When I first sat down to write this week’s article, I could only think of two or three stories worthy of mention. I had fallen behind with my email newsletters, and family commitments drastically reduced my already limited time spent on social media and various websites. As I quickly caught up with the news and did my research, I realized last week was full of stories on which people needed to be informed. I spoke to friends and family who do not have a consistent interest in politics and they were all surprised by most of what happened last week. Had I not subscribed to multiple political news emails, been acquainted with many activists, and had the time to do my research, I would have had no idea what was going on in this country.

With midterm elections approaching all too quickly, election theft stories should be on the front of every newspaper and at the top of every TV newscast. Dismayingly, last week, they were not. In North Dakota, officials created a new voter registration rule that requires a photo ID and proof of a residential address. Native Americans living on reservations are not given formal addresses by the US Postal Service, so are forced to use PO boxes. Those boxes do not satisfy the new requirements and Native American voters are therefore disenfranchised. The Supreme Court of the United States ruled in favor of the racist rule, ensuring it will be in place for next month’s voting. The vote was 6-2, with Kavanaugh not involved. Sotomayor, an Hispanic Obama appointee, voted with the majority, providing additional evidence of different minorities failing to stick together. It also shows that electing Democrats because of the judges they will nominate is naïve and reckless. Residential addresses are not mentioned in the Constitution, but there are many safeguards for voters (equal protection, freedom of speech, etc.). This rule was only written and upheld to further marginalize Native Americans and decrease the left’s electoral support. There were no big protests outside the Supreme Court and the mainstream media gave the ruling only the thinnest of coverage. It is a dangerous precedent because if voters don’t know about these stories now, they won’t be equipped to protect themselves when the neo-fascist government comes for them.

The racist disenfranchisement of thousands of voters isn’t restricted to North Dakota. In Georgia, 53,000 voters (about 70% of whom are African American) are being held back from registering to vote. The Secretary of State, Brian Kemp, is using an “exact match” system for registering new voters. That means the information on an application must match, to the letter, every piece of information on DMV and Social Security databases. If there is no perfect match, the registration is held in limbo and the applicant has 26 months to fix the discrepancies. For example, if the voter’s surname is O’Driscoll and the apostrophe is missing on one database, they cannot vote. If their address is on W. Main St. and they filled out one piece of paperwork with West Main Street, they cannot vote. Most voters have no idea their paperwork has not been processed and they permanently lose their vote because the deadline comes and goes without their knowledge.

Now get this: the Secretary of State keeping thousands of African American voters off the rolls is the Republican nominee for governor. He is stealing votes away from his opponent (African American Stacey Abrams) in order to install himself as Governor of Georgia. It is more blatant and corrupt than even the 2000 election in Florida. You probably didn’t hear much about all this because too few people care about the plight of African Americans and media outlets earn too much money every campaign season to piss off any rich candidate.

It would be incredibly easy to prevent anything like that from happening again. When any citizen turns 18, they are automatically added to the voter rolls and can never lose their right to vote. Election officials are banned from seeking public office within five years of leaving their position. That would fix the problem of disenfranchisement.

Speaking of voter registration: Taylor Swift. No, I’m not going on another rant about how she’s manufactured or phony, or how modern pop music is destroying human culture. I’m just going to grumble about her politics and the state of modern society. In her first foray into politics, she endorsed Democrat Phil Bredesen for the US Senate. Within 24 hours, Tennessee had 65,000 newly registered voters. An increase in registered voters is always something to be welcomed, but this story deserves more attention.

The fact that it takes a previously apolitical pop singer to turn out the vote is horrifying. Gun violence, racism, and environmental catastrophe won’t fire up voters, but someone who sings trash like “Shake It Off” for a living does. If voters only care about what their favorite (rich) celebrities think, the future of this country is well and truly screwed.

After some digging, I discovered that Bredesen is not someone who should be getting left-wing voters excited. He supports the death penalty and stole money from healthcare programs as governor. Then, at a time when Taylor Swift should be supporting her fellow females through the MeToo movement, I find out Bredesen supported Brett Kavanaugh. I really wish Tennesseans had looked beyond Swift’s fame and actually researched the candidates and issues before mobilizing for a conservative Democrat. I also wish Taylor Swift had kept silent.

I’ve kept you waiting long enough, so here’s something from everyone’s favorite dump: Washington, DC. Brett Kavanaugh, inferior only to Norm Peterson, finally took the Supreme Court his birth guaranteed him. It was a momentous occasion for all the rich white men who can never catch a break. Their attempted rapes get reported, their alcoholism is portrayed as a problem, and some people vote against them. Thank Mother Earth for Brett Kavanaugh breaking the diamond ceiling.

He has hired four clerks and they are all women. During his hearings, he promised to employ female clerks because “that is who I am.” Yes, Brett. A powerful man who surrounds himself with female subordinates. That is exactly who you are.

