What Would the Red Ponchos Do?

by C. A. Matthews

A few years ago, there was a fad to wear a bracelet with the letters “WWJD?” inscribed on it. In times of doubt and uncertainty, one was to contemplate what the person whose name in English begins with “J” would do in that particular situation. The “What Would J Do?” method helped a person to confidently take action and not become paralyzed with fear or indecision.

It worked. It was an effective means to an end, because if J wouldn’t be afraid to take action, then you shouldn’t be afraid, either. So, you followed J’s example and carried on boldly without hesitation, trusting that things would work out for the best. The WWJD bracelet wasn’t a magic amulet, but it could indeed work wonders.

The time has come again for a useful aid to help activists who are being overwhelmed with self-doubt and self-recrimination. I’ve read one too many comments online recently that go along the lines of “Why don’t you do something? I don’t know what to do. Nobody seems to know what to do, but somebody has got to do something to make things better, right?”

This sentiment could also be phrased as “We need a revolution to end this corrupt system, but apparently no one is going to lead us, so we might as well stay home.”

The paralysis of not knowing what to do is what the oligarchy depends upon to keep us working class peons in our place. They’ve kept us overwhelmed with one distressing event after another on purpose from the start of the year...

We haven’t been given a moment’s rest from the sensory overload. It’s just too much. We long for a respite from the capitalists’ constant nastiness and relentless stress. Why can’t our side celebrate a victory now and then? If only we had someone fighting against the system to look up to, somebody to emulate, then we’d get off our backsides and start fighting back.

But why are we waiting on a “hero” to lead us into battle? History is full of examples—Gandhi, MLK Jr., Malcolm X—that we could follow. Recent history is providing us with even more.

My suggestion is to pick a person or group with experience you admire and follow their example. Do what they’re doing/have done with maybe a few tweaks for your particular situation and culture. If “plagiarism is the sincerest form of flattery,” then why not flatter those we look up to by copying their tactics and methods until we come up with some of our own?

 

To discover a couple of excellent examples of activists to plagiarize, please copy or click on the following link: 

https://therevolutioncontinues.substack.com

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Finding the Good in the Bad

by C. A. Matthews

After a very painful week—personally painful because an old injury decided to play up and our senior cat passed away from a terminal illness—I didn’t feel like writing a weekly post. I just wanted to whine, cry, and complain, “Why me?” It’s understandable why I’m so sad and grouchy, but it doesn’t do much good for my overall attitude or help my readers. I want to enlighten and uplift others, and that doesn’t work if I don’t at least attempt to write a piece.

I searched for inspiration and found nothing until I opened up a daily email meditation. The short essay said there’s a little good in everything. Yeah, it said everything—meaning every situation and every person (and cat). You just have to look for it. Scanning my daily X and UpScrolled feeds didn’t reveal a heck of a lot of good in the world, but I decided to give it a go. I would look for the good behind some of the negative headlines this week.

So, here goes nothing—and everything at the same time.

On the US domestic front, several stories concerning the building of massive AI data centers caught my eye. There’s actually nothing new about data centers in the US. The US by far has more data centers than any other country on Earth. The thing about this topic that grabbed my attention was that the people of Utah, Michigan, Illinois, Ohio, Georgia, and New Jersey have taken notice of how data centers are growing ever larger and demanding more and more electricity, land, and water at the local community’s expense.

Data centers pollute the local water table and fill the surrounding air with light pollution (no stars, messes with bird/insect migrations), heat pollution (global warming anyone?), and destructive sound pollution. Yeah, data centers actually produce constant vibrations right below the sound threshold that can injure and kill both humans and animals. Data centers after they’re built don’t employ all that many local workers, either. Too many bad things about them just ain’t right...

So, what’s the good in this very bad situation? The good I find in it isn’t in the data centers themselves but in the reaction of ordinary people against the data centers. For the most part, they aren’t having them...

 

To see other examples of finding the good in the bad headlines, please copy or click on the following link: 

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Rest in Power, Elsie girl.

A lot of good can be found in a little senior kitty

 

This article is the 571st blog posting of The Revolution Continues. We began in June 2015, and we're still going strong. Please keep reading, sharing, and subscribing to help TRC continue for another eleven years. Thanks! 

Feel free to make a donation at our Paypal or Buy Me a Coffee or Ko-fi. Every little bit helps. Thank you.   

 Conscientious objectors: Call the G.I. Rights Hotline at 1-877-447-4487 or the Center for Conscience & War: 1-800-379-2679. 

