A very significant piece of good news took place Thursday night, when President Trump signed an executive order titled, “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History.” This order directs the Vice President and the Secretary of the Interior to restore federal parks, monuments, memorials and statues “that have been improperly removed or changed in the last five years to perpetuate a false revision of history or improperly minimize or disparage certain historical figures or events.”
This is objectively fantastic news and for me, desperately needed. I’ve had an absolutely awful few days and this lifts my spirits somewhat. Trump should have signed this order on his first day in office, but better late than never! This executive order means that thanks to President Trump, the statue genocide will indeed be partially reversed, something that my 2020-2021 self did not think was possible.
Things have not been great for me lately. Life has felt heavy and dark, for various reasons. I am sick and tired of the cruelty, the nastiness, the self-righteous intolerance, and the hypocrisy of so many people. I am sick of being condemned as “cruel” and “un-American,” by the very same people who have spent the past five years unleashing an avalanche of shocking cruelty. I am sick of pompous lectures about the importance of diversity and inclusion by the very same people who have waged a merciless campaign to obliterate all diversity from the earth and to ensure that people who are different from the norm cannot feel included anywhere. I’m sick of words being used to mean the opposite of what they actually mean. I’m sick of people brutally attacking those who have done nothing wrong and then calling their victims cruel. I am sick of it, and it is taking a heavy toll on my mental health.
But I’m not making this post to write about all of the things I’m sick of (although I’ve ended up writing quite a long paragraph about this topic). I’m making this post to draw attention to a few things that have brought a smile to my face in these dark times. Hopefully these things will bring a smile to your face as well:
On February 15, President Trump signed what is perhaps his most awesome executive order yet. It withholds federal funds from schools that force their students to receive the covid vaccine.
“It is the policy of my Administration that discretionary Federal funds should not be used to directly or indirectly support or subsidize an educational service agency, State educational agency, local educational agency, elementary school, secondary school, or institution of higher education that requires students to have received a COVID-19 vaccination to attend any in-person education program.”
Trump’s order correctly points out that people should be “empowered with accurate data” and “left free to make their own decisions accordingly,” and that “threatening to shut them out of an education is an intolerable infringement on personal freedom.”
This really shouldn’t be a revolutionary concept. The right to make medical decisions about one’s body is the most fundamental right that there is. And vaccine mandates violate this right. It’s completely unacceptable for any school, employer, or organization to require a medical procedure.
With this executive order, Trump has decided that the federal government will step in and defend people’s rights from schools that would violate them. This is exactly what the federal government should be doing. In fact, it’s what the federal government should have been doing all along.
Despicably, the Biden administration attempted to use the power of OSHA – the Occupational Safety and Health Administration – to force all companies with 100 or more employees to implement vaccine mandates, thereby violating the rights of their employees. This is the literal opposite of what the government should have done. The government should have banned companies from violating the rights of their employees, not required it. Now, under the Trump administration, the government is moving in the direction of what it should have been doing all along. It is punishing institutions that violate people’s rights, thereby providing a deterrent from doing so.
I can’t think of a more important or worthy use of the power of the federal government, than to enforce people’s rights to bodily autonomy. So thank you, President Trump, for standing up for the fundamental right to decline medical intervention.
On Wednesday, President Trump signed a truly awesome executive order.
The order establishes a task force to plan an “extraordinary celebration” in honor of America’s 250th anniversary, on July 4, 2026. If Trump’s campaign speeches are any indication, the festivities will begin on Memorial Day 2025 and will include a “Great American State Fair” in Iowa, and a “Patriot Games” for high school athletes from across the country.
Additionally, the executive order re-establishes the plan to create a National Garden of American Heroes, a statue garden filled with statues of 250 historical figures. The order goes so far as to commission artists for the first 100 statues, indicating that the statue garden isn’t just an abstract hope, but is actually on the path towards becoming reality. “The National Garden will honor American heroism after dozens of monuments to Americans, including Presidents and Founding Fathers, have toppled or destroyed and never restored,” said a press release.
