A Mad Man Owns the White House.
Here's What YOU Can Do to Get Him Out.

Yes, a mad man owns the White House

There's a madman seating in the oval office. He's beyond corrupt. He's out of touch with reality. He has lied so much that now he is inventing reality. But that's not the worst thing.

The GOP Congress, the body who can legally stop him, has not done anything because they are complicit. Congress is starting to shake up a bit, but the problem is that they know they will be held accountable, so keeping Trump is the least of their evils.

The Republicans with any leadership power are now all MAGA, if not full-fledged fascist. The Republican voters are without a party that they can trust to honor the constitution.

And the corporate Democrats are too focused on fighting the popular candidates who have won in the Primaries. They fear new leadership emerging from We, the People more than they fear that the fascist coup destroying our democracy wins.

That's another form of madness, ain't it?

SCOTUS? Too entrenched in power to do what's right.

So what do we do? Who will stop this madness? What can we do?

This is not the time of heroes, but of People Power

Here's the thing: while all of that destruction is going on, there is a popular nonviolent resistance movement growing. It is focused, strategic and effective. So why are we not talking about it? And while we are at it: have you joined it?

It worries me that we are so focused on the Destroyer in the White House that we make our own People Power invisible. With a legacy media playing hooky, this is highly dangerous.

And what is more concerning is that We, the People have the power to spread the word about our pro-democracy nonviolent resistance movement, see it grow to 12 millions and make this regime crumble.

That power? Word of Mouth. Organized Public Pressure. Relentless focused dissent. Non-stoppable non-compliance.

Gossip spreads faster than any virus. So why don't we use its more positive twin, word of mouth, to defeat this regime?

The thing is that we are already on it. Hundreds of thousands of people are on it. We just need more people to up the ante. We need you... and your cousin and your grandma to join. Word of mouth is something we can all do.

But you first need to understand how strategic nonviolent resistance works and how each of us can contribute to the pressure that will unseat this president and his entire court of sycophants.

If I tell you that NOT shutting up is one of the most powerful resistance acts you can do, what is your first thought?

Many would think that all hope is lost if that's the best we can do. And they would be wrong.

We need to stop thinking of winning back our democracy as a cowboy movie, where one hero or a team of leaders do one tough act and BOOM! We get our country back.

We need to break away from the trance of the passive citizen that has been laid over our eyes so that we do not see our own individual and collective power and give away our power to the leaders. That hasn't work out to well for us, don't you think?

And that is because that's not how democracy works.

And this is not how saving democracy works, either.

Public Pressure, a Tool of People Power

Right now there is national relentless pressure to congress through letters and calls. People are filling Town Halls to make demands.

• Grassroots organizations, like Indivisible, are part of it. We receive weekly calls to action with links to pester congress on the issues of the day.
• People Power United, another grassroots organization, is on it. Thousands of their members send thousands of letters and calls every week.
• 50501 is on it. Their members boycott, write letters and constantly dissent out-loud.
• And so are dozens of grassroots organizations, organized to maximize citizen participation into focused action and effective tactics.

You may think that this is a waste of time with a derelict Congress, but let me show you how effective our refusal to shut up and our persistence can be.

I'm going to share just one story in which We, the People used our People Power to win a battle against this regime, just this week.

Stay tune. This story will be the springboard to understand how we crumble this regime.

The USS Abraham Lincoln

This story was published in the the Dworkin Newsletter, by Scott Dworkin, who not only does investigative reporting but organizes people for public pressure.

According to Dworkin, two weeks ago nobody in Washington had said a word about the USS Abraham Lincoln, an aircraft carrier that left San Diego in November 2025.

The only place where you could hear whispers about this was in some alternative or progressive news casts that keep a radar in the local communities, where veterans and families of the military were raising the alarm.

They were complaining that there was heavy-duty neglect and abuse against the sailors in the Abraham Lincoln aircraft, that the ship had been sent to Trump’s war with Iran in spite of it been more than 260 days in service without port stops, and it was still not coming home. They were revealing that mental health among soldiers was endangered and suicidal ideation was rising and some soldiers had even jump off the ship.

Nobody was listening. But these families and veterans refused to shut up.

Dworkin tells us that about eleven days ago, two hundred family members packed a hall at San Diego’s naval base.