The protests outside the court were small and no-one disrupted his first hearings. I’m now worried that his confirmation has taken the steam out of the efforts to stop him ruining lives. There are options for unseating him, but his name has rapidly disappeared from public conversations. Fingers crossed the confirmation didn’t begin to silence the women’s rights and anti-fascism movements.

Mere days after Kavanaugh’s confirmation, Chuck Schumer assumed the position and took in 15 of Mitch McConnell’s finest. McConnell threatened to keep the Senate in session until after the midterms if his and Trump’s judges were not approved. Campaigns can easily be won with few appearances by the candidate, but it is impossible for judges to be confirmed without the consent of the Senate. McConnell’s threat was very weak; the Democrats would not really have been hurt because their campaigns would have gone on and the Republicans would have been off the trail too. Also, slowing down the conservative overtaking of the judicial system is a huge campaign issue sure to increase voter turnout on the left. The Democrats, as spineless and politically inept as always, were scared by the big bad wolf and gave in to every demand made of them. If any Democrat had a problem with the deal, they didn’t verbalize their dissatisfaction.

With the assistance of the Democrats, Trump has now put 84 conservative judges into lifetime positions. The Republicans don’t need to advertise how they get their judges just as long as they do, and the Democrats are still promising voters they will stop Trump filling the courts with far-right lunatics. The press doesn’t care because actual issues and the workings of our Congress don’t attract the kind of customers advertising corporations are looking for.

As quickly as the neo-fascist administration is filling judicial vacancies, it’s losing executive branch employees. The latest is Nikki Haley, Ambassador to the United Nations. Her resignation was almost as surprising as Katy Perry’s rise to fame (I really hate modern pop music!). She is an Indian-American, former governor of South Carolina and her role at the UN was seen as giving her the foreign policy experience necessary for national office. After less than two years in the role, and no scandals like most of Trump’s other appointees, she quit. Many speculated that she was preparing a bid for the presidency in 2020, but it was never that likely and 2024 would be a much better year for her to run. In her resignation letter she said that she was returning to the private sector which is “a step up” from public service. The letter made more sense when her personal debt was revealed. She could owe as much as $1.1 million (what the hell has she been buying?!) but would have little trouble paying it off quickly with a couple of consultancy positions and a handle of corporate board seats. We’ll see how long it takes for her to remain silent on when she’ll again seek public office, even though it’s a step down from financial greed and capitalist destruction.

The loss of Haley from Trump’s foreign policy team wasn’t the only international incident with which he had to contend. Jamal Khashoggi entered the Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul and has not been seen or heard from since. Saudi Arabia is denying doing anything to him while the Turks say they have evidence he was murdered and hacked to pieces for disposal. Khashoggi was a spokesman for the Saudi royal family, worked at the Saudi Arabian embassy in the US, and wrote articles criticizing his government. He was known for having an independent streak that led to an affiliation with the Muslim Brotherhood which favors elections as a vehicle for change. It is not a stretch to believe the authoritarian leadership executed him, although I strain to see why this has been such an issue for the US. He is not an American citizen and he did not disappear on American soil. He was, however, loved by journalists so the mainstream media made a mountain out of a mole hill in an effort to find their buddy. Trump got involved and asked the dictator of the Saudi theocracy what was going on. He received a flat denial in reply and he said he believed what he was told. He has mentioned the possibility of halting arms sales to Saudi Arabia and there are rumors that sanctions on specific individuals are being considered. The entire story requires more consideration because the government and the media are wasting time on the disappearance of a single man when they never say anything about the treatment of Saudi women or the war crimes in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia is still sold fighter jets even though they are used to kill innocent families in Yemen. They are gifted billions of dollars for oil every year despite the torture and mistreatment of every single woman. One man goes AWOL and we all have to hear about it for days on end. The screaming about Khashoggi makes the years of silence about Saudi Arabia even more outrageous.

Right now, Florida, Alabama, and other states are recovering from yet another monstrous hurricane. Michael came amazingly close to being a Category 5 storm, the most intense storm rating. It tore through Central America before reaching the US leaving behind more than thirty dead and untold billions in damage. The southeast wasn’t anywhere near to cleaning up after Florence when Michael hit, only exacerbating the problems faced by millions of residents in the region. Their deaths, injuries, and homelessness weren’t important enough to our “elected” leaders for them to even allude to climate change legislation. Science informs us that unless we aggressively tackle the problem now we will see, among other disasters and emergencies, more frequent and more intense hurricanes. Our government remains silent in the face of our extinction.

Millions of voters weren’t told voter purges and election theft are still big problems in America. 65,000 new voters didn’t know they were supporting such a terrible person. The Democrats couldn’t say no to the Republicans. No politicians laid out a plan to combat climate change and protect our entire species. And I only know all that because I went out of my way to be aware of what was happening in our country. I put in the extra effort to find credible, independent news outlets and to do the research that helped me put the stories in context.

When the mainstream media cherry picks what you hear, spend a little time finding original news sources. Keep yourself informed and ready for progress.

When the government is silent on critical issues, make your voice heard. Force those issues into a wider public sphere and create that progress.