Speaking of statues that have been topped or destroyed and never restored, the executive order reinstates Trump’s order from 2020 that was aimed at protecting existing statues from destruction at the hands of bigots and bullies. This policy directs the Attorney General to prosecute people and groups responsible for vandalizing and/or destroying statues to the fullest extent of the law. It also withholds federal funding from state and local law enforcement agencies that fail to do the same. The AP describes this order as “reviving efforts to harshly punish those who vandalize or destroy existing statues and monuments.” This is true, and there is absolutely nothing bad about it, because harsh punishment is exactly what such people deserve.
As alluded to above, you might recall that both the plans for the statue garden and the policy strengthening punishments for anti-statue bullies existed previously thanks to an executive order that Trump signed during a dark time that feels simultaneously like yesterday and like a million years ago. (I blogged about it here.) Unfortunately, within his first few days of taking office, Biden mean-spiritedly and cruelly signed an executive order rescinding both of these policies, thereby cancelling plans for the statue garden and deliberately declining to punish the people in our country who are the most deserving of punishment. Although this new executive order doesn’t undo the unspeakable atrocities that were done, I am heartened that Trump has once again chosen to stand up for the statues.
I will never stop fighting for statues, I will never stop advocating on their behalf, I will never forget or forgive what happened to them, and I will never stop writing about them. This is what is truly important. This is what matters. And I’m truly glad that President Trump, to a significant extent, feels the same.
Donald Trump has been named Time Magazine’s Person of the Year for 2024!
In my opinion, this honor is a no-brainer and 100% deserved. In just over a month since his election, Trump has made a large, positive difference in my life.
To commemorate this honor, Trump rang the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange.
I’m a bit late with this update, but Ian Smith, the brave gym owner in New Jersey who defied the oppressive stay-at-home orders back at the beginning of the Covid pandemic, has won a complete victory in court. All 80+ charges that were filed against him for the “crime” of re-opening his gym – including violation of a governor’s order, public nuisance, disturbing the peace, and operating without a license – were dismissed with prejudice.
Read Ian’s full statement in his Instagram post here and below:
As you can see, Ian has a unique personality and doesn’t pull any punches in his posts. Some people might criticize him for his combative style, but in my opinion he is 100% right. It is Ian Smith, and not Phil Murphy, who holds the moral high ground in this situation. Phil Murphy presumed that he had the right to dictate for other people what risks they should be allowed to take in their lives. While Ian Smith, on the other hand, stood up for the right of each person to make their own decision.
“The victory is for all of us. It’s a victory for sanity in an insane world. So as happy you are for us, celebrate for yourselves as well. The more of these small victories we get, the better the bigger picture gets for all of us.”
Truer words have never been said.
In my opinion, Ian Smith is nothing short of a hero.
A sliver of good news that gives me hope in these dark times: two schools in Virginia have restored Confederate school names!
Stonewall Jackson High School and Ashby Lee Elementary School (named for Turner Ashby and Robert E. Lee) had been renamed to Mountain View High School and Honey Run Elementary School during the nationwide war against people who are different that began following the death of George Floyd. (Waging a war against people who are different in response to a cop killing a person who happens to be black is about as logical as it sounds.) But now, in a triumph for true inclusion, diversity, and human decency, the school board has voted to change the names back!
This is fantastic news. This is a victory for all people who are different from the norm, like me, because Confederate place names, holidays, statues, and monuments are symbols of inclusion and acceptance of people who are different. The restored school names send a message of inclusion and acceptance of students who are different. They make a statement that it is okay to be different. They send the message that students who have trouble fitting in – whether they are nerdy, dress differently than the other kids, like different music, watch different TV shows, have different interests, or are on the autism spectrum – deserve to be included and accepted for who they are.
