I don't much know what to say right now. So I’m going to start.
You know what's going on. I mean. You know! But right now I have ink and paper and a few free minutes.
As of this writing (Monday night, Feb 3) there's an unelected billionaire running around Washington D.C. with a bunch of script kiddies shutting down government departments. They have seized access to the United States Treasury checkbook and payments system, which means that if you've received any money from the government—a tax refund? social security payments certainly—they have your information. And can decide whether you get your money.
(Take a moment to consider how pathetic you have to be, to be the richest man in the world and still not have any friends your own age willing to do your high crimes with you.)
So pretty soon, depending on the whims of some folks who think 'accountability' is something an accountant does, people might not be getting their medicaid, their social security. Also, they've apparently closed USAID, so starving folk around the world won't get fed.
In other news, we've spent ten days setting on fire a hundred years of hemispheric and international security, built with care and diplomacy and mutual support and a bunch of really heinous crime, all for the price of a handful of paltry concessions. Canada has a fentanyl czar now? Sure, Jan. Someone once described powering cars by burning gasoline as being like powering cars by burning $100 bills, because of all that could be done with those polymers instead. This analogy wasn't even thinking about, you know, climate change.
And they're taking steps to endanger my friends and family.
"They can't do that?" Well, who told them? "There are laws," and who will enforce them? Some people will, I hope. And I hope they feel that the people have their back.
Some folks are in a position to take immediate action. It might be you. I read a wonderful story told by a librarian on Bluesky. Apparently, during the height of Patriot Act overreach, their library was asked by the feds to hand over patron borrowing history, not as a one time warranted thing but as an ongoing matter. Obviously this was sensitive information, so they made sure they had a "Patriot Act Compliance" officer. But unfortunately, that Compliance Officer just happened to be the most recent person who'd stopped working for the library. No worries, we'll train someone else on the systems soon. Oh wait! Dang. Now that person left. Who’dathunk.
If you're in such a position, blessings on you. Don't tell me about it on an unsecured channel. But I hope I have a chance to buy you a drink some day.
If you're not in such a position: watch carefully. You never know when you will be.
Otherwise...
I'm not a strategist. But at this point, if you are a U.S. person, you should be at least calling your senators and congressional representatives. Lots of people are doing that, so you probably won't get through to a live staffer (if you're anxious about phone calls, this makes it easier)—but if you leave a voice mail with your street address or your zip code, it will be counted, and reported to your rep. You can find their numbers here: Senators and Reps. These folks use constituent calls to take temperature, to set agendas. I'm trying to remember who it was who defined a politician as a person who, when they see a parade, runs to the head of it. Calling your reps makes you the parade.
The voicemail won't let you talk for long. That's fine, because you don't need to say much. "Hi, my name is X. I'm a constituent, from (zip code, sometimes street address). I'm calling because I'm upset about (issue). I want to see Senator/Representative Y (do something concrete)." If you have a personal connection to the issue, or a compelling story, share that in one or two sentences, but this is optional and be careful about disclosing anything that would endanger you. "I'll be watching what the Senator does, and telling my friends (church / bridge group / takarazuka fan club). Thank you for your time."
Issues: pick one or two. Call about the others tomorrow. I did a little list up there, any of those would be a good place to start.
Concrete actions: Pick an action you want your rep to take. Something clear, that you can check up on. You might ask them to refuse unanimous consent (which I’m told gums up the workings of Congress). To vote no on all nominees. Go down to Treasury and fast while sitting on a pillar. Vote against a bill.
Call the local and DC offices of your representatives. These calls will take at most fifteen minutes, though, God, trust me, I know, psyching yourself up to do it—and then psyching yourself back down into the physical world—can take longer. I call that kind of task-switching 'cornering' and I'm really bad at it.
This is useful no matter who your rep is. If they're a Democrat, they either need more backbone, or need to know their constituents have their back. If they're a Republican—a lot of what's happened is far off the political map. Particularly the Elon / Treasury / OMB stuff. You can be a voter who's worried about what the hell will happen to his friend on medicaid, or his parents' social security check. People are pissed. The Capitol switchboard was overwhelmed this afternoon.
