My husband arrived into Union Station from NYC last night and he saw a possibly unhoused man getting really upset and ranting and worked up and scared and yelling. And as he got more worked up officers started to close in on him to arrest him. Just then a random passerby walked over to the raving man and hugged him for what seemed like 3 minutes straight until the man calmed down. And as they watched this the National Guard and police all stopped advancing and walked away. And then he took the man to the side to talk with him. My husband said the whole train station was in stunned silence at witnessing such an act of compassion. He saved this man from being arrested and who knows what else happening to him.
Just before he came home to tell me this I was listening to you say how we walk through this right now, “you do what’s right in front of you. Whatever is right in your path - you do that.” Giving a man a hug to calm him before he is arrested…I’m sure that guy had no idea this was how his day would go.
Anyway, I was so teary hearing this story I had to share. When the hatred and depravity is taking over then to see love in action and the best of our humanity and spirit stand up is truly everything. “Strong hearts give courage to the hearts of those beside them.”
God bless this healer who performed this act of love. I've worked in neighborhood organizing. Even in the 90s, we advocated that mental illness is NOT a crime. We advocated that arresting individuals for acting out mental illness delusions is inhumane. Some progress had begun. Some municipal police and county sheriffs had begun to send social workers with police on such calls. That was then. This is now. Anyone who gets in Trumps way and vision of his complete control is a threat. What this healer did was extraordinary. How many of us would have his calm, courage and presence of mind.
Oh my goodness... as Rebecca Suzanne said, truly extraordinary... thank you, thank you, thank you, for sharing this brave and brilliant example of love in action... so very moving. Would your husband consider putting this story on fb or linkedIn? I really think it would be powerful, to share it more broadly... but regardless, you have shared it here, now. Thank you!!!!
It's a small, absurd group of people pretending to be big gathering around to listen to a demented old man's unjustified grievances. Republican senators allowed him to incite a riot and then after the House correctly impeached him for that, the Senate refused to convict because he was leaving office. He should have been convicted even if it was close to the time for him to leave. He was clearly without a doubt guilty. He stopped security from scanning the crowd in his rally for weapons because Trump told them they weren't there to hurt him and apparently nobody else matters. He knowingly sent an angry armed crowd of people to the Capitol to try to stop them from counting electoral votes. That's a crime beyond any shadow of a doubt and there is no way he should have been out on a campaign trail practically days later. He belongs in jail and so do all of his enablers. This is a domestic terrorist group, not a political party.
The mainstream news reports say Trump has the military in places like the DC mall. I heard reporters exclaiming, "There is no crime on the mall,"! However, there ARE tourists on the mall. What better way to demonstrate his commitment to military take over than to put it on display where visitors to the nation's capital can see.
If I have researched correctly, there was another time a president deployed rhe national guard into a city (not counting Kent State).
That was when Lyndon Johnson deployed the national guard AGAINST THE POLICE during civil rights protests!!! The police were brutalizing peaceful demonstrators - beating them, releasing trained attack dogs on them, spraying them with fire hoses.
I kept thinking of the difference in the two instances!
Now several weeks later, Trumps done it again.
Of course, we all need to stay active and vigilant. However, I also hope that this action will finally bring statehood and federally elected representation to Washington DC.
Your leadership here is inspiring and transparent and love in action.
Barbara Coloroso wrote an incredible book awhile back: Extraordinary Evil: A Brief History of Genocide. In it is a great quote I will share in a moment…
Barbara talks about bullying… the bullies, the bullied and the bystanders.
Gordon Neufeld, a developmental psychologist unpacked bullying through his understanding of the role of attachment in emotional maturation.
Human attachment/maturation processes are required for lifelong for feeling into complex issues and competing interests.
In Brene Brown’s language, we need courage to brave the wilderness of emotional processes where we can belong and have the courage to stand alone. Gordon would say that is the height of maturity.
At the beginning of Barbara’s book on genocide, she was a parenting guru, the best person to write that book at that time. I interviewed her about it. It was tough to write she said. She had courage.
So the book opened with this quote from Chaim Ginott in 1972:
“I am a survivor of a concentration camp. My eyes saw what no man should witness: Gas chambers built by learned engineers, children poisoned by educated physicians, infants killed by trained nurses, women and babies shot and buried by High School and College Graduates. So I am suspicious of education.”
“My request is this help your students to become human….”
It isn’t head work we need to do but heart/emotional work. Clearer thinking will follow.
Gordon Neufeld gave an in depth presentation, on children and the adults in families, to the EU in 2012 available on his website …. Google that.
Bottom line: families are the emotional maturation engines of any culture if they understand the emotional processes of the unfolding of human potential, human well being.
As adults with a few patches of early trauma, we can grow each other up in the safety of small groups with experience in emotional listening . And go right back to the work of organizing, leading and creating and playing …. Yah those musical instruments and those dancing feet know how to get through tough times.
Then we can move mountains miraculously as the ego evaporates and good things happen. Let’s do our own small group work to restore our communities, heart to heart.
As Brene says
“People are hard to hate close up. Move in.
Speak truth to BS. Be civil.
Hold hands with strangers.
Strong back. Soft front. Wild heart”.
Hope you enjoy this little array of my inspiring resources, along with Marianne’s heartfelt straight talk. 🫀💕
As a military veteran and citizen I have been very upset about our crime in the cities & homeless issues and nothing being done about it. I give credit to our law enforcement and Trump for at least trying to address the issues and get these people help if they need it but get them off our streets! Many of us feel this way and happy to see the laws on the books finally being used to address these issues! Thank you God for
You think he's going to "get these people help if they need it?"
The best way to tacked crime and homelessness is to treat it at its cause, by creating economic and educational opportunities for more rather than fewer people.
Well then why hasn’t anything been done - i have been a counselor for many years and think the system is broke and doesn’t work - I do think that they will be given opportunities for help if they want it - we need to stop giving them everything and making problems worse. I believe in clean and safe streets! What if it does work & help? You will still find fault with how it’s being done!
Thank you, Marianne for verbalizing what I see happening. He is pushing for a one party system like Hitler did and creating his own military system in ICE to round up immigrants (Jews in Germany) which can easily be turned to rounding up those who don't support him. He is infiltrating the news systems. There will be no US to liberate us. We need to wake up before it gets harder to turn this thing around.
