A New American Manifesto

From the People of the United States of America: From time to time in human societies, things get so bad with the governments that we set up that we have to take a step back, stop being citizens of that government and just be basic humans again, loyal only to the primary needs of humanity. This is one of those times and it’s only fair if we are going to take such a drastic step, that we first explain why. We owe everybody that.

First of all, we start by taking for granted that nobody’s life should matter more than anyone else’s. Everyone should have the right to live their life without people oppressing them. At minimum everyone should have the right to live. Nobody should be prevented from moving around freely or doing whatever they want as long as they are not causing harm to someone else. More than that, every human has the right to seek out things that bring them joy.

These are basic things that humans need.

The whole reason we create governments is so that communities can come together and agree among themselves to set up structures that make sure that ALL the humans among them have access to these fundamental needs. If the structure that they set up stops functioning properly, if it becomes corrupted, if it stops serving the needs of the people, then it is critical that those humans be allowed to dismantle that structure in order to build one that does a better job. They need to be allowed to create new structures that are better at keeping them safe and happy.

Nobody is suggesting that we take the dismantling of a government lightly. Things must have gotten really bad for this to be the only option left. Humans by nature don’t like change and even when they’re being harmed, they’re more likely to just endure that harm than to break down a whole system that they’re comfortable with and used to. But if things get so bad that the government starts abusing and harming its citizens in the name of gaining more power, it’s every human’s moral duty to burn that government down and build one that protects them better from would-be dictators.

The American people are now facing down these exact same kinds of abuses. We have tried to be patient, but now we’re fed up and the whole thing needs to come down.

The entire Trump administration has been a long list of human and civil rights abuses and every single thing he has done has been to gain absolute power over the government.

Here are the Receipts:

1. He is lawless. He has no respect whatsoever for the rules of this country
2. He has interfered with state Governors’ abilities to take care of their states in times of crisis, constantly breaking promises and being unreliable, just to wear them down so that they will do whatever he wants and then neglects them even when they do it.
3. He has abused the powers of the Presidency, leveraging people’s rights for business purposes.
4. He turns public events into personal campaign stunts, wearing all the rational people down with his antics and erratic behavior
5. He has repeatedly fired the heads of critical agencies for refusing to support his illegal and abusive orders.
6. He routinely leaves these positions unfilled so that Congress doesn’t have a formal say in confirming nominations. This allows him to keep unconfirmed lackeys at the heads of agencies where Congress can’t touch them and they can sabotage and exploit the agencies without consequence, leaving the public without the safety those agencies provide. This causes chaos.
7. He has imposed harsh immigration laws and is directly attacking the economies of States and cities that allow people he doesn’t like into their borders.
8. He has rigged the Judicial system, conspiring with Congress to break rules to secure his judge appointments.
9. He has made shady deals with judicial appointees to influence them.
10. He is inventing personal secret police squads to terrorize and harass the population
11. He has flooded our cities with militarized personnel against the wishes of local populations and their governments.
12. He glorifies violent law enforcement and elevates them above the rest of the humans in the country
13. He has corrupted the Justice Department and Congress, using them to help him create a wholly unconstitutional set of policies
14. He pardons and covers for crimes committed by these henchmen and refuses to allow any accountability for their treason
15. He has started costly and economically damaging trade wars
16. He supports extrajudicial killings and encourages a lack of due process by law enforcement.
17. He uses tax laws to steal from the poor and give to the rich.
18. He supports the use of black sites, torture and other brutal authoritarian measures
19. He has leveraged the oversized jurisdiction of the Border Patrol to impose their power on areas and people they were never intended to.
20. He has trampled the rule of law, all protocol and policy. He shows no respect whatsoever for the institutions of government.
21. He is overreaching with Federal jurisdiction, overriding local jurisdictions with his own teams.
22. He isn’t protecting America, he’s waging war on us.
23. He has withdrawn us from crucial environmental treaties, deregulated industry, refused aid for wildfires, and has allowed over 200,000 people to die needlessly from a preventable pandemic
24. His federal forces have been stockpiling weapons for use against the civilian populace
25. He turns dissidents against each other, threatening them with high crimes if they don’t turn against their fellow protestors.
26. He starts riots and leverages those brutal, merciless folks embedded in our every community, the police, whose known rules of engagement are “anyone who’s not a cop can die”

Over and over again we have pointed these things out. We have complained. We have petitioned. We protested in the streets. None of this has worked and instead of listening to us, Trump has merely responded with increased violence. To put it plainly, a President whose every act is the same as a dictator isn’t fit to run a country. And a government who lets him isn’t fit to govern.

We tried to be empathetic to those who support Trump and his nationalism. We tried to give them the heads up that they had made a terrible choice. We tried to remind them that many of them were immigrants and that they should think twice about how we deny others entry. We tried to appeal to their sense of honor. To their sense of civics. To their sense of duty. We tried to appeal to the fact that we’re all in this together and that we are all one nation. We tried to explain that backing authoritarianism would be terrible for everyone. But they wouldn’t listen. We tried. We wanted to fight Trump together. But they mock justice and shun the idea of unity. So nothing personal, but they picked a side.

So we, the true Patriots of the United States of America, in the name of all that is good and holy, declare that we aren’t standing for it anymore. This country failed to live up to its promises and it’s time to build something new and better.

We are united in this goal.

We can do better than this.

We intend to and we swear our lives, our money, and our sacred honor to each other.

Adapted from the Declaration of Independence