Where We Are and Where We Should Go

The current administration, or where the current administration is herding us, has been described in various ways.  (1) Fascist.  Here we have a strong leader directing major private commercial entities to work in state-approved directions.  With people’s values seen as mattering only as workers in the government-business machine. (2) An autocracy.  A strong autocrat directing government priorities, actions, and contract awards.  The leader demands loyalty and obedience.  (3) A kleptocracy.  The administration awards family and friends with positions and contracts and business.  The administration expects repayment, favors, bribes, etc.   Everyone in favor gets richer, others not so.

Well, here we are.  The current administration seems to fit or aiming toward all those descriptions.  The upshot for us here in this place?  A look at Russia gives us a bleak picture.  There is less transparency as to what is really happening and how decisions are made.  There are fewer freedoms.  Services are available for the connected, maybe for a price.  There are more top-down controls…with less listening to complaints from the lower levels of society.  Little upward mobility.  Less trust.

But how can this work in our democratic system?  The current administration, and associates, are making this work through efforts to control the narrative.  The current administration and congressional allies are working to remove constitutional checks and balances.  How is this different from Newt Gingrich’s contract on America? Now we have Citizens United and the dominance of Fox News.  As others note, we have a class of people who have not benefitted from republican priorities, but who are not looking to democrats for the solution.  This is our problem.

Katie Jgln,  “We Can’t Build a Better Future Without Better Stories
Hope alone won’t save us. But radical imagination could.”  Medium, April 24, 2025

Katie contrasts current ideas of the desirability of “growth” with some other cultures’ emphasis on happiness and wellbeing.  She also notes some European experimental communities that place emphasis on livability and making day-to-day tasks easier for family-raising (women mainly).   She also highlights the importance of the old stories in indigenous cultures, stories that highlight the kind of decision making that benefits both men and women in the community.

She says we need to push stories—stories that promote our vision, stories that call us to imagine a better culture, better economic and social systems.  We can use our own stories or the stories of others today to help others imagine how it would be to live better and happier.

“……research also shows that when stories focus only on catastrophe, on doom and gloom and all the horrors of human existence, people tend to tune out. What I personally find works well and keeps people engaged is highlighting not just said horrors or their solutions, but showing how those solutions frequently benefit us all. Despite what those who insist on drawing hard lines between Us and Them might claim, we are far more connected to — and dependent on — one another than we realise.”

“Our current crises aren’t just political, economic, or technological — they’re also crises of narrative. We’re still stuck with stories that reward dominance, rigid hierarchies, scarcity, and rugged individualism; stories that, despite their lofty promises, only benefit a privileged few and block real change.”

I bet there are stories that some of us have, or know of from recent writings, that we can use here to inspire people, and to reach out to pave the way for our main messages.

So imagine:

1. We can put education funding on a more fair and firmer footing in Texas. Wouldn’t it be nice if communities didn’t have to balance the pain of property taxes against the needs of students.  It will take work in Texas, because Republicans have built a wall to protect the rich from an income tax.  But that wall can be knocked down.
2.  We have a housing crisis, even here in Erath.  An under appreciated campaign plank of Kamala Harris was grants to help first time home owners.   Imagine the boon to builders and families if there were help for home buyers.  People recognize the problem.  A solution is in reach.  This is a rich country.
3. Tied into the above, everyone will benefit from increasing the minimum wage. An early industrialist realized this and convinced his friends not to resist the call.  After all, how would he do well building refrigerators if no one had money to buy them?  Likewise, how can we sell houses?  People need to feel that they can afford them.
4. Imagine funds available to new parents for day care.  Maybe if workers received a fair wage, there would be less need for two incomes in a family, sparing the working wife.  But otherwise, we need to support working mothers and their children.  Everyone should be able to see this.  Forget a one-time small payment for having a child.  We have the money, or can get it with a small percentage increase to income taxes paid by the top 10% moneyed class.
5. A bridge too far? Also, here’s an issue which has become malignant because some could not see the benefit to themselves of changes.  We need to have immigration reform, and from that we will all benefit.   We need immigrants. We need people who feel they are on the path to becoming citizens and so have an impetus to act as good citizens.  Imagine newcomers who are eager learners of our laws and traditions—not hiding and keeping only within their trusted network of marginalized outsiders.  New perspectives, new ideas, new entrepreneurs. 

​Do you have a story to make one of those ideas a compelling ice-breaker?

• https://www.npr.org/2025/04/20/nx-s1-5338596/hungary-viktor-orban-democracy
  
• https://open.substack.com/pub/robertreich/p/the-view-from-the-right?r=2a270l&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email
• https://medium.com/the-noösphere/we-cant-build-a-better-future-without-better-stories-67a4d3889ab6

David A. Brock

David is a retired scientist/naturalist who would like to be spending more time with his books, binoculars, water garden, and wildflowers.  He is from South Dakota, with stops in Montana; Austin; Elgin, TX; central Kansas; and now Dublin, TX.