Personal Reflections of a Middle-Aged Man

Reminder: 290 and 67. The 290 represents how many U.S. House of Representatives members it takes to override a presidential veto (all Representatives are up for reelection this year). It takes 67 U.S. Senators to override a presidential veto (35 Senators are up for reelection this year with 22 of those being Republicans—the ones we have to concentrate on the most). These numbers are very important this year at the ballot box because it will take this number of votes to help right this vast ship of a country for all of us, not just the billionaire class.

The Republicans, if you haven’t noticed, have begun to say the quiet parts out loud in full view of the mainstream press and the American people.

Many of the things Republicans are saying are egregious for which the press should push back and hold them accountable, which we know is no longer happening. But, what Speaker Mike Johnson said out loud at a Washington, D.C. gathering of conservative influencers, Republican donors, elected officials, and evangelical leaders at the Faith & Freedom Coalition’s 2026 Road to Majority Conference takes the cake.

He said, for all the world to hear, “I run the protection program.” He wasn’t referencing protecting the American people from authoritarianism, fascism, or the shredding of the Constitution. No, he was talking about protecting Trump, Trump’s family, Trump’s cabinet, Trump’s donors, Trump’s Friends, and Republican congressional members.

“I am the protection program.”

Not to protect the First Amendment.

Not to protect Civil Rights.

Not to protect habeas corpus.

Not to protect voting rights.

Not to protect democracy.

Not to protect the role and responsibility of Congress.

Not to protect the Constitution.

No, it was to protect the billionaire class, the Epstein class. To protect those wanting a surveillance state and massive resource needing data centers. To protect an authoritarian regime, the rise of the fascism class, the racist class, the white christian nationalist class.

It’s not about protecting so many of us who are struggling to make the rent, struggling to pay for gas to get to work, struggling to cover health- or mental health and childcare costs, struggling to put food on the table for our families, struggling to cloth our families, to buy formula and diapers for our babies, struggling just to survive in a system designed to support and protect the wealthy in small towns and the largest of our cities alike.

So far I have seen very little outrage expressed about these comments from the mainstream press, elected Democrats, clergy, people of conscience, or business leaders. I, and I believe many of you, once believed norms and policies, laws, elected officials, religious and business leaders, and the courts would help protect us our democracy from enemies, foreign and domestic. 

I no longer believe this to be true. Too many of our elected officials, Republicans, and especially Democrats, either agree with what is happening, are too cowardly to speak up, or too entrenched in the status quo to rise to meet the needs of today.

What we have left are our voices and our votes. At least for the moment, we can still speak up via social media posts, blogs, letters to the editors, using our dollars wisely, and peaceful protest. At least for the moment we also have our vote, the most powerful of our options.

Republicans fear our votes the most. They know Trump is not a popular president. His support, based on multiple polls, show the American people are upset with him on the price of gas, our economic situation, the Iran war, and his handling of immigrants and the undocumented.

Trump is the proverbial concrete block pulling the Republican Party down, down, down in polls, and so far at the voting booth. Republicans running for office, incumbents and newcomers, all feel it. After all, it is hard to defend policies that are hurting the very people you need to elect you.

So, rather than shift to finding ways to help we the people, the Republicans are working hard, harder than ever, to suppress our vote, purge our vote, stop our vote, deny our vote, and toss our vote. 

This is where we, as a collective, even with imperfect Democratic candidates, can make the difference to elect those who, again sometimes imperfectly, actually do care about us. Please remember, and keep in mind as you vote in a primary and then the general election, in our lifetimes it has only been Democrats who have passed legislation to actually help the least advantaged and working class of our country. Only Democrat Presidents have helped to improve and bring down the national debt and signed legislation to help all of us, not just those at the top (and yes, they too have made mistakes or not gone far enough). But, in most of our lifetimes, the United States of America has prospered the most, and been the safest, under elected Democratic Presidents.

So, Speaker Johnson has told us who he and the Republican Party are, so we must believe him. It is now up to us to demonstrate he has not chosen wisely in not supporting the American people. 

We must join together, even with people whom we don’t always agree, must speak up and show up as one, in overwhelming numbers unheard of to vote, especially in November. Regardless of what President Trump, Johnson, and the billionaire class throw at us, we must stand up and be counted. Because if we don’t, our voice and our power will diminish quickly, forever silenced. Our voices, our children’s voices, our grandchildren’s voices, and so on, and so on…forever silenced.

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The following are ways we can stand up to truly follow and rise to the ideals of the creation of our country and what the Constitution actually expects of us.