Sue and I are hoping to make it to the No Kings rally here in Denver, this Saturday, October 18th. How about you?

Every day brings fresh reminders of why this is necessary.

Armed and masked paramilitary troops are patrolling our cities–indiscriminately arresting men, women, and children, be they citizens or not, but almost certainly being people of color. But be assured, it won’t stop with them, it will soon be anyone who disagrees with them. Just look at Jim Comey and Letitia James. All of our civil liberties are at stake.

Transforming the Justice Department to his own private law firm to protect Trump and his cronies and weaponizing it to prosecute his so called enemies.

This administration is waging war on science and health; people will die needlessly from preventable diseases. Children especially are at risk; come on folks; protect your babies!

Trump and his henchmen are eviscerating our Federal Civil Service for no reason except it threatens to thwart his plans to destroy American Democracy. I was a career civil servant; the vast majority of people I worked with were conscientious and hardworking, and believed that they were working for the good of the American people. We all depend on the civli service to protect our clean air and water; provide housing assistance; protect our public health; manage Medicare and Medicaid; collect taxes fairly, and do thousands of other things that make our society just, healthy and fair.

Our National Parks don’t have the staff to serve the millions of people who visit them every year or, more importantly, to take care of these national treasures. Our national monuments and forests are being auctioned off to the highest bidders.

How much longer can the overworked and understaffed air traffic controllers work before our skies become unsafe?

We all depend on the National Weather Service–so many of us are just one weather disaster away from ruin. When that disaster strikes, FEMA will no longer be there to help, so why are we cutting these vital services while our environment becomes more unstable and unpredictable?

Handing our energy future over to the Chinese; now that’s smart. Green energy is not a scam, but vital to the survival of our planet. Denying that climate change and global warming are happening while giving the fossil fuel industry carte blanche is duplicitous madness and will harm us and our children and grandchildren.

Graft, dishonesty and lying are emblematic of this White House. This president is enriching his family to the tune of billions of dollars while stealing from the American public. Giving tax breaks to the very rich while making medical insurance unaffordable once again for millions of Americans is wrongheaded.

Attacking the finest system of higher education in the world while willy nilly canceling essential scientific and medical research funding makes no sense. This weakens our universities and colleges and threatens the future of all Americans. Turning away the finest minds from around the world, only forces them into the arms of our enemies.

Cozying up to dictators and strong men, like Vladimir Putin and Victor Orban is anathema to our American ethos. Brokering a peace deal in Gaza, while leaving Ukraine vulnerable to Russia’s ongoing unjust war doesn’t make any sense. Ukraine is literally fighting for our freedom, not just theirs. Stiff arming our allies and coddling our opponents is undoing the alliances that have protected this world for the last eighty years.

Imposing illegal and foolish tariffs on a whim, saddling the average American with unwarranted taxes and weakening our economy is undermining our future.

Finally and most egregiously, this president is ignoring all democratic norms and trying to impose an Imperial Presidency. His lackeys in Congress and the Supreme Court do nothing to stop him and seem to support all of his unjust and illegal power grabs. The Founding Fathers created a system of checks and balances, but they are no longer working.

If we don’t stop Trump now, our American Democracy is in peril.