There is an app that can help. It's called 5 Calls and if you feed it your zip code it will give you your congressional representatives' phone numbers, along with a list of issues that might concern you, and scripts you can use when calling. It's been pretty good so far.
Do your calls. Then corner. To corner it often helps to slow down. Go outside. Touch grass. The body uses movement to clear adrenaline. Run. Do five pushups. Do one.
Beyond that: find people who know more than I do and listen to them.
And, I say this because I'm bad at it: consider the extent to which you're falling into an affect trap vs. taking action. Staring at a screen feelin' bad (oh lord i'm starin' at this screen feelin' bad...) doesn't help you or anyone.
Activate your local network. I say it that way because I like to sound like I know spy shit, but what I mean is, talk to people. Go to your gym class, to your reading group. Text other parents from day care. Go to church. Go to the Church of Science Fiction. Go to Friday Night Magic. Those connections are strength in a slippery world. A while ago I went to a meetup to help build out our local online newspaper, and damn if I didn't come away feeling better than I had in weeks. Talk to folks. Call them. Go to them. The people you're seeing now are the people you'll call when you need to call someone.
One challenge I face in moments like these is the uncertainty of my threat model. More goofy spy words: threat model just means, what sort of bad stuff are you bracing for? Trouble is, "how bad can it get?" is a question without a bottom. I've been lucky personally so far but I've known people and lived in places that weren't. A friend proposed an approach today that's helped me a bit. Consider a limited range of parallel threat models, three, say, or four, or five, of increasing severity. "Things get a bit worse all around and money's tighter than it used to be" might be a low grade one. "Pandemic" might be a higher grade one. And so on. Having a range of models helps me think more proportionately. Otherwise I end up sorting by "probability x severity" and, since “severity” has no fixed upper bound, I spend all my time thinking about Case Nightmare Green Plus Plus With Whipped Cream and Cherries, to the detriment of things like toilet paper supply, or dry goods, or refilling prescriptions, or writing a letter to my newspaper, or calling my reps, or driving to their offices to say hello.
Your Local Epidemiologist ran a "what you can expect from us" essay a few days back and I've been thinking about that a lot. I don't play anything like so vital a public function as epidemiological comms in an era of looming pandemic, but—One of the most bolt-from-the-blue lines I've read in years was in an Alexander Chee essay, the last in his tremendous collection "How to Write an Autobiographical Novel." The essay focuses on what he tried to teach his students after 9/11 -- but the part that I remember most vividly is a sentence fragment, which, for this is the way of such things, I may now misquote. He described himself as addressing "those of us who have chosen to serve our country in the arts." Right on, man.
I do see this work—writing, art, music—as a work of service. I don't have so instrumental or grand a vision of writing as Lu Xun did (he left medicine and started writing fiction because by writing he could 'doctor to the nation’), but I am writing for my friends and my country and my world. I was given a world of story and it's an honor to pass it along. And I feel the fundamental thirst. And it feels good. I'm so grateful to have the chance to do that work, and give it time. I only pray I've been able to pass along some fraction of the gifts I have received, and add my own.
This has never been a space for 'takes' and I am not here in a News Guy capacity. What you can expect from me, here, is that I will work, deeper and harder and with a fuller heart and a clearer eye. This space will continue to be a testing ground; right now I seem to be on the beats of 'deep thoughts about writing and building and sustaining writing practice, particularly as a parent, particularly in complicated times' and 'tradeoffs and angles of attack for structuring your tech and information environment as someone who needs space to do deep-dive work.' That seems likely to continue. I'm going to run a few experiments in the next couple months, see what I can build with other authors. I'm going to work for love and what truth I can reach and for the triumph of intellect and romance over brute force and cynicism, and I'm going to share what I've done with you when I can.
I will have another note for y'all later in the week, closer to the usual time; my excitement about that feels in tension with the National Stage, but, hey, many things are happening at once. I'm holding Spencer Ackerman up as a model, he can write about the most awful shit on the war crimes beat and turn around and bump his run on Iron Man. Watch this space.
Take care of yourselves, friends. Work for the liberation of all sentient beings.
See you in a few days.