An Empire That Starves Its Citizens While Feeding Its War Machine

by C. A. Matthews

“The message could not be clearer: there is always money for bombs, borders, and war—but never enough for children, healthcare, or basic human dignity… No amount of flag‑draped propaganda can hide the simple, brutal math of an empire that starves its citizens while feeding its war machine.” --from Can’t Afford Daycare or Healthcare — But Hegseth Swears a $1.5 Trillion War Budget ‘Puts Taxpayers First’

It can’t be that simple, can it?

Why is it that the US empire doesn’t care whether ordinary Americans live or die? Why is it they don’t care that we can't afford to have children or own a home? When you think about it, it’s a million times more evil than simply being an empire that starves its citizens. It’s an empire that cares only about making huge profits from endless wars and genocides for its oligarchy, its billionaire rulers, rather than the health and welfare of its people.

There’s no real need to explain away recent comments coming from the White House. “It’s not possible for us to take care of day care, Medicaid, Medicare, all these individual things,” Trump said. “We’re fighting wars. We can’t take care of day care.” His words speak for themselves. (Quote taken from Trump says it’s ‘not possible’ for the U.S. to pay for Medicaid, Medicare and day care: ‘We’re fighting wars’)

War will always rank above healthcare, childcare, and environmental issues for the US empire—especially if these issues have anything to do with the poor and working classes. No real surprises there. 

But the thing that surprises and disgusts me the most is how so many Americans have been brainwashed into thinking that this type of callous behavior originated with Donald Trump. To them nothing bad like this ever happened before Trump entered the White House in 2017 and then again in 2025.

To jog your memory, watch this short video. Be sure to read the text on the screen while listening to the discussion in the background: The Façade of Democracy...

To learn one way you can help stop the US empire and its war machine, please copy or click on the following link: 

https://therevolutioncontinues.substack.com

There you'll be able to read the rest of this article, find related links, see more graphics, and leave comments. You can become a free or paid subscriber and receive weekly email posts, along with occasional special articles just for paid subscribers, too.

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This article is the 570th blog posting of The Revolution Continues. We began in June 2015, and we're still going strong. Please keep reading, sharing, and subscribing to help TRC continue for another eleven years. Thanks! 

Feel free to make a donation at our Paypal or Buy Me a Coffee or Ko-fi. Every little bit helps. Thank you.   

Conscientious objectors: Call the G.I. Rights Hotline at 1-877-447-4487 or the Center for Conscience & War: 1-800-379-2679. 

Apartheid Without Borders

Apartheid Without Borders

by C.A. Matthews 

ALARM! How on earth is possible that Israel is allowed to assault and seize vessels in international waters just off Greece/Europe? Besides what you can think of Apartheid Israel and its genocidal leaders, this should send shock waves across Europe. Apartheid without borders. —Francesca Albanese on X 

Novelist Philip K. Dick would be proud.

Here’s the scenario: You’re sailing your boat in international waters when a frigate full of commandos from a country over 1,000 km away starts shooting at you and demanding you surrender to them so they can beat you up, arrest you and dump your cargo of humanitarian aid into the sea, and all because feeding starving people is now illegal and that makes you a criminal, not the pirates who boarded you off the coast of yet another country whose coast guard looks the other way while these events unfold.

Philip K. Dick would have had a field day crafting a taut suspense novel around this idea on an innocent man doing a noble thing being persecuted by those in power who claim they are always right and anyone who says otherwise is a criminal—or possibly insane or both. Either way, the innocent man will be punished for his “crimes” against the status quo.

Alas, this story isn’t fiction. (And I doubt I could come up with such a convoluted and depressive plot.) Here’s what really happened. From Flotilla Activists Beaten and Shot at by IDF, With 34 Hospitalised in Greece:

Global Sumud Flotilla participants say they were punched, kicked, dragged across the floor with their hands tied, and shot at with real and rubber bullets on board an Israeli warship after they were kidnapped in international waters more than 500 nautical miles from Gaza.

While interception was violent for many, participants say the worst treatment came when they peacefully resisted moves to abduct organisers Thiago Avila and Saif Abukeshek, who are still detained.

34 wounded participants - including two Brits - have been taken to hospital in Crete, flotilla organisers said, with broken bones and other injuries...

 

To learn more about the Global Sumud Flotilla and why the world sat back and did nothing to help them from IDF pirates, please copy or click on the following link: 

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This article is the 569th blog posting of The Revolution Continues. We began in June 2015, and we're still going strong. Please keep reading, sharing, and subscribing to help TRC continue for another eleven years. Thanks! 

Feel free to make a donation at our Paypal or Buy Me a Coffee or Ko-fi. Every little bit helps. Thank you.   

Conscientious objectors: Call the G.I. Rights Hotline at 1-877-447-4487 or the Center for Conscience & War: 1-800-379-2679.