Here's how I get through this shit.

[LuckyCharms]

I tell myself the following:

1) For the time being, don't try to make sense of anything.

2) It's all fucking broken and it will not get better until/if it is fixed. It has nothing to do with how I want things to be, it has to do with how things are.

3) Each and every one of fuckface's tweets will be fucking infuriating.

4) Mueller may find a ton of wrongdoing and illegal activities, and fuckface might skate regardless. However, it is possible and even probable that he and his will end up in prison.

5) I need to take care of myself. I need to exercise. I need to eat well. I can't let fuckface destroy me.

6) If this whole thing goes the way I/we want it to, it will be like a rebirth.

[TexasTowelie]

1. 7) And if this whole thing doesn't go the way I want it to,

then I take a bong hit!

[PJMcK]

14. Why wait?

I've started baking already. Mostly because my holiday vacation starts today!

It also mellows me out as I read the news.

Have a good week, Tex.

[SammyWinstonJack]

2. It's been a miserable year, culminating with this horrid tax scam.

It's going to get a whole lot worse before it gets better, that's assuming it does get better. In the meantime, the rethugs are poised to inflict massive suffering on millions.

[pansypoo53219]

3. georgee led to obama. i see FDR.2.0.

[jodymarie aimee]

4. yes, but participation

tag you're it...we've got to do our part.

[bdamomma]

21. +1000000

nt

[Tommy_Carcetti]

5. I tell myself that if my grandparents survived Stalin, I can survive this.

Of course, “surviving Stalin” meant fleeing their homeland, so perhaps it’s not as comforting a thought as I’d like.

[yuiyoshida]

6. HEY!! DON'T FORGET THE WEED... this message brought to you by

Juju and Yui Yoshida....Stoners for life.

[Fritz Walter]

10. Seriously, LuckyCharms!

Your avatar speaks volumes.

Everything in moderation!

[Paka]

12. Awesome!

I'm a fifty-plus veteran myself.

[dewsgirl]

7. Remember when everyone thought 2016 was so awful?

John Oliver's goodbye fu 2016 comes to mind. I pray 2018 will be a better year, yet I realize things will get worse before they get better.

[Soxfan58]

8. I'm going to sit here and hold my Jack Daniels

Jack Daniels is a 23yo cat and he's also pretty pissed.

[DFW]

9. Instead of drugs or drink

My solution is about 4000 miles including an ocean.

[frazzled]

11. No. 1 is certainly true

You can’t make sense of the irrational and the crazy, and you’ll make yourself crazy if you think you can use the rational to combat the irrational. It doesn’t work. You have to find a way to extricate yourself from the situation until it blows up on its own (hopefully).

If you live in a red state, you of course must lodge your complaints about unsavory legislation. (I live in a blue state with two senators and a representative who I know will reliably oppose Republican outrages without my input, so I feel especially removed from any steam-releasing action.) On the other hand, I got an email the other day imploring me to “call the president” to tell him to oppose the bad tax bill. Really? Call the crazy man who said he could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue in broad daylight and get away with it? Ain’t nobody got time for that. I might as well beat my head against the wall for several hours.

In the meantime, we must all cultivate our own gardens—making our own lives and those of our families and friends and communities as sane and purposeful and equitable, meaningful and giving as possible. We must make ourselves strong and fit and, yes, happy in order to combat the scourge that is beyond our reach. Sitting on the sofa stoned out or drunk is not the answer, as some have suggested: they’d like nothing more than a society full of zoned out people.

I will not let them win by wrecking our spirits and lives.

[avebury]

13. I have reached the point that I pretty much

try to just tune it all out. At my age I am not holding my breath and am not going to worry about that which I can't change. Life is too short and I don't want to spend the rest of it fighting a constant battle. It is the natural order of things that a country will rise up, assume a level of power, and eventually decline to be surpassed by another country. This country has been in decline for a while (although President Obama did an incredible job keeping his finger in the proverbial dam given the level of Republican obstruction). The ascendency of Trump to the oval office has pushed our decline into a freefall motion and it is happening at a far greater rate.

Johan Vincent Galtung, a Norwegian Sociologist/Mathematician, studied the field of peace and conflict studies to create 15 predictive models to determine when a country will fail. In 1980 he predicted that the Soviet Union would fail within 10 years. It failed in 1989. In 2009 he came out with a book that included a prediction that it was possible that the US would experience a collapse similar to that experienced by the Soviets by 2025. In 2016, after the US Presidential election, he was interviewed and asked if he stood by his 2009 predction. He did and added that he predicted that the US would lose its world leadership role by 2020.