By Josh StylesJoshua Styles July 28, 2022 History 42 minute read
¨t’s been more than seventy-five years since the Nazis were defeated and Auschwitz was liberated. Seventy-five years is a long time—so long, in fact, that while many still learn of the horrors of the Holocaust, far fewer understand how the murder of the Jews happened. How were millions of people systematically exterminated in an advanced Western nation—a constitutional republic? How did such respectable and intelligent citizens become complicit in the murder of their countrymen? These are the questions Milton Mayer sought to answer in his book They Thought They Were Free...¨ Read More
Freedom Fox: Excerpts that I pulled earlier from Mayer's book are below, straight from it without commentary.
""You will understand me when I say that my Middle High German was my life. It was all I cared about. I was a scholar, a specialist. Then, suddenly, I was plunged into all the new activity, as the university was drawn into the new situation; meetings, conferences, interviews, ceremonies, and, above all, papers to be filled out, reports, bibliographies, lists, questionnaires. And on top of that were the demands in the community, the things in which one had to, was 'expected to' participate that had not been there or had not been important before. It was all rigmarole, of course, but it consumed all one's energies, coming on top of the work one really wanted to do. You can see how easy it was, then, not to think about fundamental things. One had no time."
"Those," I said, "are the words of my friend the baker. 'One had no time to think. There was so much going on.'"
"Your friend the baker was right," said my colleague. "The dictatorship, and the whole process of its coming into being, was above all diverting. It provided an excuse not to think for people who did not want to think anyway. I do not speak of your 'little men,' your baker and so on; I speak of my colleagues and myself, learned men, mind you. Most of us did not want to think about fundamental things and never had. There was no need to. Nazism gave us some dreadful, fundamental things to think about-we were decent people-and kept us so busy with continuous changes and 'crises' and so fascinated, yes, fascinated, by the machinations of the 'national enemies,' without and within, that we had no time to think about these dreadful
Pg. 168:
things that were growing, little by little, all around us. Unconsciously, I suppose, we were grateful. Who wants to think?
***"To live in this process is absolutely not to be able to notice it-please try to believe me-unless one has a much greater degree of political awareness, acuity, than most of us had ever had occasion to develop****. Each step was so small, so inconsequential, so well explained or, on occasion, 'regretted,' that, unless one were detached from the whole process from the beginning, unless one understood what the whole thing was in principle, what all these 'little measures' that no 'patriotic German' could resent must some day lead to, one no more saw it developing from day to day than a farmer in his field sees the corn growing. One day it is over his head.
"How is this to be avoided, among ordinary men, even highly educated ordinary men? Frankly, I do not know. I do not see, even now. Many, many times since it all happened I have pondered that pair of great maxims, Principiis obsta and Finem respice-'Resist the beginnings' and 'Consider the end.' But one must foresee the end in order to resist, or even see, the beginnings. One must foresee the end clearly and certainly and how is this to be done, by ordinary men or even by extraordinary men? Things might have. And everyone counts on that might.
"Your 'little men,' your Nazi friends, were not against National Socialism in principle. Men like me, who were, are the greater offenders, not because we knew better (that would be too much to say) but because we sensed better. Pastor Niemöller spoke for the thousands and thousands of men like me when he spoke (too modestly of himself)
Pg. 169:
and said that, when the Nazis attacked the Communists, he was a little uneasy, but, after all, he was not a Communist, and so he did nothing; and then they attacked the Socialists, and he was a little uneasier, but, still, he was not a Socialist, and he did nothing; and then the schools, the press, the Jews, and so on, and he was always uneasier, but still he did nothing. And then they attacked the Church, and he was a Churchman, and he did something-but then it was too late."
"Yes," I said.
"You see," my colleague went on, "one doesn't see exactly where or how to move. Believe me, this is true. Each act, each occasion, is worse than the last, but only a little worse. You wait for the next and the next. You wait for one great shocking occasion, thinking that others, when such a shock comes, will join with you in resisting somehow. You don't want to act, or even talk, alone; you don't want to 'go out of your way to make trouble.' Why not?-Well, you are not in the habit of doing it. And it is not just fear, fear of standing alone, that restrains you; it is also genuine uncertainty.
"Uncertainty is a very important factor, and, instead of decreasing as time goes on, it grows. Outside, in the streets, in the general community, 'everyone' is happy. One hears no protest, and certainly sees none. You know, in France or Italy there would be slogans against the government painted on walls and fences; in Germany, outside the great cities, perhaps, there is not even this. In the university community, in your own community, you speak privately to your colleagues, some of whom certainly feel as you do; but what do they say? They say, 'It's not so bad' or 'You're seeing things' or 'You're an alarmist.'
"And you are an alarmist. You are saying that this must
Pg. 170:
lead to this, and you can't prove it. These are the beginnings, yes; but how do you know for sure when you don't know the end, and how do you know, or even surmise, the end? On the one hand, your enemies, the law, the regime, the Party, intimidate you. On the other, your colleagues pooh-pooh you as pessimistic or even neurotic. You are left with your close friends, who are, naturally, people who have always thought as you have.
"But your friends are fewer now. Some have drifted off somewhere or submerged themselves in their work. You no longer see as many as you did at meetings or gatherings. Informal groups become smaller; attendance drops off in little organizations, and the organizations themselves wither. Now, in small gatherings of your oldest friends, you feel that you are talking to yourselves, that you are isolated from the reality of things. This weakens your confidence still further and serves as a further deterrent to-to what? It is clearer all the time that, if you are going to do anything, you must make an occasion to do it, and then you are obviously a troublemaker. So you wait, and you wait.
"But the one great shocking occasion, when tens or hundreds or thousands will join with you, never comes. That's the difficulty. If the last and worst act of the whole regime had come immediately after the first and smallest, thousands, yes, millions would have been sufficiently shocked-if, let us say, the gassing of the Jews in '43 had come immediately after the 'German Firm' stickers on the windows of non-Jewish shops in '33. But of course this isn't the way it happens. In between come all the hundreds of little steps, some of them imperceptible, each of them preparing you not to be shocked by the next. Step C is not so much worse than Step B, and, if you did not make a
Pg. 171:
stand at Step B, why should you at Step C? And so on to Step D.
