Going into battle despite great odds

People love that shit!

Luke O'Neil

02 Feb 2025 • 9 min read

Something I hear a lot is that they're doing so much all at once because the goal is to overwhelm us and I have good and bad news for the people saying that because it is 100% working. I am in fact overwhelmed. I imagine you are too. Vacillating between a state of shock and impotence and confusion.

Here's the thing though: You and I are just some fucking guy. Which is where my additional emotion in the form of fury comes in. Not just at Trump and Musk for overthrowing our entire system of governance in a couple of weeks but at the people who are letting them do it right under their noses with barely any pushback. The people who are meant to be fighting for us just sitting on their dicks and putting out posts. Behaving as if this is all business as usual.

Here's one I saw from Adam Schiff the other day.

Ok man thanks.

Who is he talking to there? Me? Am I supposed to go handle things? Democrats don't even do their usual minimum of "bearing witness to suffering" anymore. Now they're offloading it onto their constituents so they can bang out early for a long weekend.

Let me ask you something Senator. What the fuck is it that you actually do? What is your job sir?

Just from like a cynical future personal career advancement thing you might think any one of these guys would be doing dramatic stunts to show what is going on and yet instead we get posts.

Here are some from Chuck Schumer from yesterday.

Ah crap my pizza prices. Elected Democrats are the only people left on earth who still believe any of this had to do with the cost of groceries.

Here's Amy Klobuchar in the NYT.

We’re only a couple of weeks into the Trump administration, and I think it’s fair to say it’s been a lot already. He’s taking a shock-and-awe approach.

I look at it this way: Chaos up. Corruption up. And, sadly, the cost of eggs is way up. No matter how many tech bros you have at the inauguration, none of that helps the people who weren’t in that room. Those are the people that he told he was going to work to bring down housing costs, to create more housing, to do more on child care, to bring down health care costs, and he kept telling us how beautiful it would be. Well, all of this — and maybe it’s done for a distraction — but all of this chaos takes us away from that mission.

So how do Democrats respond? What should the strategy be when you’ve got this fire hose coming at you?

Well, first of all, it is very clear that, if there is a middle of all of this hot mess of division, Americans want us to work together when we can and find common ground. We have said repeatedly — our leaders, individual senators — that we are ready to do that. So that’s No. 1.

No. 2 is, when they start violating the law and firing inspectors general without following the law, when they start illegally cutting off funding for home heating and other things that people need to live, we are going to stand our ground. When an unknown bureaucrat in the Office of Management and Budget issues a two-page memorandum that says, “Hey, we’re just cutting off cancer trials. Sorry,” we stood our ground in a big way. So it is a combination of finding that common ground and standing our ground.

They're gonna find that common ground any day now.

Here's Hakeem Jeffries the other day.

“One of the reasons that [Aaron Judge is] a great hitter is that he does not swing at every pitch. He waits for the right one and then he swings,” he said. “We're not going to swing at every pitch. We're going to swing at the ones that matter for the American people.

I don't know buddy they've got like 500 pitchers on the mound all at once right now and they're all throwing greased balls. Maybe stop playing the rigged game under the rules only your team is following anymore?

At least we have our answer to this question after all.

And is the president an all powerful figure who can do whatever he wants as in the hypothetical second Trump term or is he just a little guy who is trying his best but everything is really hard like Democrats say when Biden is president?

This way shit works has always been Republicans will break the rules to gain and wield power and the Democrats answer is: And that is why we have to follow the rules even harder!

Don't worry though he has a plan in place. The big umpire in the sky is going to sort everything out in the wash eventually.

I know it seems like I am always more critical of Democrats than Republicans but that is because it is a given that Trump is an evil monster who will sow as much destruction as possible for his own personal benefit and there's not a single one of his people who would not toss your body into a burning pit for one measly dollar.

Something I wrote in the Hell World book the last time Trump was in power:

Or think of criticizing Democrats this way: When you’re playing basketball and the other team scores a basket you don’t get pissed off at the guy do you he’s just doing what he’s supposed to do. You don’t say what the fuck are you doing man? But if a guy on your own team took the basketball and shoved it up his shirt and pulled down his shorts and started doing cartwheels with his dick and balls out toward your own goal you might rightfully feel justified in screaming at him to get his shit together or he’s off the team. You might take that guy aside and say buddy are you sure you understand what you’re supposed to bedoing here?

I feel like this headline from a few years ago holds up pretty well by the way.

The president is a racist piece of shit. Apparently that is considered somewhat of a controversial position to take at this point in time so just in case there was any confusion where I stand vis a vis the president and all the racism he’s been up to lately there you go. Does it make you feel better to hear it said plainly because another controversy that we’re going through this week – which we go through every other time the racist piece of shit president does or says something racist – is that a significant number of publications and news programs are tying themselves into knots trying to find other words to use besides racist.

Unlike Republicans the Democrats are supposed to fight for us. I don't care how hard it is! I don't fucking care that they might have to work late or stay in D.C. over the weekend. I don't care if they risk losing their seat. I don't even care if they win. I do but you know what I mean.

All I have been saying for the past ten years or so is please please just try to fight. And on top of that make sure everyone knows you are fighting. Even if it's a hopeless battle. People love that shit. People are inspired by that shit. That is one of the singular myths that we have at the foundation of our entire culture. Going into battle despite great odds. Swinging until your last breath.

What exactly are they supposed to do though?

Stop voting to confirm his nominees for a start! Slow every fucking process down. Get on TV every day and explain to people exactly what is going on with Musk and his team of unelected 19 year old groypers seizing control of the literal purse strings of the federal government. Explain that this is all in fact illegal and that yes – for now – there are still such things as laws. Then sue them all for everything. Find sympathetic judges that will agree with you. Fucking fight by hook or by crook. Cheat and lie if you have to. Use muscle if necessary. Actual muscle. They certainly already do. Demand to be let into the government buildings where this illegal takeover is happening with camera crews and show us who the people are that are conspiring to destroy us.

Even Kathy Hochul of all people is putting up more of a fight than national Democrats. Jesus Christ.

Or they could – I don't know – just run out the clock and hope that talking about the price of eggs and how Trump is a hypocrite might work out a couple years down the line in the mid-terms.

Don't like my suggestions? Too bad I'm not an elected official. I do not now and have never wanted power. I did not want to represent my country. You did though. You wanted this responsibility. You wanted the power that you have. Now fucking use it while you still have it. You might not for much longer at this rate.

It's certainly not going to be the media that saves us I'll tell you that.

Hold on I've just been reading up on Ken Martin the newly elected DNC chair.

Or try that I guess. Maybe that will work this time around.

Remind me real quick who the good billionaire was like five years ago?

I don't know it feels weird writing or thinking about anything else right now but fuck it we still gotta live I suppose.

It was Flaming Hydra's first birthday the other day. We made something cool just to do it and it worked. Here are ten of the best recent pieces people can read for free.

That includes these four new shorts of mine I mentioned the other day.

Here's a poem that I found stunning. I love it so much when I start reading a poem already pissed off – which is how I go into reading almost any poem – like ok dipshit let's see what you got and then halfway through I think lol that's it that's the premise you fucking asshole and then I get to the end and ultimately eat shit. Alright. Well then. Fuck. I was not familiar with your work.