Notebook: Social Security Rally Today in SB - and Across the Nation; Why It Matters
As most Democratic electeds remain in a defensive crouch, the most visible evidence of resistance to the mob boss president has taken shape on the streets. It's starting to have an impact
A growing wave of public anti-Trump demonstrations, one factor in his steadily declining poll numbers, will re-emerge in Santa Barbara and across the nation today, as protesters rally against cuts in the Social Security Administration.
A rally has been organized for noon today (Thursday April 24) at the Santa Barbara Security Office at 122 West Figueroa Street in the city.
“We are experiencing the biggest assault on Social Security in its 89 years as the most effective anti-poverty program in American history,” said Jon Bauman, President of Social Security Works PAC, in a statement about the protest. “We absolutely demand that no SSA offices be closed by the un-elected Musk and his co-president Trump.”
More than 73 million people - one in five Americans - depend on Social Security benefits, which they have earned by paying into its fund during their working years.
Elon Musk, while transferring official Social Security communications to his social media platform X (!), already has overseen the reduction of thousands of jobs inside Social Security, amid reliable press reporting that he and Trump plan more massive cuts in the nation’s largest and most venerable safety net program.
Organizers of today’s rally, led by Social Security Works and Indivisible Santa Barbara, said the event will be a demonstration to “support the work being done by these offices to deliver benefits earned by working Americans.”
Symbolic of that support, protest leaders will deliver a letter written by U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren, D-Ma., that says congressional Democrats will “fight Trump and Musk in order to safeguard the Social Security benefits earned by millions of Americans over the court of their working lives.”
As a political matter, the Social Security rallies are just the latest in a series of increasingly visible demonstrations against Trump’s extremist right-wing agenda. Researchers of authoritarian movements have identified collective resistance by broad pro-democracy coalitions as a crucial feature of effective opposition.
At a time when elected Democrats, with precious few exceptions (Senator Chris Van Hollen; Gov. JB Pritzker; Rep. Robert Garcia, D-Long Beach come to mind) are responding to the Trump’s corrupt and kakistocratic government in cowardly (shout-out Gavin Newsom), appeasing (John Fetterman in the house), or utterly lame ways (looking out you, Salud Carbajal), it has been left to ordinary citizens and political activists to organize resistance organically.
Although public protest can achieve only so much, it appears to be having some effect.
As Trump prepares to observe the 100-day mark of his Administration next week, he has substantially declined in public opinion polls of his job performance, especially on his handling of the economy, the critical issue that paved the way for his narrow victory over Kamala Harris last fall.
The latest aggregation of professional public polling by survey research guru Nate Silver on Wednesday showed Trump hitting a new low, with 44.8 percent approving of his performance as president and 51.8 percent disapproving. a net approval rating of -7.0.
In a must-read op-ed in the New York Times this week, the veteran Washington strategist Doug Sosnik noted that every modern president, of both parties, endured a steep decline in approval by September of the first year of the term, which he said is a more reliable predictor of how an administration will fare than the 100-day milestone.
Sosnik, arguing that Trump is “over reading his mandate” by emphasizing issues of greater interest to his base than to the independent mainstream voters who were determinative last November, notes that he’s headed toward September from a position of unique weakness:
“Now as in 2017, he is the only modern president to have a net negative approval rating at this point in his term. And as more and more Americans begin to feel the pain of his policies, we may well look back on his first 100 days as the prelude to a historically unpopular presidency.”
Notably, he reports that there are 1,986 counties in the U.S. where 25 percent or more of the income of local residents derives from government assistance - primarily Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.
“What is particularly dangerous for Mr. Trump is that almost 80 percent of these counties supported Republicans in previous elections.
“Despite the fact that most people think there is waste in the government and that fat should be cut, they also believe that the government performs essential services. They will value these services even more when they no longer receive them.”
Recommended Reading. When future generations ask, “What did grandpa do to stop the onslaught of the fascists?” it may or may or not be adjudged a satisfactory defense to answer, “he spent all day, every day, reading, writing and talking on the internets.”
Notwithstanding the questionable efficacy of such a blueprint for opposing authoritarianism, it is reassuring, if only as a matter of personal mental hygiene, to day-in-day-out discover such a treasure of thoughtful, informative and outrage-filled reporting, analysis and commentary that reliably buttresses two core beliefs necessary to sustaining and surviving in the Age of Trump:
We are not the crazy ones.
This is not normal.
In that spirit, here are five must-read pieces with the Newsmakers Seal of Approval, ranging from economics, history and foreign affairs to baseball, race and the scientific study of happiness.
Trump’s Tariff Madness is about One Thing: His Thirst for One-Man Rule — E.J. Dionne, The New Republic
“The big thing the CEOs missed, pre-Liberation Day, is that Trump is not a capitalist in the strict sense of the term. He’s a kleptocrat. Webster’s defines kleptocracy as “a government by those who seek chiefly status and personal gain at the expense of the governed.” That’s a rather good definition of the Trump regime.”
Dodgers’ Celebration of Jackie Robinson Day Rings Hollow in Wake of White House Visit — Dylan Hernandez, Los Angeles Times
“Rather than continue to stimulate important conversations, the Dodgers are back to whistling past America’s graveyard, pretending there is nothing hypocritical about visiting President Trump one week and celebrating Jackie Robinson Day the next. Conservative Fox News commentator Laura Ingraham wanted athletes to “shut up and dribble,” and the Dodgers are doing the baseball equivalent of just that.”
America’s Future is Hungary — — Anne Applebaum, The Atlantic
“What is this Hungarian model (Trump allies) so admire? Mostly, it has nothing to do with modern statecraft. Instead it’s a very old, very familiar blueprint for autocratic takeover, one that has been deployed by right-wing and left-wing leaders alike, from Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to Hugo Chávez. After being elected to a second term in 2010, Orbán slowly replaced civil servants with loyalists; used economic pressure and regulation to destroy the free press; robbed universities of their independence, and shut one of them down; politicized the court system; and repeatedly changed the constitution to give himself electoral advantages…He has aligned himself openly with Russia and China, serving as a mouthpiece for Russian foreign policy at EU meetings and allowing opaque Chinese investments in his country.
Feeling Bummed? You’re Not Alone as the U.S. Drops to a Record Low in the World Happiness Index — Peter Guo, NBCNews.com
“In the rankings of happiness haves and have-nots, the U.S. dropped to its lowest ever spot at No. 24, continuing its decline from a peak of the 11th place over a decade ago. The report described political polarization as a result of growing despair among Americans.”
The American Age is Over — Jonathan V. Last, The Bulwark
“The eighty-year period when the United States embraced the mantle of global economic leadership—when it forged alliances rooted in trust and mutual respect, and championed the free and open exchange of good and services—is over.
While this is a tragedy, it is also the new reality. And just like that, the age of American empire, the great Pax Americana, ended.”
Have you felt the impact of Trump’s mis-Administration? If you, a friend or family member has been impacted by the reckless actions and policies of the White House - economically, socially, politically or any other way - send us an email at newsmakerswithjr@gmail.com. We’d like to tell your story.
Image: President Franklin Roosevelt signing the Social Security Act, on August 14, 1935. Attending were: (L-R) Representative Robert Doughton (D-NC), Senator Robert Wagner (D-NY), Representative John Dingell (D-MI), Representative Joshua Twing Brooks (D-Pennsylvania), Secretary of Labor Frances Perkins, Senator Pat Harrison (D-MS), and Representative David Lewis (D-MD). (Library of Congress).