"And one day, too late, your principles, if you were ever sensible of them, all rush in upon you. The burden of self-deception has grown too heavy, and some minor incident, in my case my little boy, hardly more than a baby, saying 'Jewish swine,' collapses it all at once, and you see that everything, everything, has changed and changed completely under your nose. The world you live in-your nation, your people-is not the world you were born in at all. The forms are all there, all untouched, all reassuring, the houses, the shops, the jobs, the mealtimes, the visits, the concerts, the cinema, the holidays. But the spirit, which you never noticed because you made the lifelong mistake of identifying it with the forms, is changed. Now you live in a world of hate and fear, and the people who hate and fear do not even know it themselves; when everyone is transformed, no one is transformed. Now you live in a system which rules without responsibility even to God. The system itself could not have intended this in the beginning, but in order to sustain itself it was compelled to go all the way.
"You have gone almost all the way yourself. Life is a continuing process, a flow, not a succession of acts and events at all. It has flowed to a new level, carrying you with it, without any effort on your part. On this new level you live, you have been living more comfortably every day, with new morals, new principles. You have accepted things you would not have accepted five years ago, a year ago, things that your father, even in Germany, could not have imagined.
"Suddenly it all comes down, all at once. You see what you are, what you have done, or, more accurately, what you haven't done (for that was all that was required of
Pg. 172:
most of us: that we do nothing). You remember those early meetings of your department in the university when, if one had stood, others would have stood, perhaps, but no one stood. A small matter, a matter of hiring this man or that, and you hired this one rather than that. You remember everything now, and your heart breaks. Too late. You are compromised beyond repair.
"What then? You must then shoot yourself. A few did. Or 'adjust' your principles. Many tried, and some, I suppose, succeeded; not I, however. Or learn to live the rest of your life with your shame. This last is the nearest there is, under the circumstances, to heroism: shame. Many Germans became this poor kind of hero, many more, I think, than the world knows or cares to know."
A Jewish Plea to The International Court of Justice
Avrum Burg - Aug 08, 2025
Author, teacher, public and political activist, the founder and Co Chair of All its Citizens party, marathon runner, the Former Speaker of the knesset
Magnified, sanctified
Be the holy name
Vilified, crucified
In the human frame
A million candles burning
For the help that never came
You want it darker
Hineni, hineni
I'm ready, my Lord
(Leonard Cohen)
There is no single definition that defines all who identify themselevs as Jewish. Is Jewishness a religion? A gene? A culture? A nationality? A legal status? In the confusion of these overlapping and contradicting identities, modern Israel has forged its own unprecedented synthesis; a fusion of five elements never fully welded in Jewish history: religion, land, power, language, and sovereignty. The product of this Israeli crucible is a cultural mutation that dares to call itself Judaism.
At this moment in Israeli history, three of those elements; religion, power, and land, have metastasized into malignant growths. Power has become too great and is now wielded in service of the most pathological interpretations of Judaism, bent on conquest and domination. The immediate cost of this cancer is the unraveling of Israeli sovereignty. Power has been handed over to violent messianic militias; their gang leaders now serve as government ministers. Together, from the top and the bottom simultanously, they have dismantled the Israeli state. That country no longer exists.
These destructive elements were always present in the Jewish whole, but they were usually contained, marginalized, restrained. Today, after two thousand years, they have seized control and are implementing their darkest impulses. Every Jew must now confront two fundamental questions: What is my Jewish identity? And am I with them, or against them?
There is no middle ground. There mustn’t be.
To stand with them is to align oneself with the ruinous forces of our past. With those who launched a reckless and delusional revolt against the Roman Empire, bringing the destruction of the Second Temple and untold suffering upon our people. To stand with them is to embrace the biblical commandments of annihilation of the native nations and the myth of mass suicide at Masada. It is to follow a separatist, supremacist culture: a world where non-Jews are reviled, and Jews are chosen and exalted.
There are thick, unbroken lines stretching from Bar Kokhba’s hubris to Ben-Gvir’s thuggery; from Rabbi Akiva’s messianic madness to Smotrich’s crudity and zealotry. The lords of ruin in Jewish history never truly died and now they even kill.
But Judaism has always held within it another civilization. One rooted in introspection, critique, compassion, and moral action. The prophet Nathan stood before King David, Israel’s most powerful ruler, and indicted him for corruption and bloodshed. Centuries later, the prophet Jeremiah warned the decadent elites of Jerusalem of the looming First Temple's destruction. In the year 70 CE, Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai fled the city of zealots and blood-lust and inaugurated the new alternative Judaism: a faith of worship without temple, of identity without territory, of strength without force, and of spiritual authority without political sovereignty.
This was the Judaism that later embraced Yiddish, the language Isaac Bashevis Singer once described as “the language of exile… a language without land and without borders, unsupported by any government, a language with no words for weapons, for ammunition, for military maneuvers or warfare tactics. In the ghettos, Yiddish speakers lived out what the great religions merely preached: a daily practice of studying humanity and human relations. What they called Torah, Talmud, ethics, and mysticism. The ghetto, far from just a refuge for the persecuted, was a grand experiment in peaceful living, self-meaning, and care for others. And it still survives, refusing to surrender, despite the cruelty that surrounds it”.
This inner tension in the Jewish soul is still alive. Between the forces of domination, bloodlust, and silencing of others, and that Judaism of tolerance, openness, and dialogue.
Now, a great moral exaltation is required of all who refuse to accept the dictatorship of power and corruption led by Caesar Netanyahu and his coalition of apocalyptic zealots.
Now is the time to walk out of the city, as Yohanan ben Zakkai did, and rekindle a Judaism of morality and humanity. We have no institutions, no vast resources. We are scattered, often alone. We possess no military or governmental power. But we do have the spiritual and ethical strength of our past. We have Jewish history on our side.
That is why we can and must stop the flow of blood.
Here is how we can begin: We need one million Jews. Less than ten percent of the global Jewish population to file a joint appeal to the International Court of Justice in The Hague. A collective legal complaint against the State of Israel for crimes against humanity committed in our name and under the false banner of our Jewish identity.
It is time to say: enough!
Two suns will rise on that day. One will shine within the Jewish firmament, casting light on our inner darkness and replacing fanaticism with moral clarity. The other will shine across the world, declaring that among Jews there are those who resemble the worst criminals of the nations and there are those who, without fear or favor, stand against them.
