What we deserve
There is a through line that runs through the administration’s policies that explains nearly all of their decisions: the belief, which appears in messaging as well as actions, that other people (people other than them, and those on whom they have chosen to bestow a measure of their power) deserve less. Less freedom, less wealth, less health care, less happiness, less housing, less voting, less self-determination, less ability to say no to sex or favors or anything else, less legal rights, less human rights, less life.
Not born in the US? Deserve less
Not white? Deserve less
Not male? Deserve less
Disagree with the world view that others deserve less? Deserve less
Refuse to bow to actual or perceived power? Deserve less
The United States was founded on the premise that equality was the main goal. The Declaration of Independence contains, as you all well know, these words:
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
If you go back to 1776, it is of course true that the “men” for whom such equality was self-evident were a rather narrow lot of those then inhabiting the territory that would become the United States, but much of the last 250 years has reflected a gradual, painstaking, and sometimes faltering expansion of the idea of equality to include the rest of humanity.
The current administration did not get the memo. Or they got it, ripped it to shreds, and attempted to flush it down the toilet.
The idea of deserving less does not only apply, in the administration’s view, to those attempting to survive within the territorial borders of the U.S., but also to other countries, whether or not our allies, and their inhabitants. Venezuela does not deserve its own oil. Cubans do not deserve food and energy. Greenland does not deserve its autonomy and its natural resources. The world does not deserve peace when we have the power to dominate through war.
The view that the president won the 2020 election despite voluminous evidence to the contrary can perhaps be explained by the belief that those who voted against him did not deserve to vote. This is not just limited to the minuscule number of non-citizens who may have voted (the number is likely in the tens, not even the hundreds), but the women, the people of color, the people who are citizens as a result of birthright, and of course the Democrats. The effort to strip voting rights from large swaths of Americans through the SAVE America Act is an effort to ensure that those who have been deemed to deserve less don’t have a path to insist on more.
The view that immigrants can be taken and deported with no due process is grounded in the belief that they deserve less, and if the law entitles them to more, it is the law and not those who ignore it who are wrong. The view that such immigrants can be stashed indefinitely in warehouses with inadequate food, water, sanitation, sleep and hope is grounded in the belief that, because they deserve less, having private prisons profit off their misery is not a human rights violation but a recognition that the owners of such prisons deserve more.
The graft of this administration, from getting payouts from foreign governments to profiting on inside information to demanding luxury planes at taxpayer expense, is more of the same. The people who run our government believe they deserve more than the people who don’t, and therefore they deserve to profit at the expense of the American people, who deserve less.
Enough.
For 250 years, we have been feeling our way toward an inclusive, compassionate embrace of equality, supported by a commitment to human rights, civil rights, the Constitution and the rule of law. We are not going back.
#NoKingsIII. March 28, 2026.