I received an email after one of my newsletters came out. The email was from a subscriber and read:
“Fascism has now been imposed in America, a genocide has likely killed more than 100,00 people in Gaza, Israel is engaged in its 78th year of land theft….and this is only the beginning. The topics in your blog are the last things I care about. Please remove me from your list.”
She complained that what I was writing about was superficial. However, my blog analytics show that my audience is most interested in topics like fashion and beauty. Several years ago, I attempted to write about my political opinions but received nasty responses. I deleted those posts and decided to keep them out of the mix.
The truth is, I agree with that subscriber. I don’t like the way things are going in the world. It’s insane. This puts me in a conundrum. Should I risk expressing myself and how I feel, or keep silent and focus on less controversial content?
Sick of biased news? Ground News will show you what leans right or left so you can be factually informed. Another fun option is Morning Brew – news with a sense of humor delivered to your inbox.
Honestly, I don’t want to stay silent. I think that has been the problem all along. People are not paying attention. They are going about their lives, avoiding controversy. In the interest of that former subscriber and any others who feel the same way, I want to get a few things off my chest.
Here is what I really think
First, I understand you might disagree with me. The political atmosphere these days is extremely divisive, and many of us have strong opinions. When I rant, I do it mostly on Threads. It’s a safe place for me, and I need a place to vent.
I kept quiet for the last four years because a few relatives would get pissed off on Facebook. They post about cats and other light stuff and would prefer I do the same.
However, it’s harder to remain muted. I am a lifelong Democrat, but what I really believe in is preserving integrity, compassion, and adherence to the law. The Constitution is the Constitution, and when it is being ridden roughshod, we need to speak out and stop it, no matter what party we are affiliated with.
Our harsh reality
The citizens of the United States elected a 34-time convicted criminal as President in 2024. I don’t care what party you belong to; if a candidate is a convicted felon, they should be prohibited from running for office. He was indicted for many other crimes, but his money and influence exonerated him. He was also impeached twice.
You may say, “Well, the Democrats politicized the justice system to charge him with the crimes, but the fact is, all of the witnesses in the January 6th investigations were Republican, except for 2 black election workers whose lives he ruined. The defense and prosecution during his trials handpicked the jurors, and they convicted him of his crimes.
The Supreme Court has at least two justices who have accepted huge bribes from billionaires with clout. They should also be removed from the court because that is also a crime. I would feel the same way if they were Democrats.
The current President has gutted federal agencies and fired thousands and thousands of qualified workers. Those people had families, mortgages, and pensions. DOGE took a chainsaw and fired air traffic controllers, public health officials, veterans, IRS officials, CIA, FBI, and others without researching whether or not they were needed. It was random. His list of crimes since he was re-elected to office continues to grow.
If you elect a felon as President, expect an endless crime spree.
Meanwhile, Republicans stand there like robots and bow to the King, no matter how heinous his executive orders are. Democrats are much too wishy-washy. What we need is someone aggressive enough to make changes for the good of people without pussy-footing around. And that starts with prohibiting billionaires from buying elections, and not letting convicted felons be elected to the highest office in the land EVER!
The biggest horror, in my opinion
Brown faces are being rounded up like dogs with no due process and put on airplanes to foreign countries. A dog-killing Barbie had a photo op in front of the prison with men who had tattoos, assuming they were all in gangs.
The ICE immigration raids are what are most infuriating to me, and I find it hard to sleep at night.
I live in Los Angeles, where elderly female food vendors are being pushed to the ground, stripped and assaulted, nursing babies being torn from their mothers, pregnant women stomped on, hard-working tax-paying laborers who have been in the country for decades disappearing, farmworkers chased through strawberry fields, and students being taken from graduation ceremonies. These people are not the criminals that the administration promised to deport. They are the heart of our community.
Some of the people “detained” have been in the country for decades, own thriving businesses, and even became parents of Marine Corps heroes. Businesses in the cities targeted are closing because of this, which affects the economy. And this is not limited to brown and black people. Some who have been detained are from Ireland, Great Britain, and even Scandinavia.