Yes, Hamas committed heinous crimes against humanity. But none of that justifies Israel’s actions in Gaza since.
This is a moment of reckoning. We must not run from it.
So this is my plea:
If you are an individual, a community, or a Jewish organization anywhere in the world, and you are shaken by what Israel is doing; if you align yourself with the values of humanistic Judaism, with basic moral decency and collective responsibility, join this historic initiative. Not by turning to weapons or power structures, but to the conscience of humanity. Turn to The Hague.
In our appeal, we shall declare: We will not allow the State of Israel, which systematically inflicts violence upon a civilian population, to speak in our name. We will not allow Judaism to be a cover for crimes. This is not a rejection of our people it is a defense of its soul. Not destruction but repair.
We are thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands. A million Jews who simply say: We are here, and we are against.
Conscientious individuals whose souls are stirred, thinkers, scholars, clergy, artists, jurists, the time is now. Connect. Sign. Organize. Raise the Jewish voice of moral resistance. The light exists. It only needs many candles.
I really hope activist readers will raise to this call and initiate it
Will hear the most ancient call -, “Where art thou?” and will respond like Leonard Cohen responded:
”First there is authoritarianism … Next is totalitarianism … (It’s when military control is added to the mix) … Then, lastly, Phase three, is fascism” … The 2026 Elections will be critical … We will need to be “Super Vigilant” to prevent him from nullifying those Elections … and Thwarting the will of the People !!!
”First there is authoritarianism … Next is totalitarianism … (It’s when military control is added to the mix) … Then, lastly, Phase three, is fascism” … The 2026 Elections will be critical … We will need to be “Super Vigilant” to prevent him from nullifying those Elections … and Thwarting the will of the People !!!
Yes. FIRST, we must call a thing a thing, clear-eyed, straight talk, no holds barred.
Then SECOND, we must act accordingly lest history repeats itself to that fatal end.
We are already bearing witness to the rapid collapse, the demolition of our democracy. A democracy which was established on the credos “…that all people are endowed with certain unalienable rights, primarily "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness".
“These rights are considered inherent to all individuals and not granted by any government. The Constitution, while not using the term "unalienable," aims to protect these and other fundamental rights through its various articles and amendments, particularly the Bill of Rights.”
SO. THIRD. This government does indeed belong to WE THE PEOPLE. Hence everyone who works in the government - including DJT and everyone who works in his administration - actually WORKS FOR US!
FOURTH. Clearly, this vindictive, monstrous narcissistic psychopath, dictator wannabe is establishing an authoritarian state, by ignoring the US Constitution, the rule of law, rewriting history, militarizing armed forces, ignoring court orders, arresting and imprisoning civilians without due process, seizing control of cities, and threatening to arrest and execute everyone who has opposed him, starting with Barack Obama.
FIFTH. If we are naive enough to believe he won’t do it, ie hang Pres. Obama in a public square, on the White House lawn, or at the Capitol, live, while the entire world watches in horror, then we’re fools, living in a hellscape cluttered by our own delusions. And if we dare to believe we can sweet-talk this madman into playing nice, or smother him with love and expect him to be a good boy, then we’re as insane as he is!
So yes, first call a thing a thing. DJT IS A WEAPON OF MASS DESTRUCTION!!!
Then second. Remember the 1960’s???
We must act accordingly or we will suffer the inevitable consequences.
I’m not sure why you used the collection pronoun WE. But I’ll humor you.
For decades, I have used these letters on a variety of social media sites and as part an integral part of passwords, as my reminder - IWFG.
And I’ve followed Marianne Williamson for decades. I’ve read her books and seen her lecture live. So I know what her message is. And typically I agree with her.
I love the clarity that you offer here. I just wish you would have that same clarity about the genocide being committed in Gaza and that you would speak up about it with the same ferocity that is apparent here.
Marianne, I did support your campaign! I even contributed financially towards it! I just read your article. Thank-you. And I apologize for my previous words. I always open all of your mails but somehow that article slipped through unread. I consider you to be one of the spiritual leaders of our world today and hearing your voice on this is very important to me. I'm grateful that your wrote about what is happening in Gaza and I hope that you continue to speak about it.
Excellent Marianne. I agree with your every word. I particularly relish when you wrote: "Our Founders themselves were hardly naive about despots, and by compromising their vision we have failed ourselves." Yes, indeed! Now we must, as you have orally said, "recalibrate"! As always, thanks for sharing your very sane perspective. Joan
Who has been to any of these cities in question to witness the conditions, behaviors, and attitudes in the high crime areas? Why is it that so many average citizens are leaving for safer places? I know this to be true re Oakland. And why is that the homelessness hasn’t improved but rather has increased: the state of California? Might this be the case in these other problem areas where people aren’t or don’t feel safe? They leave quietly and say little or nothing publicly. Perhaps they just don’t want to get tangled up in the dirty politics and be attacked or ridiculed? Too many cities in the USA are being destroyed and made ugly.
Yes, I've witnessed this for the last couple decades and have been sounding the alarm to anyone who will listen, but what do we do now? Is it too late?
My husband arrived into Union Station from NYC last night and he saw a possibly unhoused man getting really upset and ranting and worked up and scared and yelling. And as he got more worked up officers started to close in on him to arrest him. Just then a random passerby walked over to the raving man and hugged him for what seemed like 3 minutes straight until the man calmed down. And as they watched this the National Guard and police all stopped advancing and walked away. And then he took the man to the side to talk with him. My husband said the whole train station was in stunned silence at witnessing such an act of compassion. He saved this man from being arrested and who knows what else happening to him.
Just before he came home to tell me this I was listening to you say how we walk through this right now, “you do what’s right in front of you. Whatever is right in your path - you do that.” Giving a man a hug to calm him before he is arrested…I’m sure that guy had no idea this was how his day would go.
Anyway, I was so teary hearing this story I had to share. When the hatred and depravity is taking over then to see love in action and the best of our humanity and spirit stand up is truly everything. “Strong hearts give courage to the hearts of those beside them.”
