February: It already felt like forever


We’re recapping the Year of the Sociopath in the USA. Some people will remember, by the end of February people were saying things like “can you believe it’s only been 20 days since Trump became president?” February was one of the more ‘chill’ months, but everyone was already exhausted from being in “post-truth America.”

 

  • Trump started the month with his executive order to cut Dodd-Frank banking regulations. We created these rules in response to the recent housing crisis and recession, and they didn’t even go far enough. This is just a standard step in the Republican effort to enrich bankers at all costs.
  • For the first time ever, the Vice President had to cast a tie-breaking vote to confirm a cabinet nomination. A completely unqualified rich person named Betsy DeVos was confirmed despite huge opposition by the public. Her job is to excessively promote private schools* at best, more realistically to dismantle public education in their favor.
  • Mass shooting: 5 people (including 4 teens) were injured when someone started shooting at them with a shotgun from a car. We never found out what the heck happened.
  • Police forces finished beating up, arresting, and clearing out the water protectors (a.k.a. protesters) who were trying to prevent the Dakota Access Pipeline from being built. Over the course of this very long struggle, Obama and Trump shrugged as people were beaten back in support of oil companies.

 

Footnotes are for people in the far future.

*Private schools were special schools that rich people maintained to separate their children from the others and give them a start on experiencing societal advantages.