Back when I was a young kid, I used to fight with my brother and cousins all the time. My brother used to teach me new stuff and then tell friends of mine I said something wild about them, just to see how I would handle myself in a fight. There was one Saturday in particular that he went outside like 20 minutes before I did. When I stepped out, I saw my friends standing near my brother, but they didn’t say much to me. One guy said “what was that shit you said” and pushed me. I let it slide because I didn’t know what he was talking about. The other two got behind me talking crazy too. Now, at no point did I think they were seriously upset, or stupid enough to attack me…with my big brother, known for beating ass in the hood, right there. Next thing I know, they attacked me.
Initially, they were getting the best of me because I assumed my brother would step in and then we would beat their ass. Nope, he just leaned against the gate watching them punch and kick at me, waiting for my black out moment. FYI, there was a moment in every fight I was ever losing in which I hit a black out moment that resulted in me fighting 2 or 3 levels better than I began with. When I realized, he wasn’t going to help, the situation turned from dire, to completely one sided even though it was 3 against 1. To say I beat the shit out of each one of them would be an understatement. All of them walked away bleeding, but not before my brother let them know he made it all up just to see what I would do. I wanted to fight those dummies again for being dumb. We didn’t speak for the rest of the day, but we got cool again the following weekend.
Ain’t No Help Coming!
In 2016 I believe, the media and Democrats in general were having a difficult time combatting Donald Trump’s bullshit. He would say 20 lies and a half truth in the same day. All of the left leaning pundits took the bait and talked about the 20 lies. Right leaning pundits would inflate the value of the half-truth and they’d also pretend like some of the lies were actually positive. This served to frustrate most democrats and infuriate candidates as it should have. The response was to continue combatting it with what they were already doing, as if they couldn’t recognize the futility in that. To make matters worse, somehow, they decided it was best to take the high ground in a fight. As my father told me many times, there is no such thing as a fair fight, as it pertains to street fighting of course. I believe it was that election cycle when Michelle Obama said “when they go low, we go high”. That is the ONLY time I looked at her and said “what part of Chicago you from again” because she knows better than that.
And it’s that sentiment that has Democrats losing ground politically. Not that the high ground is bad, it’s just not effective in a real fight. What becomes apparent when watching a fight, if one side appears to be going all in, cheating, doing awful, unforgivable shit while the other side is always trying to play by the rules, people begin to think they’re watching WWE Wrestling. Much like that form of entertainment, as people advance in age and intelligence, it no longer appeals to their senses. I personally stopped watching wrestling when I was 8 or 9, not saying it is objectively bad, but it’s obviously not real fighting.
Call It Like It Is
The problem is the Republicans are doing shit that is actually harmful to most of the folks watching. The people cheering for it, pretend like it’s not the fault of the GOP, whereas the people booing them are getting angrier that the person they’re cheering for keeps looking to the ref to intervene. Democratic leaders don’t seem to have a black out mode in them, at least not enough of them do. Sadly, the only politicians trying to go at these folks are Black and Hispanic women. The lack of testicular fortitude is adversely impacting the fight. Not to say women can’t fight, but it is to say, on average, White men don’t really give a shit about how Black and Hispanic women feel. As I previously stated, there is strength in numbers, but a lot of these liberal White men are standing outside of the fight like a timid girl picking the best moment to jump in the Double Dutch ropes.
It seems like many of the constituents are seeing this and losing faith in them to do their job. I fully understand that because I question if these guys really care sometimes too. Too many of the liberal White guys don’t want to get hit in the face, so they’re waiting until it seems like the fight is more in their favor to jump in. They’re letting others do the hard work in laying the foundation for resistance and letting them take the lumps, to only come in later for the win. The problem with that is, the people fighting on their behalf can’t win without their assistance, they simply don’t have the numbers to win. So, what is more likely if this timid behavior continues is a slow loss, versus a good, winnable fight.
If it wasn’t already obvious, I’m not into “going high when they go low”. If anything, I’d say, when necessary, go to the deepest depths with these spineless fucks and get as dirty as is needed for the win. THAT is what people want from Democrats, but we keep getting this “turn the other cheek”, moral high ground bullshit that no one truly believes in. As one’s rights, investments, peace of mind and general sense of sanity erodes, so too does their confidence in the team they support. My theory is that the bullshit being pushed by the GOP right now doesn’t adversely impact liberal White men enough for them to feel the same level of outrage as White women, and every ethnic minority in the country. It’s in the “not my problem” ballpark for many, and “well this wouldn’t be all that bad for me” ballpark of many others.
Turning The Corner
Many GOP supporters have fucked around and found out already. However, they are fed a daily dose of pure bullshit, so these folks in the middle of nowhere places have been convinced that a trans kid in a big city 5 states over is their concern, while healthcare, and a livable wage is left wing socialism. I know, I know, more doom and gloom in these sporadic blog posts, but oddly enough I feel optimistic. I’ll get to that but let me address a couple more of these clouds. The darkest cloud to me at the moment is minority support for the GOP going up in spite of every rational reason for it not to. That speaks more to the lack of hope and lack of ownership in my opinion. Financially, it’s a tough time because of income inequality and tech advancements. Even so, there is opportunity in this chaos.
And with that, here’s a few reasons why I’m optimistic. In regards to the market, things will probably be bad for a few months, maybe a year or two. When shit is bad on Wall Street AND Main Street, then people are usually relocating out of First Street SE and 1600 Pennsylvania Ave in election years. That’s the US Capitol and White House for those unfamiliar. With a change at the Capitol, there will at least be a check and balance factor restored. I fully expect that to occur in 2026. Also, I believe this is a prime time for more poor people to get into the market. Sounds like an oxymoron, but poor folks still buy things they don’t need. We may be in the best stretch for dollar cost average investing accessible to multiple income classes. Yes, the barrier is education and information, but this is an “each one, teach one” moment courtesy of yours truly, and you.
As of me writing this, the S&P 500 is down 5% in 2025 and expected to drop some more. In addition to some actual idiotic decisions by Trump’s administration, fear is driving the market down. That said, this is the time to open a brokerage account and buy shares of a dividend paying index fund every month if you can afford it. Sure, the value will go down in the near term, that’s kind of the point though. Buy low, hold or sell high. Over the last 30 years, if you were to pick the month of, or the 4 months preceding a downturn, if you advance 5 years from each of those points, the market recovered 100% of the time. COVID was brand new 5 years ago. We went through it, got beyond it, and are now dealing with new shit. That to say, 5 years is not that long of a time period.
The positive impact is twofold, if the people have a greater percentage of ownership in companies than we do now, those companies will have to care a little bit more about how we feel, because mass selloffs trigger corporate losses and so on. Also, we can have folks on the lower end of the financial spectrum coming up, older folks passing generational wealth on, and things of that nature. I can guarantee that with money invested, folks will care about more aspects of the political spectrum than just the social things we can rightfully complain about. It becomes the multifaceted beast that we know it is, but we will know and understand another facet, and there’s A LOT of value and benefit in that.