Um, I told you so?
The Democratic Party needs a complete overhaul
Many otherwise naysaying Democrats are waking up to the fact that their party is all but abandoning them. Bernie Sanders is literally on the road espousing progressive Democratic values, and he’s not even a Democrat! AND most of the actual Democrats think he’s “radical” for offering Americans solutions they actually want! AOC is joining him on the road and is another sane voice for the Democrats that most of the other Democrats probably hate.
Many establishment Democrats still think moving FURTHER to the right is what this moment calls for. It’s absolutely bonkers.
Jamaal Bowman and Cori Bush, two progressive Democrats that establishment Dems (at the behest of AIPAC and with their help) got rid of, now have their own show on Zeteo (the media channel started by Mehdi Hasan).
The establishment Dems want to get rid of anyone who threatens their positions of power (which is made possible by Wall Street, AIPAC, and billionaire donors). I doubt they even care about our donations anymore. They certainly don’t listen to us.
Chuck Schumer (or, as I call him, “that worthless bag of skin”) just wrote a very untimely book about antisemitism (which I imagine does not mean just anti-Jewish to him). This is what the description says on Amazon:
When it comes to the history of the Jewish people, there is a national and global crisis of misunderstanding.
This is part of the “big lie” of Zionism: that the average person could not possibly study history and understand anti-Semitism or the Jewish plight (and definitely not what’s happening in Gaza). (Grammarly just made me capitalize “Semitism.” Do you know who else are Semites? Palestinians.) Incidentally, Amazon reviewers are lambasting his book.
Right before Schumer was supposed to go on tour to promote the book, he voted for cloture and got enough other Dems to vote for it so Trump could have everything in his harmful budget without Democrats’ intervention. Once he heard that people were planning protests at every book stop, he postponed it… just like the coward he is.
Chuck Schumer’s book undoubtedly lends fire to Trump’s war on anti-genocide protestors. And don’t be fooled, Biden’s rhetoric and failure to defend protestors last year is what got us to this place. AIPAC is bipartisan. They control almost everyone in DC. Just ask Biden, and he’ll tell you that he’s a Zionist. Why? No idea. Does he understand what that means, or is he just another person who thinks they’re progressive even though they support a settler colonialist state that is practicing apartheid and mass extermination? Zionists don’t care about Jewish people. They only care about protecting their own interests. And, honestly, when you’re aligned with the Trump administration and evangelical Christians, you should examine those interests.
People are watching Democrats very closely. The stuff we’re getting from Trump is expected, but what we didn’t expect was for Democrats to roll over and play dead (even though James Carville told them to literally do that). Only someone who is rich enough to survive this administration would even suggest that. It’s cruel and ignorant.
I think many Democratic leaders are going to find that when they come up for air, they have become irrelevant. I predict a lot of new names in the next primaries.
🦩 Life Observations
Customer Service
To my hosting company, GreenGeeks, their clients are apparently just domain names, but to me, my clients are real people with small businesses and non-profits that make a difference in the world.
I worked late on Friday, using my own time to get a non-profit client’s website back up. Their crime: not changing the email address on the account after the employee whose name was on the account left the organization. On the phone, two different customer service reps told me the current executive director could submit verification that she is the executive director in order to change the email address to hers. But they said we had to handle it through the ticketing system. Every single person in the ticketing system said it was not possible to change anything without the “account owner” who no longer worked there. What if the account owner was dead?
This must happen a lot, right? And no one is able to get their account back? That's insane. The whole thing was insane.
One of the reps did turn the account back on long enough for me to reroute my client's email back to GreenGeeks (which meant all their email accounts were broken until I was done), create the old email address, and try to reset the password. Unfortunately, GreenGeeks's password reset function would not send any emails to the new/old email account. Customer service then sent me a manual reset link, and I literally started crying because I thought I was there. But then it wanted to send a code to the email address, and the code would not show up in the account.
I forgot to mention that at midnight, the account would be suspended again.
The worst part is that I recommended GreenGeeks to all my clients, and then one of them gets treated like this. Their customer service is definitely going downhill as they get bigger, which is, of course, the normal pattern in capitalism.
Eventually, around 8:00 pm on Friday night, they did something to make the code go through to the new/old email address, and I was in. I immediately paid the past-due invoice with my own credit card so the site wouldn't be shut down again. I didn't even look at the amount.
Then, I worked on getting the account email address changed as quickly as I could so I could route their email back to Google Workspace so they could get emails again.
Without my intervention, the client would've lost all access to the account. I told one of the customer service agents on the phone how absolutely dumb it would be if my client had to open a new account where we just duplicated everything in their existing account. Because if they would just help me, we could access the existing one. However, I was prepared to duplicate the account because of GreenGeeks’ incompetent and unhelpful customer service. For real, I don't know what the aim of their customer service is. It's certainly not to help their customers. It's some bizarre form of covering their ass mixed with trying not to have to actually DO anything.
I'm probably going to charge my client zero dollars for doing this. In the end, it really came down to the principle. They did not ask to be mistreated by this corporation. I can absorb this time without any issue, but does this small non-profit have hundreds of dollars to pay me for this unexpected occurrence? The hosting bill was for three years and totaled over $600. They're already going to have to pay that.
So, this is why I'm not rich. Because I'm not a capitalist, and I see my clients as human beings and important enough to fight for without expecting anything in return.
Shameless Plug
I am still loving Mint Mobile! I have saved so much damn money already. If you work at home like me and are often on wifi, it’s really super cheap. They are on T-Mobile’s network if that makes a difference to you.
Here’s my referral link if you’re interested in checking it out: http://fbuy.me/u4ESk
📑 Project Updates
Tour of the Arts Recap
I was very excited to sell eight of my books over the weekend. I also gave away bookmarks with links to buy them, so I may have sold a few that way, too.
My postcard hugs sold better than I thought they would, especially since I’ve had them for a while. I originally made them to sell them when I gave hugs.
As I sold the last of the packs I had, I’m going to be repackaging the 4x6 postcards that I bought 1000 of previously. I’m going to put them in teal vellum envelopes and pre-stamp them like the originals. Unlike the originals, however, these postcards all say “Sending You a Big Hug,” which I think is nice for sending to anyone. They would make a great gift to give to a departing college student or someone who loves to reach out to people.
How to Find Joy in a Capitalist Hellscape
I got a lovely new review on Amazon:
This makes my heart sing.
Get your copy on BookShop.org
Monthly Postcards
As you know, I send monthly postcards to my paid subscribers. Somehow, I manage to have a theme each time I assemble these. (Although I do notice I'm running low on postcards and need to find some to buy… preferably already used or in bulk.) This month’s theme was black and white.
⏰️ Currently
🏠 Feeling anxious that I haven't found a house I like in Troy, NY yet.
🌿 Staying grateful every day
✊️ Staying hopeful by watching the resistance happening in the country and world