In general, like, for the planet, 2025 does not promise to be a good year. I sort of hate when people think like that, though. 2024 was a good year for me<\/a> and many people I know. Politics is necessarily going to suck up a lot of the oxygen in the room. We should not let it suck up all the oxygen<\/a>\u2014especially people like Donald Trump and Elon Musk, who actually die a little if you don\u2019t pay attention to them. So really\u2014gear up, steel yourselves, hold your loved ones close\u2014but also take walks, stare at bodies of water, listen to music, see your friends, go to a museum. <\/p> I\u2019ll go ahead and spoil Friday\u2019s books, because they\u2019re something of a theme for this column: I\u2019m reading Anarcho-Indigenism: Conversations On Land and Freedom<\/em> edited by Francis Dupuis-Deri and Benjamin Pillet. I\u2019m also reading The Book Of Delights<\/em> by Ross Gay. <\/p> The theme I\u2019m starting the year with eyes open to the horror, but having a good time as much as you can.<\/p> Beauty and joy continue even when the jagoffs and assholes don\u2019t want it to. <\/p> The idea for this post has been percolating since a little before Christmas, and I\u2019m still unsure what exactly to say. The genocide in Gaza rages on, even as reports of Israeli soldiers indiscriminately killing Palestinian civilians<\/a> collide with reports of the last hospital in northern Gaza being destroyed<\/a>. We are coming up on the one-year anniversary of Aaron Bushnell self-immolating<\/a> in an attempt to get the Biden administration to come to its senses and stop arming the bloodthirsty, racist, and settler-colonial regime in Israel. Others have followed his example. Crickets. <\/p> It\u2019s been months since Luigi Mangione\u2014sexy ab-haver, back pain experiencer\u2014triple-tapped a drunk driver who happened to be the CEO of a health insurance company<\/a>. To underline his motives, Luigi wrote \u201cdelay, deny, depose\u201d\u2014a play on the book <\/a>Delay, Deny, Defend<\/a><\/em> by Jay M. Feinman<\/a>\u2014on the shell casings the police would recover from the insurance CEO\u2019s body, which United Healthcare investors stepped over to start their meeting on time<\/a>. People in this country are so mad at the healthcare system that America\u2019s Librarian, aka Your Aunt Who Is Okay With You Never Calling Her But Does<\/em> Like To See You Occasionally, Elizabeth Warren, said: \u201cyooooo, I get <\/em>it!\u201d1<\/a><\/p> It will be 10 years this year since Donald Trump descended an escalator without taking a step\u2014exercise takes years off your life<\/a>, says the man who eats Big Macs without buns<\/a>\u2014and called all Mexicans rapists and killers. Literally every non-billionaire\u2019s life has gotten worse since then. Even the car dealership-owning Klansmen who support him are worse off, they just don\u2019t realize it. Trump\u2019s life? Only gotten better since then. <\/p> I often feel like I am out of step with most people. I freely admit to being a weirdo. Hell, I relish it. But at my core, I feel pretty uncomplicated: I want to be a good dad and husband and friend and brother and son, read and write books, play music, eat good food, have a little adventure, watch movies, and most importantly, I want everyone to have a good time. So many people seem to be completely oriented toward other people not<\/em> having a good time, or shit, even everyone<\/em> having a bad<\/em> time. I can\u2019t understand it. I don\u2019t get people who work in the insurance industry or defend it. I don\u2019t get people who work in the military industrial complex, or people who relish war\u2014including the broadcasters who salivate over bombs dropping<\/a>. I am not a person of violence or dramatic action, but I completely understand<\/em> Luigi Mangione and Aaron Bushnell. I am also a voter\u2014Jesus Christ forgive me, but I have voted Democrat my whole life. But after the DNC\u2019s response to ceasefire demonstrations\u2014literally, fingers in their ears<\/a> and complete denial of a voice<\/a>, even when a powerful union calls for it<\/a>\u2014I completely<\/em> understand <\/em>people who do not participate in the electoral process. I don\u2019t think either of those things\u2014murder, self-immolating, nonparticipation\u2014are particularly productive. But there is clearly a time for every tactic. <\/p> Over at Defector<\/em>, Tom Ley asks \u201cwhat comes after the gun?\u201d<\/a> (maybe a spiritual sequel to Nicholas Russell asking \u201cwhat comes after the post-crisis reading list?\u201d<\/a>) Tom points out that Liz Warren (or any other politician) hasn\u2019t exactly come out with a megaphone yelling about passing Medicare For All. In fact, as Tom says, \u201cIt wasn\u2019t so long ago that we witnessed a populist presidential campaign premised on [healthcare for all], and then watched it be swept aside by a political order that neutralizes insurgency just as swiftly as it metabolizes violence. \u2018Medicare for all\u2019 went from being one of the most urgent and prominent political slogans of my lifetime to a relic of a dead language over the course of a few short years.\u201d In the grocery store parking lot the other day, I saw a Harris\/Walz bumper sticker that read \u201cdemocracy or dictators?\u201d Well. What kind of democracy do we have, when the people make such increasingly desperate cries for help, and the powers that be continuously respond with \u201csuck it up?\u201d <\/p> This year, I promise to offer no answers to these questions. But I think you know what you\u2019re getting from this blog<\/a>. We\u2019re going to be reading with an eye toward these questions, problems, potential solutions. But we\u2019re gonna be reading, like, werewolf sailor stories. It\u2019s gonna be a year. <\/p> Sorry you got an email, <\/p> Chris<\/p>![\"File:Two](\"https:\/\/substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/public\/images\/db737203-e969-4ddf-bc72-7fcdbd7edc03_800x450.jpeg\")
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