Taking the Confederate school names away was a cruel and mean-spirited decision amidst nearly four years of ubiquitous and soul-crushing cruelty and meanness. It is a tiny iota of justice, and brings a tiny glimmer of hope, that the names have been changed back.
Kaczynski in 1968, as an assistant professor at UC Berkeley
Theodore John Kaczynski (May 22, 1942 – June 10, 2023)
Earlier this month, Ted Kaczynski, also known as the “Unabomber,” passed away. Kaczynski, age 81, was residing at the federal prison FMC Butner in North Carolina and was suffering from advanced and incurable cancer.
Kaczynski is best known for having conducted a bombing campaign from 1978 to 1995, killing three people and injuring 23. Living in a primitive cabin in a Montana forest, he meticulously created explosive devices and mailed them to various people, including professors, scientists, airline and advertising executives, lobbyists, and computer store owners. His motivation was a fierce opposition to modern society, which he believed was destructive to human dignity and freedom. Kaczynski explained his views in a manifesto called “Industrial Society and Its Future.”
Ted Kaczynski was one of the most remarkable people ever to walk the earth. He was a murderer and a terrorist; that much is true. At the same time, I truly admire Ted Kaczynski, as strange as it might be to say such a thing about a murderer and terrorist.
Kaczynski had an IQ of 167. He was accepted to Harvard at age 15 and became a mathematician, before abandoning both his career and modern life in its entirety to move to the woods. There, he employed his intellectual gifts in constructing increasingly sophisticated bombs. To avoid detection, he enclosed misleading clues in the packages and carefully sanded down the containers to avoid leaving fingerprints. By the time of his arrest in 1996, he was the subject of the most time-consuming and expensive manhunt in the FBI’s history.
According to news reports, Kaczynski ended his own life. This is fitting, because it meant that Kaczynski died on his own terms, which is exactly the way that he lived his life. It is an understatement to say that not many people would give up both a successful career and the comforts of modern life in favor of a solitary existence in a primitive cabin. Equally, it’s an understatement to say that not many people would have the dedication needed to write a 35,000-word manifesto outlining their philosophical beliefs, let alone to undertake a decades-long bombing campaign to fight for those beliefs. At trial, his defense team attempted to use an insanity defense, but Kaczynski rejected this, choosing to stand up for his philosophical beliefs rather than abandon them in the hope of receiving a more lenient sentence. Throughout his time in prison, Kaczynski continued to express his views through frequent correspondence with the outside world (I regret not taking the time to write to him while I still had the opportunity).
A fun fact about Ted Kaczynski is that he became friends with Timothy McVeigh, another murderer and terrorist whom I greatly admire. Before McVeigh’s execution in 2001, they resided together in the federal supermax prison in Florence, Colorado, specifically on a cell block nicknamed “bombers’ row.” The two infamous bombers passed the time by playing cards, swapping magazines, and discussing politics and religion. I am not a very religious person, but I am certain that somewhere, in another world, Ted Kaczynski and Tim McVeigh are hanging out together once more.
Here are a few of my favorite quotes by Ted Kaczynski:
“I am afraid that as the years go by that I may forget, I may begin to lose my memories of the mountains and the woods and that’s what really worries me, that I might lose those memories, and lose that sense of contact with wild nature in general. But I am not afraid they are going to break my spirit.”
“The big problem is that people don’t believe a revolution is possible, and it is not possible precisely because they do not believe it is possible.”
“Imagine a society that subjects people to conditions that make them terribly unhappy, then gives them the drugs to take away their unhappiness… Instead of removing the conditions that make people depressed, modern society gives them antidepressant drugs.”
“I must tell you that mathematicians are not scientists, they are artists. … Apart from the most elementary mathematics, like arithmetic or high school algebra, the symbols, formulas and words of mathematics have no meaning at all.”
“Never lose hope, be persistent and stubborn and never give up. There are many instances in history where apparent losers suddenly turn out to be winners unexpectedly, so you should never conclude all hope is lost.”
Kaczynski’s high school yearbook photo, around age 15
