This will be a long post, but I wanted to share my thoughts today as we commemorate the signing of the Declaration of Independence and where we go from here.
With yesterday’s passage of the Big Bad Bill, the Republican Party has set the stage for the evisceration of America’s social safety net. The effects of this abominable piece of legislation will be felt at every level of our society. Here in Harford County, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) helped feed 23,000 residents in 2022. Medicaid covers 16% of Harford’s residents, including 28.8% of our children. Unless Congress acts separately this year to extend the Covid-era subsidies to Affordable Care Act premiums, many of our lower-income residents will find their health insurance costs rising by 75% or more. It will be devastating.
All this, so that billionaires and the wealthiest can extract yet more tax breaks. And so that he can expand the assault on immigrant communities, build more concentration camps in the swamps and deserts of our states, with ICE expanding its budget to almost double that of the United States Marine Corps in 2026.
All this, while adding further trillions to the national debt - from the party that preaches fiscal responsibility.
We can ask, when will it all end? Is there no end to the boundless cruelty of the Stephen Millers and Tom Homans of the world? Is there no bottom to the chasm between truth and the lies their spin-masters and their oligarch-owned propaganda networks spew on a daily basis? Can any of us truly say that our fundamental rights to due process are safe in the face of this administration?
There is an end, if we make one.
Thousands of you have joined in nationwide demonstrations of disapproval in Bel Air, Aberdeen, and on the overpasses of this county. You are starting to organize within your neighborhoods, help the Party sign up new volunteers by writing postcards, have helped reinvigorate the Young Democrats of Harford County, and have helped the party demonstrate its presence at various community events. That work must continue and expand in every district, precinct, and neighborhood if we are to turn the ship of state around.
Some among you may be dissatisfied with the Democratic Party. That is ok. We invite those of you to share your frustrations and desires and to join us to help build the Party that you want to see. This month some of you have the opportunity to apply to join the Central Committee itself, and next year’s election presents your opportunity to run for any number of offices, including for positions on the Committee. Either way, we encourage all of you to come to our meetings, which are generally on the 3rd Wednesday of the month with the exceptions of December and July. Share with us your thoughts; we need to hear them.
The signers of the Declaration of Independence made it clear that the People have the right to replace their government if it no longer serves to secure inalienable rights and the blessings of liberty. It is that Declaration that we celebrate today. The framers of the Constitution then codified the process by which that replacement may be accomplished peacefully, a tradition we held sacred until it was so greviously violated in January of 2021.
It is up to us, joining with like-valued people of all (or no) political parties and alignments, to protect, defend, and improve upon those legacies, and it is that obligation to which we recommit ourselves today. If, like me, you are not feeling today to be the happiest or proudest of holidays, join me in committing to make future Independence Day celebrations happier than today’s.
By starting now, we will create a legacy for our posterity, and, to paraphrase a line from one of the recent Star Wars series, to make for our democracy a sunrise that we may ourselves never see.