’m a big fan of the quote, “When people show me who they are the first time, I believe them.” I think Maya Angelou said that.
My very first Substack post was titled, “Where will you be when they come for me?” and I quoted from a law professor explaining how these goons really didn’t want to stop at “immigrants,” but they would come for people such as myself, who did everything “the right way.”
And now they are. They are saying that they are. Who are the people not believing what they say, is my question.
Sometime in the last two weeks, I was streaming some bad television on a free app, and I almost fainted when I came across a commercial for jobs at CoreCivic, a for-profit company that is trying to build a Gulag right here in my backyard in Kansas.
When that is greenlighted for operations, I will be a fine candidate for detention, among many others in this part of The Heartland.
If you are a U.S. born person with the tiniest bit of empathy, I’m sure you are very sad about what I have written so far. And I’m sure you are waiting for instructions on what to do next. I don’t know what to tell you. I really don’t. Your relatives weren’t so concerned about Mahmoud Khalil, Rümeysa Öztürk or Mohsen Mahdawi… Every one of those activists, when given the chance at due process, were exonerated by the judges, who wagged their finger at The Regime’s lawyers.
And what of those ‘criminals’ that got shipped off to CECOT in El Salvador? Well, pretty much every media outlet has confirmed that only about eight percent of them had criminal backgrounds. Kilmar Abrego Garcia is back in the U.S., and his lawyers were so worried about his safety, that they asked the court to keep him in jail, so that ICE wouldn’t get him, again.
I don’t know what to tell you. What I can tell you is this: Your country is in danger. Whatever you are doing now is Not Enough. Do More. Time is of the essence. You, we, don’t have much time.