Acting Secretary Hung Cao sat in front of them with two admirals.

"One woman stood up crying, as her husband messaged her just that morning saying he hopes he doesn’t wake up tomorrow.

Another told them they’d broken trust with everyone in the room."

Somebody asked when the ship would finally return home—they wouldn’t say."

The families got no answers and no acceptable explanations.

But they kept the pressure.They talked to whoever would listen. They talked with alternative news. They wrote and call their senators. They call friends and families and ask them to spread the word and put pressure. They kept at it.

The word spread. It became news and more people started putting pressure. As the word of mouth grew, the pressure became stronger.

Now Congress faced immense public and family pressure regarding the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft. Mistreating those who are protecting us, giving their lives for us, is one of the foulest things a government can do, and people refused to put up with it. The story went viral through word of mouth.

This is the moment when you hear your old auntie saying things like "Do you know what they did now? They are abusing our military! This administration has no morals. I'm going to call Doris. Her young son was thinking of joining the marines. We can't let our young ones sign up for this abuse."

The rising pressure had a domino effect.

Dworkin reports that: "Democratic senators—led by Richard Blumenthal—sent sharp letters to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Acting Navy Secretary Hung Cao demanding accountability regarding crew fatigue and living conditions."

Senator Mark Kelly, who deployed twice to the Persian Gulf aboard the USS Midway and flew 39 combat missions in Operation Desert Storm, spoke  with a grandmother who said her grandson has lost twenty-five pounds on the ship. You know Kelly would not let this slip by. He pushed for a full investigation and for a bipartisan delegation to be flown out to the ship.

And here's the clincher. Here's how once we start the ball running, things can quickly backfire against the regime.

Fox News host Joey Jones, a retired U.S. Marine Corps staff sergeant who lost both legs in Afghanistan and should have known better, went instead into "testosterone" tough guy mode, shaming the sailors on the ship for speaking about their abuse, calling them weak.

Just imagine what a mother, a wife, a son of a military thinks when they hear that kind of shaming against a loved one who is risking his life for this country. Oh, my God! The outrage was huge.

Joey's macho posture backfired as the people and the media reacted against his disrespect and his blaming the sailors instead of holding the leaders accountable.

Here's what Ring of Fire's Josh G said:

"Trump dismissed military families’ concerns outright, while Navy officials and MAGA media rushed to protect the administration’s story instead of addressing what sailors say is happening at sea. The people who claim to “support the troops” are showing exactly what that slogan means when the troops become inconvenient."

And then Josh gave an even clearer picture of what was happening:

"What these sailors and their families are actually describing is downright ghoulish. Rotten meat, no milk, food rationing, plumbing failures... The sailors on this carrier have described brutal schedules with barely any sleep. Morale has collapsed on this deployment that keeps getting extended with no end at in sight. At least one sailor that's confirmed by the government and reports of many more acting upon their darkest thoughts have either considered, tried, or actually jumped overboard. That is the most serious thing that we can think of in this situation, not some blowhard on Fox News."

Josh went on to expose the government's dereliction even more:
"Another ship in the same region is reporting similar conditions, the USS Boxer. A family member of someone on board, says that the women there have been reduced to begging relatives back home to mail them feminine care products."

"Look, I can tell you that it isn't a sailor's weakness that has led to near starvation or a lack of basic human sanitation or led to this disrespect. That all comes to a broken supply chain and even worse, a broken chain of command. To put it bluntly, these sailors didn't fail a mission. The people in charge of the mission failed them."

The story grew and revealed even more of the incompetence and dereliction of this government; which made the military leaders look really bad.

Calls for Inspection were raised by Lawmakers like Ruben Gallego, pressing the administration to allow a bipartisan congressional delegation (CODEL) to board and inspect the ship directly.

Both Democratic and some Republican members of Congress criticized the lack of a clearly defined mission or end-in-sight for the ongoing conflict operations, tying the strain on the crew to rudderless administration policies.

Ret. US Navy Admiral Mike Mullen, the former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said “these ships, these people” need to come back.

The problem became a liability, a show of weakness, bad press fodder and a cost that the administration could not afford.