God bless this healer who performed this act of love. I've worked in neighborhood organizing. Even in the 90s, we advocated that mental illness is NOT a crime. We advocated that arresting individuals for acting out mental illness delusions is inhumane. Some progress had begun. Some municipal police and county sheriffs had begun to send social workers with police on such calls. That was then. This is now. Anyone who gets in Trumps way and vision of his complete control is a threat. What this healer did was extraordinary. How many of us would have his calm, courage and presence of mind.
Oh my goodness... as Rebecca Suzanne said, truly extraordinary... thank you, thank you, thank you, for sharing this brave and brilliant example of love in action... so very moving. Would your husband consider putting this story on fb or linkedIn? I really think it would be powerful, to share it more broadly... but regardless, you have shared it here, now. Thank you!!!!
Oh I am so grateful for your post, BIG HUG ;)
It's a small, absurd group of people pretending to be big gathering around to listen to a demented old man's unjustified grievances. Republican senators allowed him to incite a riot and then after the House correctly impeached him for that, the Senate refused to convict because he was leaving office. He should have been convicted even if it was close to the time for him to leave. He was clearly without a doubt guilty. He stopped security from scanning the crowd in his rally for weapons because Trump told them they weren't there to hurt him and apparently nobody else matters. He knowingly sent an angry armed crowd of people to the Capitol to try to stop them from counting electoral votes. That's a crime beyond any shadow of a doubt and there is no way he should have been out on a campaign trail practically days later. He belongs in jail and so do all of his enablers. This is a domestic terrorist group, not a political party.
The mainstream news reports say Trump has the military in places like the DC mall. I heard reporters exclaiming, "There is no crime on the mall,"! However, there ARE tourists on the mall. What better way to demonstrate his commitment to military take over than to put it on display where visitors to the nation's capital can see.
If I have researched correctly, there was another time a president deployed rhe national guard into a city (not counting Kent State).
That was when Lyndon Johnson deployed the national guard AGAINST THE POLICE during civil rights protests!!! The police were brutalizing peaceful demonstrators - beating them, releasing trained attack dogs on them, spraying them with fire hoses.
I kept thinking of the difference in the two instances!
Now several weeks later, Trumps done it again.
Of course, we all need to stay active and vigilant. However, I also hope that this action will finally bring statehood and federally elected representation to Washington DC.
Dear Marianne
Your leadership here is inspiring and transparent and love in action.
Barbara Coloroso wrote an incredible book awhile back: Extraordinary Evil: A Brief History of Genocide. In it is a great quote I will share in a moment…
Barbara talks about bullying… the bullies, the bullied and the bystanders.
Gordon Neufeld, a developmental psychologist unpacked bullying through his understanding of the role of attachment in emotional maturation.
Human attachment/maturation processes are required for lifelong for feeling into complex issues and competing interests.
In Brene Brown’s language, we need courage to brave the wilderness of emotional processes where we can belong and have the courage to stand alone. Gordon would say that is the height of maturity.
At the beginning of Barbara’s book on genocide, she was a parenting guru, the best person to write that book at that time. I interviewed her about it. It was tough to write she said. She had courage.
So the book opened with this quote from Chaim Ginott in 1972:
“I am a survivor of a concentration camp. My eyes saw what no man should witness: Gas chambers built by learned engineers, children poisoned by educated physicians, infants killed by trained nurses, women and babies shot and buried by High School and College Graduates. So I am suspicious of education.”
“My request is this help your students to become human….”
It isn’t head work we need to do but heart/emotional work. Clearer thinking will follow.
Gordon Neufeld gave an in depth presentation, on children and the adults in families, to the EU in 2012 available on his website …. Google that.
Bottom line: families are the emotional maturation engines of any culture if they understand the emotional processes of the unfolding of human potential, human well being.
As adults with a few patches of early trauma, we can grow each other up in the safety of small groups with experience in emotional listening . And go right back to the work of organizing, leading and creating and playing …. Yah those musical instruments and those dancing feet know how to get through tough times.
Then we can move mountains miraculously as the ego evaporates and good things happen. Let’s do our own small group work to restore our communities, heart to heart.
As Brene says
“People are hard to hate close up. Move in.
Speak truth to BS. Be civil.
Hold hands with strangers.
Strong back. Soft front. Wild heart”.
Hope you enjoy this little array of my inspiring resources, along with Marianne’s heartfelt straight talk. 🫀💕
As a military veteran and citizen I have been very upset about our crime in the cities & homeless issues and nothing being done about it. I give credit to our law enforcement and Trump for at least trying to address the issues and get these people help if they need it but get them off our streets! Many of us feel this way and happy to see the laws on the books finally being used to address these issues! Thank you God for
answering our prayers!
You think he's going to "get these people help if they need it?"
The best way to tacked crime and homelessness is to treat it at its cause, by creating economic and educational opportunities for more rather than fewer people.
Yes to creating the right opportunities not focused upon for decades since too many pursued "what's in it for me"!
Why is that the best way?
Just because the system is set up to hurt others, do not ever think it will not hurt you
Well then why hasn’t anything been done - i have been a counselor for many years and think the system is broke and doesn’t work - I do think that they will be given opportunities for help if they want it - we need to stop giving them everything and making problems worse. I believe in clean and safe streets! What if it does work & help? You will still find fault with how it’s being done!
Oh and I am also open to learning what kind of counseling you have done. This is a sincere question too, like the other one I asked you..
In the interest of civil conversation I'd like to know what you mean by "be given opportunities for help if they want it."
This is a sincere question.
I am open to your answer.
Leavitt press release: "homeless shelters, for addiction and mental health services, or jail if they refuse, are the options on the table right now."
Thank you, Marianne for verbalizing what I see happening. He is pushing for a one party system like Hitler did and creating his own military system in ICE to round up immigrants (Jews in Germany) which can easily be turned to rounding up those who don't support him. He is infiltrating the news systems. There will be no US to liberate us. We need to wake up before it gets harder to turn this thing around.
