Wake up. We’re slowly slip-sliding into a Russian-orchestrated coup.

This goes way beyond the jokey rumors that Russian dictator Vladimir Putin is blackmailing Donald Trump with a secret, compromising ‘pee tape.’ Consider how the U.S. voted in the United Nations with Russia, China and Iran against American supposed ally, Ukraine. Now there’s the shocking Oval Office ambush of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky by Trump and JD Vance.

As a smirking gaslit affront to Republicans, Trump is performing his excessive allegiance to Putin under the recently installed portrait of former Republican icon, President Ronald Reagan. Once upon a time, Republicans ascribed the fall of the totalitarian Soviet Union to Reagan’s strong, moral, anti-Communist principles.   

“Let us be aware that while they preach the supremacy of the State, declare its omnipotence over individual man, and predict its eventual domination of all peoples on the earth, they are the focus of evil in the modern world,” Reagan exclaimed at the 1983 National Association of Evangelicals Convention in Orlando, Florida. He warned against ignoring “the facts of history and the aggressive impulses of an evil empire…thereby remov[ing] yourself from the struggle between right and wrong and good and evil.”

Where are the Republicans who cheered Reagan’s ‘evil empire’ speech now? Why do Republicans plug their ears when historians say Putin wants to restore the glory of the Soviet empire – by any means necessary?

Why do Republicans ignore the fact that former KGB agent Vladimir Putin is a communist.

By the way – where are all the Charlton Heston-loving evangelicals who watched him as Moses and cheered when he shouted from atop Mount Sinai, “Thou shalt have no other gods before me” – the first of God’s Ten Commandments. Look at that garish Golden Calf! It’s something charlatan Trump would feature in his NYC apartment or sell for crypto online.

Why have evangelicals forsaken their God for a fraudulent ‘savior’ who acts more like Satan in disguise?   

I confess that I’ve been pissed off at evangelicals since rabidly anti-gay Rev. Jerry Falwell said AIDS was “God’s punishment for homosexuality.” Pastor Peter J. Peters wrote in 1992, “The Death Penalty for Homosexuals is prescribed in the Bible.” Now, Christian Nationals and their allies Trump & Putin make self-determined exceptions to the Ten Commandments while mouthing morality.  

Nazi-loving Afrikaner Elon Musk’s unbridled enforcement of Project 2025 is not just about eradicating DEI but also about erasing us. Meanwhile, Democrats have been twisting in the wind trying to find a ‘message’ that will woo workers who believed Trump’s ‘populism.’ Pundits are advising the Democratic Party to stop talking about ‘identities’ and focus on ‘issues’ – with some progressives throwing trans folks under the bus to win votes instead of vigorously standing up for the values of fairness and equality.

Remember when Republicans were vehemently against government telling individuals what they can and cannot do and Democrats extolled the right to Freedom of Expression?  Now, ‘identity’ is a slur. 

Ask Black women if their race doesn’t impact their access to healthcare.  Ask same sex couples if they fear placing a photo of their loved ones on their work desk might get them fired. Ask fundraisers and pollsters and nonprofit organizers if ‘identity’ demographics matter when voting on issues.

But none of this will matter if we don’t actively intervene to stop Trump’s Putin coup.  Last week, former Fox Weekend co-host and current U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth ordered the U.S. Cyber Command to halt “all planning against Russia,” according to a Feb. 28 report in the cybersecurity publication The Record. 

The Recorded Future story reported how Russian state-backed hackers compromised SolarWinds Inc.’s systems and its Orion network management platform in 2023, distributing malware “to thousands of enterprises and government organizations” with “numerous other cyberattacks” discovered later.

“If Hegseth’s order only applies to the armed service members focused on Russia, it will reportedly affect several hundred cybersecurity experts,” though “several thousand personnel could be affected if the guidance also encompasses other teams,” The Report says. “Those other teams focus on tasks such as intelligence analysis and capabilities development.” 

“How much more proof do we need that this administration is completely compromised?” Brian Krebs, a cybercrime and security investigative journalist, wrote on infosec.exchange. “There is zero reason for the US to relax any offensive digital actions against Russia. If anything, we should be applying more.”

This is hard. How close we thought we’d come to full equality with Obama, Biden, Hillary and Kamala – only to find, like the Paul Simon song says, “the nearer your destination/The more you’re slip sliding away.”

But we can’t give up. Rather, let’s take inspiration from the “Eyes on the Prize” series: “We Who Believe in Freedom Cannot Rest.”

Conclusion: America has switched sides in the Ukraine-Russian war. Up till now, we supported Ukraine’s existential fight for democracy, knowing they are on the frontlines for the free world.

I want to live & die knowing I fought for freedom.