Fear and loathing plus what blue states should be doing now
Just when you think you can't be more alarmed and disgusted by the Republican Fascist regime, further horrendous stuff happens. Just because none of it is surprising doesn't mean it isn't shocking. Nothing Trump, Musk, the Trump cabinet heads and other Trump appointees are doing is unexpected, yet it is still very hard to process and absorb. Same for the support for all of this by the Republican Fascists who form the majorities in both the House and Senate of the federal government.
The fear and loathing, overlaid by feelings of incredulity and unbelief, can be disorienting and paralyzing, not just for us ordinary folks but also, I imagine, for state executive branch members and state legislators who prepared for months to respond to the reign of Republican Fascism at the federal level. Yet they, and we, are going to have to act if we are to give ourselves any protection at all.
Blue state governments must become real sovereigns. They must become more ambitious and more active in their own internal affairs. This is different from suing the federal executive for its lawless and unconstitutional conduct. As I keep saying, we are going to rapidly discover the limits of prevailing in this litigation anyway. So, blue state governors, attorneys general, treasurers and comptrollers, and legislatures should be working to figure out how to disentangle their state operations from all the myriad joint federal-state programs that began in the 1970s and are now ubiquitous. Whether it is roads or schools, healthcare or retirement benefits, environmental protection or parks and forests - almost all social and cultural public goods have, for the last 75 years, been produced by joint cooperation between states and the federal government. Now is the time for blue states to ready themselves for a world where the federal government is de facto no longer participating in this and in fact will be actively working to sabotage the public goods already achieved.
The first step toward robust, state-driven provision of public goods is for states to identify in concrete detail how their functioning is enmeshed with federal programs and then to extricate themselves, both by formal legal measures and operationally. This is a big task and will require blue state governors to convene task forces bringing together those who staff state agencies, and members of state attorneys general offices. But once accomplished, this extrication will allow blue state governors and legislatures to identify how much statue revenue they can hang onto - not participating in joint state-federal programs means recouping state funds spent on that - and use to fund alternative programming.
That programming will require significant effort from state legislatures who will have to go into overdrive passing laws to put it into effect and in the process building up existing state agencies and departments and creating new ones to make the programs a reality. State attorneys general will be key to this. Fortunately, blue state attorneys general offices already have strong ties with one another, especially at the staff attorney level. The coalition of blue state attorneys general should coordinate wherever possible to formulate templates for bills and executive orders that can then be adapted for use by individual state legislatures and governors.
As for us citizens, especially those of us in blues states and especially those who are politically engaged, we must channel the bulk of our energy toward demanding our state governments to drastically strengthen and invigorate our state governments; we must support and aid any efforts to do this. If we are ever going to repair government at the federal level, we need educated, healthy blue state citizens, bolstered by appropriate state level social welfare programs. We must not squander our energy now fighting battles to bring the federal executive and the federal legislature into compliance with, let alone into commitment to, the federal Constitution. This struggle to have a lawful, law-abiding federal government is going to be long and hard. In the meantime, we need blue states to strengthen themselves so they can sustain their residents.
Of course, even if blue states, working individually and in consortium with one another, achieve all I am describing, there are the perennial matters that states are unlikely to be able to conduct: foreign affairs, national security, and national defense. Ever since the failed Articles of Confederation, the need for national level effort in these realms has been apparent. With today's Republican Fascist national government in overdrive to benefit our foreign enemies and undermine our foreign allies, what is also clear is that we need national level effort from a federal government dedicated to the well-being of the United States of America. I believe the only way to regain such a government is through the robust survival of blue states and their citizens.