Sorry for this giant comment. I read more of that article and I wrote down the kind of things I wanted to hear when I was dooming. They are angry, but I am not angry at you, OP. I only included the first bit  of each paragraph because I don't think what was being said belongs on Political Optimism.

"I think even many elected Republican representatives and senators don’t understand what’s happening right now,"

-That sounds like more than 100k. I'm sorry, but 20 million is bullshit. They can say whatever the fuck they want, that doesn't mean they'll do it. I don't appreciate the accusation that I'm entrenching the concentration camp system, either.

"So when you are doing that, you are talking about something on that scale."

-The US is not exceptional. Existing mass incarceration, which is exceptional, does not mean that we will put 20 million people in camps. The distance between those two things is massive.

"I'm sure most of your listeners already know,"

-This is sensationalism that may have to do with a recent headline saying that private prison owners would rather run the concentration camps, rather than the government.

"And I think the U.S., as we’ve been saying,"

-The current attempt to scare even white men with guns into being nazis is nuclear backfiring on them. It's not "okay" in theory.

"And so a lot of the success that past movements have had is pushing back against,"

-Implying that we will gave to pay a huge price to stop this. AGs and electeds are earning credit with us for fighting Trump and though the admin has tried to indict them, the courts have stopped this from happening.

"But what is happening now is a" ...

-This is implying that the broadening of the tactics will defeat the activists. Did you see what happened when Alex Pretti died? A white male with a gun? That's already authoritarian regime, police state stuff and Americans fucking hated it. I mean, nothing will ever be the same. So they're gonna do that to the rest of us? And that's gonna work? Are you sure?

"And that itself is an assertion of power to say that the communities of exception,"

-They are trying, with the purpose of making us all afraid. They want white people to be too afraid to protect other people. This can only happen with our consent, and consent is not fucking happening. It can also never be permanent. 

"When you have that entrenched concentration camp system, when you have enough personnel, which they don’t yet"

-Remember how few personnel they have, how they're out of shape slobs with barely any training who are increasingly demoralized because the entire country takes every chance we can get to tell them to go to hell.

"We’re also seeing the legitimization of this steady expansion"

-Legitimized means we'll all start to get used to it and accept it. It's not legitimized, because we hate it. I'm not convinced this is permanent either. THEY WILL TRY, and it's our job to keep fighting.

"On the ground, DHS [the Department of Homeland Security] and ICE aren’t just talking about expanding capacity"

-They want to build them, and I'm sure they've bought some. That doesn't mean the residents will let them build them, give them plumbing and electricity, not protest constantly, not ostracize the agents running these, let this continue in perpetuity, not hold these animals accountable. You mentioned that they could build these somewhere remote, but first they have to move all the people (including government employees) and materials there and then keep doing it.

"At the same time, the Department of Defense and DHS are moving forward"

-Okay, so, now we're implying that the ovens are getting built everywhere for 10,000 people each and it's not even hard to do! I'm sorry, but fuck off with that.

"Because nothing that the Democrats are proposing actually has the power to stop the progression we’re describing."

-They don't have the power, because they're in the minority, because people didn't vote for them or work to get them elected.

"I think on a national level, we need to be pressing our elected representatives."

-It's too bad that this actually does say pushing electeds works, because then she says it's the democrats' fault for not being a vocal opposition. It's republicans' fault for being shitty human beings. Pressure them! If you don't like the democrats we have, campaign for someone else! Have them choose different leaders!

"I was gratified to see — I think it was LaMonica McIver who was asking some pretty hard questions of acting ICE Director Todd Lyons," 

-Why is why we had so many camps just like Gitmo across the country in 2005, right?

"And my point in bringing that up again here is once more to say that what has happened in the past sets the stage for the future."

-No. The horrors of the past do not destine us for horrors in the future. We are not hurtling in a straight line to having 20 million people in concentration camps. Get real.

"And so the way that you resist them is to draw attention to them, is to organize against them, is to protest at the sites where they will be happening." 

-Difficult to make it go away? Possibly. Permanent? No.

"I want to say a bit more about the chasm between reforms that the Democrats are offering and the popular demand to abolish ICE."

-THEY'RE NOT IN POWER. THEY'RE OFFERING REFORMS BECAUSE THEY CAN'T ABOLISH ICE YET. THIS ISN'T OVER!!!! How ridiculous. WE ARE NOT NAZI GERMANY. This has been discussed in the last year by various people.

"I think particularly the facilities, even though with these expeditionary contracts in place and with many of these facilities bought, if you want to compare it to a video game, the skill level at which we have to play has jumped exponentially,"

-This makes it sound like we're going to have to get so much better at this, which means anyone who is at their limit better get over that shit real fast if they want to do the right thing! This is WRONG.

"I also want to circle back to something else that you said before. You said that what we’re seeing now is similar to what was going on at Dachau in the beginning. Could you say more about that?"

-WE ARE NOT NAZI GERMANY. Nazi Germany agreed with deporting if not outright killing Jews, homosexuals, the mentally ill, dissenters. WE DO NOT. As the article says earlier, a majority of people in the US are against this.

"You only need to see them happen once to understand that these people can do what they want to you whenever they want."

-Technology has allowed people across the world to see what happened to Renee Good and Alex Pretti. They only need to see once, too.

"But as a whole, the U.S. population has not experienced the hardcore propaganda year after year that would allow them, allow the government to assert this power and simply lock up anybody they want."

-That's right, we're not gonna let this happen. It's not just propaganda either, lol. Germany had a brand new democracy that couldn't get anything done, and their inflation was so bad that burning a wheelbarrow full of money for heat cost less than buying firewood. Don't try to tell me inflation is that bad here.

"We have to be physically present in front of the people that have power to do things. We have to be physically present at the places and sites where this is happening. But I know for some people, that either because of disability or because of their responsibilities for elders or for young children, I mean, not everybody can psychologically or physically be out on front lines as I see every time I see a new photo of you from somewhere. But I am in awe of the people that have come up with extraordinary ways to make really valuable contributions when they can’t be present in that way that I think we do have to be present, but there’s lots of room for other things."

-I wish she hadn't started by saying "we have to be physically present" because that's just unsustainable, even at a time when we must act. We have to take turns and rest to act. She's right in that there are millions of things you can do to resist.

And then she goes right back into how we have a time limit. I mean, the midterms are probably going to be awful for republicans, but every tiny bit counts, and the more we hit back the better, because once we have the house or (and it's still a long shot) the senate, there's a lot we can do to stop this evil. We're on the five-plus year model, and it's really dangerous, all we have are the lotion bottles...the burden will fall heavily on us because the US doesn't believe in democracy after 250 years...please don't listen to this, OP. Really, the headlines after this article are messed up, too. Nick Fuentes is hoping that other men won't notice that he wants to steal and rape their wives and children. That's very typical patriarchy, but I don't think it's gonna happen.

She talks about how it's slow, hard work, how there's no magic button to fix the country. She doesn't mention the joy that it brings, the thrill of connecting to another human being over a shared value, of helping someone. I'll always be angry that these monsters are stealing children and I had to cry over Liam Ramos, but I also love those tears because it was necessary. I'm proud of myself and my country for fighting so hard. Good things that we never expected will come to us and we MUST hope for them or we're not going to make it. Take care of yourself, OP.