A 2-month-old baby was detained, and his mother had to make formula with unclean water. She was nursing, but her milk dried up due to the terrible nutrition in detention. She was recently postpartum when she was put in a horrid detention center. The baby developed RSV and had to be rushed to the hospital after a long delay by staff at the center. Before the baby was healed, he and his mother and 16-month-old sibling were taken to the Mexican border with less than $200 to their name.
A GoFundMe page was created by compassionate strangers to aid the family. Please do not call yourself a Christian if you think the treatment the family received was warranted.
Many other children, pregnant women, and the elderly are being held and mistreated by ICE. This is WRONG!
I.C.E “officers” have minimal training, wear masks, and enter people’s homes without warrants. They work on a quota system dictated by Stephen Miller, who is a dead ringer for Joseph Goebbels.
They are not making America safer. They are making it much more dangerous!
You may say the immigrants are illegal, so they must be punished. May I remind you that most of these people were taken while in court, going through the asylum process? That is what Nazi’s did, and, as a Jew, I am not afraid to say it.
U.S. citizens are also being detained and assaulted indiscriminately. Renée Nicole Macklin Good and Alex Pretti, both U.S. citizens, were executed by I.C.E. Renée had just dropped her 6-year-old at school, and Alex Pretti, an ICU nurse for the Veterans’ Administration, was trying to help a woman who was being manhandled.
Mass deportations of Latinos also occurred in the 1930s and 1950s, and didn’t end well. But this crazy cult, which has nothing to do with traditional Republicans, instilled fear in the masses that they are all rapists and murderers. Nothing could be further from the truth.
May I remind you that Fox News paid the courts 787 million after being sued for spreading disinformation about the 2020 election. It’s amazing how many of their viewers are unaware of that fact.
If you voted for the Felon in Chief, I hope you are happy with what is happening to our country. I am not. He is a nasty, heartless man that I thoroughly despise.
His list of crimes, both during his first term and continuing into his second, is so long that I cannot even begin to list them. To those of you who are gleefully enjoying your tax break (which is costing our nation billions) to the expense of everyone else who cannot afford their healthcare, please go F yourself!
There, I said it
I hope any of my readers who share the same opinion as the reader above who unsubscribed now know my stance on politics. However, I will continue to focus on blogging about fashion, beauty, travel, and positive aging, because we all need positivity these days.
Follow me on Threads @rebeccaforstadt, where I let loose about how I really feel and block the crazies in droves.
Do you think the content on BabyBoomster.com is superficial, based on the current political environment? If you don’t, please subscribe to post updates every Wednesday here. Leave a comment. I ask that you don’t get nasty because I will delete your comment. I own this blog and can do whatever I like with it. I choose to keep it civil.
Great writing. It’s challenging as a blogger to pick out your “lane” then stick to it. As a journalist who has worked for newspapers, it’s clear. You have news articles, which are reports on what’s happening, you have your editorial section or page with editorial opinions from separate staff members and op-eds written by guests, and you have columns where writers offer their opinions. As a consumer and personal finance journalist, I write mostly about consumer issues. However, I do occasionally write an opinion piece.
Thanks, Rita. I love how you broke down how news is published. I consider my blog to be more of the lifestyle section and want to appeal to most women over 50. But, it’s hard to keep quiet when our rights that we fought for in the 70s and way of life are being whittled away.
I agree 100 percent. Wholeheartedly. This is the time to stand up.
It is. I prefer to do it elsewhere but we must.
Oh Rebecca, you sum it up so well. We’re going through hell right now, but a light at the end of the tunnel will appear. I have to believe that. I also agree with not making the blog political. I will sometimes hint at how I feel politically. Anyone who reads it can surmise. That’s as close as I want to go.
I completely understand, Laurie. Your blog has such wonderful insights into your life. And the news is fleeting. It gets forgotten the next day when the next crisis hits.