They Thought They Were Free
By Josh StylesJoshua Styles July 28, 2022 History 42 minute read
¨t’s been more than seventy-five years since the Nazis were defeated and Auschwitz was liberated. Seventy-five years is a long time—so long, in fact, that while many still learn of the horrors of the Holocaust, far fewer understand how the murder of the Jews happened. How were millions of people systematically exterminated in an advanced Western nation—a constitutional republic? How did such respectable and intelligent citizens become complicit in the murder of their countrymen? These are the questions Milton Mayer sought to answer in his book They Thought They Were Free...¨ Read More
https://brownstone.org/articles/they-thought-they-were-free/
From Freedom Fox - https://substack.com/@freedomfox
It was posted on ¨Is Modern Medicine a Sham?¨
Attorney Bobbie Anne Cox Aug 9 2025
https://attorneycox.substack.com/p/is-modern-medicine-a-sham/comments#comment-144210444
Freedom Fox: Excerpts that I pulled earlier from Mayer's book are below, straight from it without commentary.
""You will understand me when I say that my Middle High German was my life. It was all I cared about. I was a scholar, a specialist. Then, suddenly, I was plunged into all the new activity, as the university was drawn into the new situation; meetings, conferences, interviews, ceremonies, and, above all, papers to be filled out, reports, bibliographies, lists, questionnaires. And on top of that were the demands in the community, the things in which one had to, was 'expected to' participate that had not been there or had not been important before. It was all rigmarole, of course, but it consumed all one's energies, coming on top of the work one really wanted to do. You can see how easy it was, then, not to think about fundamental things. One had no time."
"Those," I said, "are the words of my friend the baker. 'One had no time to think. There was so much going on.'"
"Your friend the baker was right," said my colleague. "The dictatorship, and the whole process of its coming into being, was above all diverting. It provided an excuse not to think for people who did not want to think anyway. I do not speak of your 'little men,' your baker and so on; I speak of my colleagues and myself, learned men, mind you. Most of us did not want to think about fundamental things and never had. There was no need to. Nazism gave us some dreadful, fundamental things to think about-we were decent people-and kept us so busy with continuous changes and 'crises' and so fascinated, yes, fascinated, by the machinations of the 'national enemies,' without and within, that we had no time to think about these dreadful
Pg. 168:
things that were growing, little by little, all around us. Unconsciously, I suppose, we were grateful. Who wants to think?
***"To live in this process is absolutely not to be able to notice it-please try to believe me-unless one has a much greater degree of political awareness, acuity, than most of us had ever had occasion to develop****. Each step was so small, so inconsequential, so well explained or, on occasion, 'regretted,' that, unless one were detached from the whole process from the beginning, unless one understood what the whole thing was in principle, what all these 'little measures' that no 'patriotic German' could resent must some day lead to, one no more saw it developing from day to day than a farmer in his field sees the corn growing. One day it is over his head.
"How is this to be avoided, among ordinary men, even highly educated ordinary men? Frankly, I do not know. I do not see, even now. Many, many times since it all happened I have pondered that pair of great maxims, Principiis obsta and Finem respice-'Resist the beginnings' and 'Consider the end.' But one must foresee the end in order to resist, or even see, the beginnings. One must foresee the end clearly and certainly and how is this to be done, by ordinary men or even by extraordinary men? Things might have. And everyone counts on that might.
"Your 'little men,' your Nazi friends, were not against National Socialism in principle. Men like me, who were, are the greater offenders, not because we knew better (that would be too much to say) but because we sensed better. Pastor Niemöller spoke for the thousands and thousands of men like me when he spoke (too modestly of himself)
Pg. 169:
and said that, when the Nazis attacked the Communists, he was a little uneasy, but, after all, he was not a Communist, and so he did nothing; and then they attacked the Socialists, and he was a little uneasier, but, still, he was not a Socialist, and he did nothing; and then the schools, the press, the Jews, and so on, and he was always uneasier, but still he did nothing. And then they attacked the Church, and he was a Churchman, and he did something-but then it was too late."
"Yes," I said.
"You see," my colleague went on, "one doesn't see exactly where or how to move. Believe me, this is true. Each act, each occasion, is worse than the last, but only a little worse. You wait for the next and the next. You wait for one great shocking occasion, thinking that others, when such a shock comes, will join with you in resisting somehow. You don't want to act, or even talk, alone; you don't want to 'go out of your way to make trouble.' Why not?-Well, you are not in the habit of doing it. And it is not just fear, fear of standing alone, that restrains you; it is also genuine uncertainty.
"Uncertainty is a very important factor, and, instead of decreasing as time goes on, it grows. Outside, in the streets, in the general community, 'everyone' is happy. One hears no protest, and certainly sees none. You know, in France or Italy there would be slogans against the government painted on walls and fences; in Germany, outside the great cities, perhaps, there is not even this. In the university community, in your own community, you speak privately to your colleagues, some of whom certainly feel as you do; but what do they say? They say, 'It's not so bad' or 'You're seeing things' or 'You're an alarmist.'
"And you are an alarmist. You are saying that this must
Pg. 170:
lead to this, and you can't prove it. These are the beginnings, yes; but how do you know for sure when you don't know the end, and how do you know, or even surmise, the end? On the one hand, your enemies, the law, the regime, the Party, intimidate you. On the other, your colleagues pooh-pooh you as pessimistic or even neurotic. You are left with your close friends, who are, naturally, people who have always thought as you have.
"But your friends are fewer now. Some have drifted off somewhere or submerged themselves in their work. You no longer see as many as you did at meetings or gatherings. Informal groups become smaller; attendance drops off in little organizations, and the organizations themselves wither. Now, in small gatherings of your oldest friends, you feel that you are talking to yourselves, that you are isolated from the reality of things. This weakens your confidence still further and serves as a further deterrent to-to what? It is clearer all the time that, if you are going to do anything, you must make an occasion to do it, and then you are obviously a troublemaker. So you wait, and you wait.
"But the one great shocking occasion, when tens or hundreds or thousands will join with you, never comes. That's the difficulty. If the last and worst act of the whole regime had come immediately after the first and smallest, thousands, yes, millions would have been sufficiently shocked-if, let us say, the gassing of the Jews in '43 had come immediately after the 'German Firm' stickers on the windows of non-Jewish shops in '33. But of course this isn't the way it happens. In between come all the hundreds of little steps, some of them imperceptible, each of them preparing you not to be shocked by the next. Step C is not so much worse than Step B, and, if you did not make a
Pg. 171:
stand at Step B, why should you at Step C? And so on to Step D.
