The green shoots are rising. They push through the cracks, stubborn, reaching for light. You see it in the streets. In the faces at town halls. In the crowds swelling, growing, multiplying.

           It started in places people don’t always look. Decatur, Georgia. Vancouver, Washington. Pittsburgh, Kansas.Places where people are supposed to stay quiet, keep their heads down. But they didn’t.

          Bernie Sanders stood in Kenosha, Wisconsin, and four thousand people showed up. He went to Altoona, where a quarter of the whole town packed in just to listen. Then to Detroit, where the crowd swelled past nine thousand. These weren’t just Democrats. They weren’t just Republicans. They were people—people with something to say.

          Elsewhere, town halls filled up so fast they had to hold them twice. Tacoma, Washington. San Antonio, Texas. Even in places where Republican representatives tried to avoid the crowds, opting for phone calls instead of face-to-face meetings, the people showed up anyway.

          There’s a shift happening. You can feel it.

           And it’s not just at the grassroots. It’s in Washington, too. Maybe, just maybe, the political class is starting to remember what democracy looks like. Maybe they’re seeing the same thing we are: that fear and anger are powerful, but hope is more dangerous to a man like Trump. Hope, when it spreads, is unstoppable.

Two Layers. Two Slices of Civic Bread.

         It’s a two-layered situation,– the makings of a  shit sandwich for Trump– built with citizen power on one side and a rattled establishment on the other.

         The bottom layer is the grassroots uprising. The dealership protests, the street marches, the projection pranks on Cybertrucks. Tesla dealerships in Pasadena, Palo Alto, Boston, Chicago, Manhattan. SpaceX headquarters in D.C.Women’s marches in Atlanta, Lexington, Indianapolis, Sacramento, St. Paul. The protest at the Kennedy Center over Trump’s attack on trans people.

          The top layer? That’s Washington feeling the heat. Democrats forced to be bolder. Republicans afraid to face their own voters. The vice president trying to enjoy a ski vacation in Vermont—until people made sure he heard them.

           And in between? Trump. Musk. The ones who thought they could break the system, only to find out that people don’t break that easy.

So, here’s the recipe:

• A bottom layer of activism, swelling up from the streets, from the dealerships, from the universities, from the workplaces, from the people who’ve had enough.
• A top layer of political reckoning, forcing Washington to wake up, to act, to stop playing along.
• And right there in the middle, between those layers of movement and consequence—that’s where you’ll find trapped

     Once the people start shifting, the politicians follow. And once the politicians follow, the laws change. And once the laws change?

     Well. That’s when everything starts to crack.

     So, let’s keep building. A shit sandwich for Trump– served cold

More to Come: A Bigger Sandwich

     You haven’t seen anything yet.

      Wait until Trump’s Veterans Administration cuts 80,000 jobs and vets can’t get care. Wait until veterans—the ones he used for applause lines, the ones who fought our wars—start dying in waiting rooms. And wait until he comes for Granny.

Trump’s Coming for Granny

     Maybe you’re comfortable. Maybe you think all this tumult is someone else’s problem. Let someone else figure it out.

     But if you’ve got a mother, a grandmother, an aunt in a nursing home—you better start paying attention. Because when Medicaid cuts come—37% of the Medicaid budget is spent on extended nursing care–who’s going to pay that $4,000 a month to keep her in a bed?

     You?

     You gonna take out a second mortgage? Cancel the college fund? Give up your golf game, your dinners out, your retirement? Because someone’s going to have to. And yet—where the hell is the on-the-ground outrage?

      Why aren’t there billboards outside every single nursing home saying: “Republican Congressman X is about to throw your grandma out of here”?

        My guess is it won’t be too long before they’re sprouting like spring daffodils.

Once Again, It May Be the Women Who Save Us

        History has a way of repeating itself. And once again, it may be the women of America who step in to save the rest of us.

        Because they are the caregivers. The ones who will most feel the brutal force of Trump’s Medicaid and Social Security cuts first. The ones who will have to figure out what happens to Granny, Uncle Joe, the disabled cousin, the veteran husband. The ones who will be left picking up the broken pieces of a system being deliberately dismantled.

       And they’re pissed.

        They’ve already had to fight to hold on to basic  rights—forced to defend, again and again, their own ability to make decisions about their bodies and their futures. Now, they’re watching the future get ripped away from their families and themselves.

        And here’s what happens when you piss off the gender that controls 80% of consumer spending decisions.

        It won’t be pretty.

       Not for the economy. Not for the billionaires. Not for the big-box stores and corporations that have happily played along with Trump’s agenda, thinking they’d profit.

       Women can break them.

Meanwhile, Look North

       Above Trump’s Meth House, Canada fights back. Ontario’s Premier slaps a 25% surcharge on electricity exports to New York, Michigan, Minnesota—hitting 1.5 million American homes and businesses. They’ll take the money and use it to support their own workers.

        At least they know how to go for the jugular.

This is the Moment for Nonprofits

      Although some groups like Common Cause, ACLU, immigration and women’s rights organizations are battling back full bore, too many nonprofits organizations that claim to fight for justice are silent.

     Too many of them are tiptoeing around Trump, Musk, and the Republican cuts.

      Too afraid of losing funding. Too afraid of upsetting donors. Too afraid to fight.

      Well, here’s the thing. It’s not a choice. It’s an obligation.

     Every nonprofit, every advocacy group, every membership organization has a responsibility to sound the alarm. Not just to run voter registration drives every two years. Not just to host polite town halls and hope for the best.

     To tell the truth.

      To let donors, members, and stakeholders know that they can push back.

      That they don’t have to just watch this happen.

      A phone call  or visit to a congressional office, a meeting with the staff at a U.S. Senator’s local office, a little bit of hell-raising at a town hall—could actually make a difference.

There’s Always Something to Fear

       Sure, there are risks. There always are. Being cut out, pushed to the sidelines, sued, defunded, harassed.

       But this is no time for the fearful.

      This is a time for those of us who simply care.

       For those of us who just want to lead an ordinary life in freedom.

       Because if we don’t fight for it now, we won’t have it later.

      This is how democracy fades. Not with a bang, but with silence. With people assuming it’ll be fine. That someone else will handle it.

       Until one day, we wake up and realize we’re not the country we thought we were. And by then, it’s too late.

Here’s the Question for Those Remaining Silent

        Do you want to be Hungary? Belarus? Russia? Do you want to be the next country that sleepwalked its way into authoritarianism?

        Because that’s the path of silence and inaction.

        So please join your fellow citizens and organization who are talking. Showing up. Calling  the local office of your Senator, your Rep, your city council member. It doesn’t matter if they’re a Democrat or a Republican—tell them this has to stop.

          It’s time to shove the shit  sandwich right down Trump’s throat.

Roger