Honor the Fallen by Renewing American Values
Throughout American history, men and women have fought for a cause they found worthy of making the ultimate sacrifice for. We owe them our fight.
This Monday on Memorial Day, Americans paid tribute to the servicemen and women we’ve lost, who selflessly placed the interests of their country above their own lives, willingly paying the ultimate sacrifice to secure a nation they believed was worth defending. Ultimately, those we honored didn’t just fight for a “nation,” but for what they believed to be a noble set of ideals America has historically represented on the world stage.
With the new Trump administration making aggressive moves to realign traditional American foreign policy—making allies out of our former enemies and enemies out of our democratic allies, it’s necessary to take a step back and ask: Is this America still worth fighting for?
In short, my answer is yes. But it will require a herculean effort from American citizens to unite in defense of our traditional American values. We must recommit ourselves to the defense of democracy, truth over lies, and civility over inflammatory rhetoric. We must learn to listen to each other and remember how much more we have in common than in what divides us.
After 9/11, when the hearts of all Americans were shattered with grief, we came together and united in the defense of freedom. Even then, we had our differences, but we put them aside for the greater goal. This year, to honor those we’ve lost, let’s rally around what actually makes America great, and show the world that we still stand against authoritarianism and in defense of democracy — both stateside and abroad. Our service members deserve a citizenry dedicated to doing the hard work at home while they serve abroad. We can’t allow those we’ve lost to have died in vain.
What We’re Reading
The Atlantic: “The Trump Presidency’s World-Historical Heist”
His businesses collected at least $13 million from foreign governments over his first term in office…In his first term, he made improper millions. In his second term, he is reaching for billions.
The Dispatch: “Natural Law Does Not Lead to the Unbound Executive”
Our constitutional system, inspired by the writings of Aristotle among others, is designed with human weakness in mind. An unbound executive was precisely what it meant to avoid because the Founding Fathers recognized, as Aristotle did, that an executive unconstrained by law is a tyranny, and that those in whom such power was concentrated were likely to be corrupted by power. Aristotle thought that it would be lovely to have a perfectly wise and just monarch, but recognized that, human nature being what it is, a tyrant was much more likely.
CREW: “50 Trump Crypto Dinner Invitees Hold Tokens Linked to Alt-right Symbols and Racist Language”
Fifty of the $TRUMP memecoin dinner invitees hold crypto assets named for Pepe the Frog, which is known as an alt-right symbol, as well as swastikas, a racial slur and references to anti-semitic ideology, according to an analysis by CREW, adding to concerns raised by the dinner, which represents a naked attempt by President Donald Trump to profit from his office.
The Verge: “How a Crypto Bro Shorted $TRUMP Coin — and Scored a Dinner with the President”
Last month, Donald Trump pushed the boundaries of government and financial ethics by announcing a contest: whoever bought and held the highest amount of the $TRUMP meme coin for an entire month would win an invite to a private dinner with the President.
The Dispatch: “Make Sarah and Yaron’s Memory a Blessing”
Societies that persecute Jews are societies that are sick and dying. Societies that allow the moral rot of Jew hatred to proliferate are societies on their way out of the pages of history.
Axios: “Scoop: Stephen Miller, Noem Tell ICE to Supercharge Immigrant Arrests”
The new target is triple the number of daily arrests that agents were making in the early days of Trump's term — and suggests the president's top immigration officials are full-steam ahead in pushing for mass deportations.
NPR: “Misinformation Channels to the Oval Office”
President Trump's spreading of the false claim that South Africa is perpetrating a genocide against its white inhabitants is just the latest example of misinformation making its way from corners of the internet into presidential statements or even policy.
Washington Post: “My Fellow Republicans, the Responsibility to Speak Out Rests With You”
Former Republican AZ Senator Jeff Flake: “Our allies hear the vitriol aimed not at despots but fellow democracies. When longtime partners are publicly mocked or punished for defending their own national interests, the message is clear: Loyalty is expected to be personal, not principled.”
The Bulwark: “A Whiff of Courage in the Air”
In the midst of a complete takeover and weaponization of the executive branch of government by the authoritarians, and the complete collapse into timid passivity of the legislative branch, the third branch (the courts) is at least trying to step up. Yesterday’s unanimous decision from the Court of International Trade striking down as unlawful Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs was the most recent and one of the most striking examples.
The Dispatch: “A Blinding ‘Realism’”
A world in which America values friends who can make handshake deals, regardless of how much blood they have on their hands; a world in which trade between free economies is deemed to be theft; a world in which mutual defense over shared values is for suckers; a world in which nations can buy good will with fawning lightshows and free luxury jets: This is not a good world for Israel.
But more importantly, it’s not a good world for America.
Meidas Touch: “Trump Declares Divine Mission and Infallibility in Meme Posts”
Behind him looms a cartoon of Pepe the Frog, a meme used by far-right, QAnon, and white nationalist online communities. The phrase “nothing can stop what’s coming” is a well-known QAnon slogan, used to invoke a coming reckoning or prophetic judgment.
Check out this interview with AVC Board Chair Neal Rickner:
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