Stochastic Resistance

We've seen his kind before. The man who is so empty inside, so lacking in humanity, that he won't be satisfied until he has the whole world in his hands.

Symbol for a variable resistor

Voracious Vulture Vlad

Just like Hitler and others before him, voracious vulture Vladimir Putin is aiming to take country after country. But he has more tools than Hitler did.

He has subsumed America not by war, but by interfering in elections with money and with trolls, and by exploiting the weaknesses of people like Trump and Musk to turn them into his puppets. They are greedy but simple men.

I was always uncertain just how far he had been successful until the past few days, when the man acting as president of the United States of America openly parroted Putin's false narrative that Zelensky started the war and was a dictator, and Musk openly and cruelly set about destroying all the institutions that the free people of America had built up.

We defeated Hitler, we can defeat Vlad and the vipers in America's bosom

In the last century free countries in Europe plus America and Russia, and some citizens of Germany and German-occupied countries, united to fight and defeat Hitler. Previous empires have fallen. Putin can and will be defeated, but the sooner we fight back effectively the better it will be. Germany grew back stronger, but under Putin's influence it is backsliding, with the rise of the AfD.

To loosely paraphrase Churchill's famous "we shall fight them on the beaches" speech, we shall go on to the end, we shall fight in America, we shall fight in Europe, we shall fight on the Internet, we shall defend our freedom, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the airwaves, we shall fight in the media, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender, and even if, which I do not for a moment believe, democracy or a large part of it were subjugated and starving, then our friends beyond the seas, armed and guarded by our allies, would carry on the struggle.

We need to stop him before he starts World War Three, turns America (and not just Trump) against Europe, and before there is nuclear disaster, which Putin has been flirting with at Chernobyl and Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plants.

Unfortunately, this time we cannot rely on the 'New World' to come to the rescue. But Putin does not have the resources to physically invade all the countries he covets - look how little progress he has made in Ukraine. Look how well Ukraine's innovative use of drones and other weapons dances rings around his old-fashioned forces. In this internet age, we don't need massive armies to fight him, we just need to be more clever. And just as bad actors incite stochastic terrorism, we can incite stochastic acts of resistance.

We can rebuild democracy. We have the technology. We can make it better than it was. Better, stronger, wiser. But first we must save it.

Just as resistance fighters here and there made a significant difference in WWII, individuals and small groups can make a difference now. While lawyers and some lawmakers are throwing up challenge after challenge (I just contributed to Democracy Docket) to his shock troops, the The Lincoln Project and Led by Donkeys have been getting the message out online and in public. Many have been out to protests - the more protests larger than any of Trump's, the better, so long as they are peaceful. No need for hateful banners, love and ridicule and truth should do.

In previous wars, counterfeit currency has been a weapon. Perhaps local currencies' time has come, particularly since so much of our money is online and therefore vulnerable to hacking, and Trump plans to risk America's money in cryptocurrencies. And so far as possible, do not buy from the companies of any of the billionaires who attended the inauguration (is there a site listing all the companies, including those backed by Koch?). If you have the skills, develop software and products to compete with theirs.

Hack government sites not with messages of opposition, but to restore them to their factual state, and put up mirror sites so people can find those truths which Putin and his puppets do not want you to know. Make them better defended that DOGE's. The many mistakes DOGE has made show that they are not as clever as they think they are.

In his book "The Hidden History of Big Brother in America: How the Death of Privacy and the Rise of Surveillance Threaten Us and Our Democracy", Thom Hartmann describes how foreign powers have hacked not only banks but infrastructure such as dams when waging war against enemies. Putin does not always need his hackers, he could tell Trump to harm infrastructure such as dams. If I was hacking (and it is 20 years since I was a computer geek and I never hacked), I would never do any harm, but aim to insert the truth where it was not welcome or make the oppressors look useless and/or ridiculous. Anything to reduce their effectiveness or block their actions against the people.

In WWII, pamphlets were dropped behind enemy lines. Martin Luther may have posted his Ninety-five Theses on the door of churches in Wittenberg, leading to the Reformation. Some of the founders published their ideas in the Federalist Papers. So, handing out pamphlets and writing articles have a noble history when it comes to turning things around.

Britain's interception and decoding of the Zimmerman Telegram brought America into the war on the side of the allies in WW2. A spy in the Trump White House would be useful, but even infiltrating the MAGA and Proud boys online could provide warning of planned terrorist acts. I wouldn't advocate placing explosives in pagers or phones, but cloning one from each group could provide a lot of useful information. These days we the people have tools that our predecessors could only have dreamed of.

Some countries are beefing up their armies in the light of America abandoning Ukraine and taking the side of Russia over Europe. I hope they are putting a lot of effort into cyber warfare and drones as well as planes, missiles and tanks. And that they are protecting their infrastructure against cyber warfare. Even smaller poorer countries can help, if they set their brightest minds to studying cyber warfare. It was Poland which first broke the German Enigma machines, before handing over the task to Britain which had more resources. Homosexual Alan Turing played a major part, as did an army of women - if bigots had had their way WWII would have lasted a lot longer. A few brave souls seized an Enigma machine. Putin's generals and DOGE are not as clever as they think they are, and can be defeated.

Disagree with the war on DEI? Hire the best, not the whitest. No need to say a word. Like Mexican food? Don't let the bigots stop you from patronising Mexican restaurants. Everyday acts can be acts of resistance. Care about the climate crisis? Boycott companies which are adding to it, reduce your own footprint, come up with new ideas and inventions how to combat it, spread the word online and in person. Don't wait for leaders, though hopefully some will emerge. Engage in whatever form(s) of stochastic resistance that you can.