Dworkin reports that "A month ago this was a few worried family members that the regime brushed off. Now it’s a push for an investigation, a congressional summons, and a former Joint Chiefs chairman saying "bring them home. "

That’s what a month of not shutting up did.

Eight days later, the Navy announced that the Lincoln is coming home. All five thousand of them—including Karen Bramlett’s grandson and Nicole Conrad’s son (whose families had protested strongly.)

When you refuse to shut up or look the other way, putting relentless public pressure on a cause you care about, you have no idea where it could lead. Think of the Epstein Files. Who would have known that it will turn so many against this regime and still haunts the Destroyer in the White House?

If you are looking for that crack that will break this regime, then know it will more likely come this way than by some solo heroics. It will come from People Power, from non-compliance, from Public Pressure. Let's see how that works.

This is how we defeat the regime.

There is not a one-moment victory that will crumble it. Those of us who are training in nonviolent resistance have learned this. There's no quickie here.

There is no hero, much less an official leader, that will come and save us.

There is enough evidence and science now in the phenomena of democratic sliding for us to know that much.

This is what works:

Each of us, personally

Whatever you are doing for democracy based on your skills and capability, you must do to your best potential right now (without waiting for it to be perfect) and consistently. Know that it's all good. Whether that is to write, tell stories, use art, educate, inform, talk to friends and family, fact-check news and here-say, etc.

Each of us, in community

We spread the word using whatever tools we have at hand. Watch out for:

• Rumors and conspiracy theories put about to divide and defeat We, the People. Fact-check everything. Stay informed so you can answer questions.
• What the pro-democracy nonviolent resistant movement is doing in response to something. Let everyone know what actions to take, what cause to support, where to focus at the moment. When there is no mainstream press speaking truth to power, we must do it ourselves.
• Issues like the sailor's abuse, that move you and feel unacceptable. Start your own community word of mouth campaign. Here's where your passion becomes People Power.

What can you do to spread the word and put pressure? It doesn't have to be a huge thing. I know that it's tempting to think that what we can do is not enough because the problem is so big. But always remember that none of us is acting alone. This is a collective work. Everyone adds to the pressure until it builds up and pushes the regime out of power.

For example: I have a blog and send a newsletter. So what I do is create the article in my blog and then refer to it in my newsletter, so that I can kill two birds with one stone. When I do a  video, I also post it in my blog and social media, again magnifying one action. 

The mainstream media is covering up what People Power is doing and this has a detrimental effect in the people, which can lead to giving up. Our job as citizens is to support each other to stay informed and strong.

Each of us, as part of a grassroots organization

Grassroots organizations help us stay focused and make it easy to do daily actions for our democracy. I am a member of Indivisible and follow People Power United and 50501. They each send me emails letting me know what is going on, where to put my focus and what actions I can take. They make it easy by including links. One click and I've done a bit that day for democracy.

• You can write letters and do calls to all your reps. Don't worry if they just reply with a form letter and do nothing. Keep at it. Be relentless. It's really easy with links to sites that make it a one-click action. I send letters almost every day and my finger is still attached! 🙂
• Forward emails from grassroots organizations about what is happening, what we are focused on, what candidates to support and what to fund that will give The People a leg up. Or if you don't want to forward too many emails to your friends, get the most important things and put them in an email and send this as a newsletter to them to keep them consistently engaged and informed. If you want to get fancy, get an email server and ask them to join your list. If you keep 12 people on the loop and 3 join a grassroots organization and contribute to the resistance, that's amazing. If 4 of them send the newsletter to a dozen friends in turn, and those send it to a dozen more; pretty soon you may be spreading the word to hundreds or even thousands. That's how People Power works!

Even issues like ICE, election protection and AI need us to spread the word, write and call, put public pressure and educate others.

Refusing to shut up, putting public pressure, inundating Congress with your demands, refusing to look away or to comply with crazy "executive disorders"-- all of it adds up.

Remember: it's not just you. If you send a letter, that may not be much. But if 10 million send a letter, that is massive public pressure that will then get picked up by other sources and can generate a wave that makes this regime actions backfire. 

When a population engages in this nonviolent civil resistance in a consistent way across the nation using all these tactics, our chances to win against this fascist coup skyrocket.

Stop Thinking that "Something Happens and We Win"

We also need to stop thinking that "something happens and we win."