We are now almost at the end of 2017 and the US has pretty much lost its world leadership position. Under Trump and a Republican Leadership we are headed towards that collapse similar to that experienced by the Soviet Union. What will be interesting to see is whether or not, once rid of the yoke of world leadership, can the US bounce back and blossom once more as a US Republic. That will be the $64 question. Only time will tell but as long as the Republicans remain in control I doubt it. They are far to interested in tearing down the republic.

[smirkymonkey]

20. Very interesting bit about Galtung. I had never heard of him, but now

I am interested in learning more. He seems to be on the right track as far as the US is concerned. Look at how far we have fallen in only one more year. A few more years of Trump and republican dominance and we'll practically be third-world (ok, that's a little hyperbolic, but I put nothing past these monsters.)

An interesting distinction he makes is between the American Republic and the American Empire. From Wikipedia: "For Johan Galtung, the US is simultaneously a republic and an empire, a distinction he believes is highly relevant. The US is on one hand loved for its republican qualities, and on the other loathed by its enemies abroad for its perceived military aggressions. Its republican qualities include its work ethic and dynamism, productivity and creativity, the idea of freedom, or liberty, and a pioneering spirit. On the other hand, its military and political manipulation are censured for their aggressiveness, arrogance, violence, hypocrisy and self-righteousness, as well as the US public ignorance of other cultures and extreme materialism.

In 1973, Galtung criticised the "structural fascism" of the US and other Western countries that make war to secure materials and markets, stating: "Such an economic system is called capitalism, and when it's spread in this way to other countries it's called imperialism", and has praised Fidel Castro for "break[ing] free of imperialism's iron grip". Galtung has stated that the US is a "killer country" guilty of "neo-fascist state terrorism" and compared the US to Nazi Germany for bombing Kosovo during the 1999 NATO bombing of Yugoslavia.

According to Galtung, the US empire causes "unbearable suffering and resentment" because the "exploiters/ killers/ dominators/ alienators, and those who support the US Empire because of perceived benefits" are engaging in "unequal, non-sustainable, exchange patterns". In an article published in 2004, Galtung predicted that the US empire will "decline and fall" by 2020. He expanded on this hypothesis in his 2009 book titled The Fall of the US Empire - and Then What? Successors, Regionalization or Globalization? US Fascism or US Blossoming?.

However, the decline of the US empire did not imply a decline of the US republic, and the "relief from the burden of Empire control and maintenance...could lead to a blossoming of the US Republic". Elaborating on the radio and television program Democracy Now, he stated that he loved the American republic and hated the American empire. He added that many Americans had thanked him for this statement on his lecture tours, because it helped them resolve the conflict between their love for their country and their displeasure with its foreign policy."

As far as bouncing back, if we do, it is going to take a very long time, I think. Thanks for posting.

[Dave Starsky]

15. The Joy of Painting has been my salvation.

Tons of episodes available on Netflix, Hulu, and YouTube. Bob Ross is my personal Jedi Master.

Go ahead. You owe it to yourself.

[kpete]

16. LuckyCharms

I think I love you!

[LuckyCharms]

18. .

[FM123]

17. We need more "how to get through this" posts on DU. Seriously!

[Javaman]

19. this is how I get through this shit...

[Demtexan]

22. You got it.

There herbs that will help you sleep and relax.

This crap with Trump is not getting me.

[Cha]

23. Excellent.. especially # 5 & 6!

5) I need to take care of myself. I need to exercise. I need to eat well. I can't let fuckface destroy me.

6) If this whole thing goes the way I/we want it to, it will be like a rebirth.

[Sugar Smack]

24. I draw. It's the only thing in the world over which I have total control.

I made this for my Dad's 86th b-day. He's had dementia for a few years. He loves this assemblage b/c it reminds him of details of his life, tastes and achievements by using "customized" drawings. I emptied 5 or 6 black pens onto it. So, whatever else happens "out there", dad couldn't give a damn, at least.





ALSO: I'm VERY careful to preserve my own original language. I don't want to become mentally lazy and begin picking up those cheap phrases the media enjoy tossing at us ("thrown under the bus" and "time in the barrel" are essentially "betrayal" and "under scrutiny&quot . What's being done NOW with regard to the CDC "7-Word List" is scary to me. Government programs' names mean the opposite of what they did under any legitimately-elected president. I feel compelled to keep vigilant. Language is the last thing we have.

I needed this thread. Thank you for the things you said, Lucky!

[LuckyCharms]

25. This is so nice and warms my heart.

I have a soft spot for people who are kind to their parents as they age. Your dad looks like a heck of a nice man.

[Orange Free State]

26. Calling him Fuckface .....

....is an insult to fuckfaces.

I survive by watching videos of dogs and babies on YouTube. And when it gets very bad I watch Thunderball. It was filmed in The Bahamas, and a lot of it takes place underwater. It’s very beautiful and has a tranquilizing effect. I am retiring before too long, and hope to end up there.

I do not watch the news under any circumstances.