Letter from Virginia Kennedy

A Tale of Two Americas

The Rise-up and Sing-out Concert, organized by the No Kings Coalition, was an inspiration. The concert happened at New York City’s “Town Hall,” a venue founded by women’s suffragists in 1921 as a place to celebrate civil rights.

The speakers and performers encouraged everyone to fight for an America where our tax dollars fully fund strong public schools so our kids have a chance for a future with good educations and good jobs, where leaders work to bring housing prices down so people have safe, affordable places to live, where people can afford to go to the doctor when they need to, and where people who came here, as most of our ancestors did, to legitimately work for an American dream of freedom and prosperity can do so without fear of harassment and detention.

President Trump’s 250th celebratory cage match took place simultaneously. Like the ballroom he bulldozed the East Wing of the White House to build, he claims the UFC and corporate donors covered costs for the event. Like the ballroom, which Trump recently demanded a billion dollars of taxpayer dollars to fund, the cage match, just between security and clean up, will cost American taxpayers millions. Our corporate billionaire president sat with other billionaires in an arena covered with corporate logos.

You would be excused if you suddenly imagined rich Roman authoritarians watching gladiators fight to the death. But who knows? Maybe Trump and his billionaire friends and family members took a minute to talk about affordable healthcare.

Virginia Kennedy
CooperstownOneonta Indivisible