That's not how it works. If we keep waiting for congress to do something that will end this, or for one event to happen that makes the regime crumble, we will find ourselves with a fascist coup entrenched, with no rights protected. And that's when the chances to defeat the coup start going down.

If and when an event topples the regime it will be because we've done all the work necessary for it to crumble.

So when do we win?

We win when our collective push is so massive, effective and consistent that:

1. It raises the cost of tyranny beyond what the top players are willing to pay and the regular power holders (corporations, upper middle class, millionaires, institutions etc.) are willing to endure, and
2.  It systematically removes the sources of power of the autocrat and his enablers. Think of the pillars that support governance. Once they crumble, the regime crumbles.

In other words, this is a battle of brain, not brawn. This is a battle of strategy, not confrontation or one heroic battle. This is a battle of persistence, not heroics.

The good news is that while few of us can afford to play the hero, we can all do word of mouth and we can all persist.

In their book On Courage: How to be a Dissident in an Age of Fear, Julia Angwin and Ami Fields-Meyer say something that we need to internalize.

"Tipping the balance means that Americans-accustomed to showing up every few years to cast their ballots and make their voices heard-- will have to learn a different mode of activism beyond the familiar cycles of electoral campaigns."

I phrase it like this:

We must become citizen leaders because an evolved democracy demands that its citizens are the leaders of their leaders. Only then, when we participate in a definitive and leading way in our political life, will democracy deliver its promise of freedom, justice and opportunity for ALL.

Here's a Thought...

What if this horrible political catastrophe is a tough, swim or sink training to become the citizen leaders that evolved democracy needs?

As a people we allowed leaders to lie to us, get rich and put an oligarchy in charge to grow this corruption. We did it because we got used to being passive in politics. And we became passive citizens because when politics abandoned us, we abandoned politics and went about trying to make ends meet on our own. And this is what brought us here.

Now we've become engaged, courageous and unwilling to be blindsided. We've looked at this mess on the face and we've seen it for what it is: corruption at a large scale, a fascist coup and a capture of our country's wealth by greedy billionaires. And we've said: "Heck no!"

We have awaken and we are stepping up. We are organizing, training, speaking up and assuming our leadership.

You may be assuming leadership by

• Confronting your Reps and letting them know what you expect of them.
• Spreading the word by using your talents to write, draw, sing or inform others.
• Joining a grassroots organization to practice peaceful resistance.

And some of us have had to do even more scary and challenging things, like ...

• Start up a local grassroots cell in our community because there was none,
• Organize a town hall meeting because no one else knew how or even
• Confront ICE in a rapid response.
• Lately, we have come together to endorse, champion and fund more than 20 popular leaders that we selected among ourselves, in our communities.
• And we prevailed against millions of dollars of the oligarchy. Most of our candidates won the primaries all across the nation! We did it!

We are becoming the citizen leaders that evolved democracy needs.

Let's appreciate this. Let's own this. Let's spread the world and let's celebrate this together! Woohoo!

Call to action

1. Join Indivisible at: https://indivisible.org/
2. Join training for election protection at:
   https://www.mobilize.us/indivisible/event/1000403/?utm_source=email&utm_medium=newsletter_20260817
3. Join training for facing ICE and protecting immigrants, people of color and dissidents at: https://www.mobilize.us/indivisible/event/971533/?utm_source=email&utm_medium=newsletter_20260817
4. Or find an action that matches your passion at:
   https://indivisible.org/get-involved/take-action/

REFERENCES:

Story of the Abraham Lincoln Carrier
Scott Dworkin Newsletter: https://substack.com/@scottdworkin
August 17, 2026

On Courage: How to be a Dissident in an Age of Fear," Julia Angwin and Ami Fields-Meyer: https://www.amazon.com/dp/006349194X

"Why Civil Resistance Works," Erica Chenoweth and Maria J. Stephan: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0231156839

Indivisible leadership training: https://indivisible.org/group-support-hub/trainings-and-calls/

"Breaking Down Pillars of Support for Democratic Backsliding," paper published in "Mobilization: An international Quarterly," in October 2024 issue, written by Jonathan Pinckney and Claire Trilling: (I could not download the paper. You may have to sign up.) https://jonathanpinckney.com/publication/pillars_paper/