"And one day, too late, your principles, if you were ever sensible of them, all rush in upon you. The burden of self-deception has grown too heavy, and some minor incident, in my case my little boy, hardly more than a baby, saying 'Jewish swine,' collapses it all at once, and you see that everything, everything, has changed and changed completely under your nose. The world you live in-your nation, your people-is not the world you were born in at all. The forms are all there, all untouched, all reassuring, the houses, the shops, the jobs, the mealtimes, the visits, the concerts, the cinema, the holidays. But the spirit, which you never noticed because you made the lifelong mistake of identifying it with the forms, is changed. Now you live in a world of hate and fear, and the people who hate and fear do not even know it themselves; when everyone is transformed, no one is transformed. Now you live in a system which rules without responsibility even to God. The system itself could not have intended this in the beginning, but in order to sustain itself it was compelled to go all the way.
"You have gone almost all the way yourself. Life is a continuing process, a flow, not a succession of acts and events at all. It has flowed to a new level, carrying you with it, without any effort on your part. On this new level you live, you have been living more comfortably every day, with new morals, new principles. You have accepted things you would not have accepted five years ago, a year ago, things that your father, even in Germany, could not have imagined.
"Suddenly it all comes down, all at once. You see what you are, what you have done, or, more accurately, what you haven't done (for that was all that was required of
Pg. 172:
most of us: that we do nothing). You remember those early meetings of your department in the university when, if one had stood, others would have stood, perhaps, but no one stood. A small matter, a matter of hiring this man or that, and you hired this one rather than that. You remember everything now, and your heart breaks. Too late. You are compromised beyond repair.
"What then? You must then shoot yourself. A few did. Or 'adjust' your principles. Many tried, and some, I suppose, succeeded; not I, however. Or learn to live the rest of your life with your shame. This last is the nearest there is, under the circumstances, to heroism: shame. Many Germans became this poor kind of hero, many more, I think, than the world knows or cares to know."
I said nothing. I thought of nothing to say."
They thought they were free : the Germans, 1933-45 372 pages
by Mayer, Milton, 1908-1986
https://archive.org/details/theythoughttheyw0000maye
Jews – Rebel. Now!!!
A Jewish Plea to The International Court of Justice
Avrum Burg - Aug 08, 2025
Author, teacher, public and political activist, the founder and Co Chair of All its Citizens party, marathon runner, the Former Speaker of the knesset
Magnified, sanctified
Be the holy name
Vilified, crucified
In the human frame
A million candles burning
For the help that never came
You want it darker
Hineni, hineni
I'm ready, my Lord
(Leonard Cohen)
There is no single definition that defines all who identify themselevs as Jewish. Is Jewishness a religion? A gene? A culture? A nationality? A legal status? In the confusion of these overlapping and contradicting identities, modern Israel has forged its own unprecedented synthesis; a fusion of five elements never fully welded in Jewish history: religion, land, power, language, and sovereignty. The product of this Israeli crucible is a cultural mutation that dares to call itself Judaism.
At this moment in Israeli history, three of those elements; religion, power, and land, have metastasized into malignant growths. Power has become too great and is now wielded in service of the most pathological interpretations of Judaism, bent on conquest and domination. The immediate cost of this cancer is the unraveling of Israeli sovereignty. Power has been handed over to violent messianic militias; their gang leaders now serve as government ministers. Together, from the top and the bottom simultanously, they have dismantled the Israeli state. That country no longer exists.
These destructive elements were always present in the Jewish whole, but they were usually contained, marginalized, restrained. Today, after two thousand years, they have seized control and are implementing their darkest impulses. Every Jew must now confront two fundamental questions: What is my Jewish identity? And am I with them, or against them?
There is no middle ground. There mustn’t be.
To stand with them is to align oneself with the ruinous forces of our past. With those who launched a reckless and delusional revolt against the Roman Empire, bringing the destruction of the Second Temple and untold suffering upon our people. To stand with them is to embrace the biblical commandments of annihilation of the native nations and the myth of mass suicide at Masada. It is to follow a separatist, supremacist culture: a world where non-Jews are reviled, and Jews are chosen and exalted.
There are thick, unbroken lines stretching from Bar Kokhba’s hubris to Ben-Gvir’s thuggery; from Rabbi Akiva’s messianic madness to Smotrich’s crudity and zealotry. The lords of ruin in Jewish history never truly died and now they even kill.
But Judaism has always held within it another civilization. One rooted in introspection, critique, compassion, and moral action. The prophet Nathan stood before King David, Israel’s most powerful ruler, and indicted him for corruption and bloodshed. Centuries later, the prophet Jeremiah warned the decadent elites of Jerusalem of the looming First Temple's destruction. In the year 70 CE, Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai fled the city of zealots and blood-lust and inaugurated the new alternative Judaism: a faith of worship without temple, of identity without territory, of strength without force, and of spiritual authority without political sovereignty.
This was the Judaism that later embraced Yiddish, the language Isaac Bashevis Singer once described as “the language of exile… a language without land and without borders, unsupported by any government, a language with no words for weapons, for ammunition, for military maneuvers or warfare tactics. In the ghettos, Yiddish speakers lived out what the great religions merely preached: a daily practice of studying humanity and human relations. What they called Torah, Talmud, ethics, and mysticism. The ghetto, far from just a refuge for the persecuted, was a grand experiment in peaceful living, self-meaning, and care for others. And it still survives, refusing to surrender, despite the cruelty that surrounds it”.
This inner tension in the Jewish soul is still alive. Between the forces of domination, bloodlust, and silencing of others, and that Judaism of tolerance, openness, and dialogue.
Now, a great moral exaltation is required of all who refuse to accept the dictatorship of power and corruption led by Caesar Netanyahu and his coalition of apocalyptic zealots.
Now is the time to walk out of the city, as Yohanan ben Zakkai did, and rekindle a Judaism of morality and humanity. We have no institutions, no vast resources. We are scattered, often alone. We possess no military or governmental power. But we do have the spiritual and ethical strength of our past. We have Jewish history on our side.
That is why we can and must stop the flow of blood.
Here is how we can begin: We need one million Jews. Less than ten percent of the global Jewish population to file a joint appeal to the International Court of Justice in The Hague. A collective legal complaint against the State of Israel for crimes against humanity committed in our name and under the false banner of our Jewish identity.
It is time to say: enough!
Two suns will rise on that day. One will shine within the Jewish firmament, casting light on our inner darkness and replacing fanaticism with moral clarity. The other will shine across the world, declaring that among Jews there are those who resemble the worst criminals of the nations and there are those who, without fear or favor, stand against them.
Yes, Hamas committed heinous crimes against humanity. But none of that justifies Israel’s actions in Gaza since.
This is a moment of reckoning. We must not run from it.
So this is my plea:
If you are an individual, a community, or a Jewish organization anywhere in the world, and you are shaken by what Israel is doing; if you align yourself with the values of humanistic Judaism, with basic moral decency and collective responsibility, join this historic initiative. Not by turning to weapons or power structures, but to the conscience of humanity. Turn to The Hague.
In our appeal, we shall declare: We will not allow the State of Israel, which systematically inflicts violence upon a civilian population, to speak in our name. We will not allow Judaism to be a cover for crimes. This is not a rejection of our people it is a defense of its soul. Not destruction but repair.
We are thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands. A million Jews who simply say: We are here, and we are against.
Conscientious individuals whose souls are stirred, thinkers, scholars, clergy, artists, jurists, the time is now. Connect. Sign. Organize. Raise the Jewish voice of moral resistance. The light exists. It only needs many candles.
I really hope activist readers will raise to this call and initiate it
Will hear the most ancient call -, “Where art thou?” and will respond like Leonard Cohen responded:
Hineni, hineni
Hineni, hineni
I'm ready, my Lord¨
https://avrumburg.substack.com/p/jews-rebel-now
The Founders feared a standing army for a reason.
Once the boots are in the marketplace, they rarely walk themselves home.
Authoritarians always call it “cleaning things up” before they call it “order” before they call it “forever.”
If we don’t draw the line now, the line will be drawn for us.
”First there is authoritarianism … Next is totalitarianism … (It’s when military control is added to the mix) … Then, lastly, Phase three, is fascism” … The 2026 Elections will be critical … We will need to be “Super Vigilant” to prevent him from nullifying those Elections … and Thwarting the will of the People !!!
”First there is authoritarianism … Next is totalitarianism … (It’s when military control is added to the mix) … Then, lastly, Phase three, is fascism” … The 2026 Elections will be critical … We will need to be “Super Vigilant” to prevent him from nullifying those Elections … and Thwarting the will of the People !!!
Yes. FIRST, we must call a thing a thing, clear-eyed, straight talk, no holds barred.
Then SECOND, we must act accordingly lest history repeats itself to that fatal end.
We are already bearing witness to the rapid collapse, the demolition of our democracy. A democracy which was established on the credos “…that all people are endowed with certain unalienable rights, primarily "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness".
“These rights are considered inherent to all individuals and not granted by any government. The Constitution, while not using the term "unalienable," aims to protect these and other fundamental rights through its various articles and amendments, particularly the Bill of Rights.”
SO. THIRD. This government does indeed belong to WE THE PEOPLE. Hence everyone who works in the government - including DJT and everyone who works in his administration - actually WORKS FOR US!
FOURTH. Clearly, this vindictive, monstrous narcissistic psychopath, dictator wannabe is establishing an authoritarian state, by ignoring the US Constitution, the rule of law, rewriting history, militarizing armed forces, ignoring court orders, arresting and imprisoning civilians without due process, seizing control of cities, and threatening to arrest and execute everyone who has opposed him, starting with Barack Obama.
FIFTH. If we are naive enough to believe he won’t do it, ie hang Pres. Obama in a public square, on the White House lawn, or at the Capitol, live, while the entire world watches in horror, then we’re fools, living in a hellscape cluttered by our own delusions. And if we dare to believe we can sweet-talk this madman into playing nice, or smother him with love and expect him to be a good boy, then we’re as insane as he is!
So yes, first call a thing a thing. DJT IS A WEAPON OF MASS DESTRUCTION!!!
Then second. Remember the 1960’s???
We must act accordingly or we will suffer the inevitable consequences.
“For What it’s Worth, Buffalo Springfield
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YVhn1edWaDA
And who do we « work for »?
I’m not sure why you used the collection pronoun WE. But I’ll humor you.
For decades, I have used these letters on a variety of social media sites and as part an integral part of passwords, as my reminder - IWFG.
And I’ve followed Marianne Williamson for decades. I’ve read her books and seen her lecture live. So I know what her message is. And typically I agree with her.
So. Who do YOU work for?
You said « We » the people
And I work for the Kingdom… follow
Jesus, guided by the Holy Spirit.
Do you know what Jesus taught?
I love the clarity that you offer here. I just wish you would have that same clarity about the genocide being committed in Gaza and that you would speak up about it with the same ferocity that is apparent here.
And I wish you had supported my Presidential primary campaign (perhaps you did, in which case I thank you) at a time when saying what needed to be said could have made a difference. https://marianne2024.com/israel-and-palestine/ Also, I wrote an article about Israel and Palestine on July 29th https://www.transformarticles.com/p/when-bad-men-run-great-nations.
Marianne, I did support your campaign! I even contributed financially towards it! I just read your article. Thank-you. And I apologize for my previous words. I always open all of your mails but somehow that article slipped through unread. I consider you to be one of the spiritual leaders of our world today and hearing your voice on this is very important to me. I'm grateful that your wrote about what is happening in Gaza and I hope that you continue to speak about it.
Excellent Marianne. I agree with your every word. I particularly relish when you wrote: "Our Founders themselves were hardly naive about despots, and by compromising their vision we have failed ourselves." Yes, indeed! Now we must, as you have orally said, "recalibrate"! As always, thanks for sharing your very sane perspective. Joan
Who has been to any of these cities in question to witness the conditions, behaviors, and attitudes in the high crime areas? Why is it that so many average citizens are leaving for safer places? I know this to be true re Oakland. And why is that the homelessness hasn’t improved but rather has increased: the state of California? Might this be the case in these other problem areas where people aren’t or don’t feel safe? They leave quietly and say little or nothing publicly. Perhaps they just don’t want to get tangled up in the dirty politics and be attacked or ridiculed? Too many cities in the USA are being destroyed and made ugly.
Yes, I've witnessed this for the last couple decades and have been sounding the alarm to anyone who will listen, but what do we do now? Is it too late?
Have faith Brother… where do you put your trust?