What you may not know is that during World War 2, there were concentration camps in the United States.  People that were Japanese American citizens, and people that looked Japanese, were rounded up and sent to camps, and held. 

They had not done anything wrong, there was no due process, their civil liberties were fully stripped and ignored.  Men, women and children scooped up and sent to the camps.  Many were then sent to other states too.  

People were pulled from their homes, losing everything - including their basic rights as citizens.  

When you talk about the next administrations plans for camps, on day one, and you are comparing to Hitler, I encourage you to look a little closer.  

World War 2 was not that  long ago and in fact there are many people still alive today that were held in those camps.  One you may have heard of, and certainly would recognize is George Takei, he played Sulu on the original Star Trek series.  

Idaho was one of the places where a camp was built and you can learn more about it here: 
https://www.nps.gov/miin/index.htm?fbclid=IwY2xjawGo1i1leHRuA2FlbQIxMAABHXcJaV9VT5Hrv1oOne0jDFlUFEK1fIHcGsXA-skXI8TMmcT2ye7j4xheHw_aem_l4NcLo049R95vOCFCXHQVg#:~:text=Minidoka%3A%20An%20American%20Concentration%20Camp&text=Although%20little%20remains%20of%20the,the%20importance%20of%20civil%20liberties

There were others too, ten of them:
Tanforan: Located in Northern California 
Puyallup: Located south of Seattle, Washington 
Tule Lake and Manzanar: Located in California 
Gila River and Poston: Located in Arizona 
Jerome and Rohwer: Located in Arkansas 
Minidoka: Located in Idaho 
Topaz: Located in Utah 
Heart Mountain: Located in Wyoming 
Granada: Located in Colorado 

They didn't call them concentration camps, they called them "relocation centers" they were run by a department that was created, it was a federal agency and it was called the War Relocation Authority. 

You can learn more at: 
Densho https://densho.org/learn/introduction/american-concentration-camps/
​The National Archives https://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/japanese-relocation
History https://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/japanese-relocation

If someone tells you, that can't happen here, or won't happen here.  Know that is has happened before, and if it's to not happen again, it will have to be the will of the people, to stop it.  

We don't know them all, but we owe them all. And that means year-round, and wrap around support. 

(0:00) Okay, it's Friday. Tough love, let's go. It's time to pick a lane.

It's been a tough week (0:09) and time is ticking between now and the inauguration. Plus, we have all the (0:13) holidays in between and a calendar year change. Time goes fast.
Yeah, we're in grief. You get to (0:23) be sad. You get to be in grief, even if you take the whole weekend.

You bet. Go for a walk in the (0:33) Here's why. Because it lets you release your emotions.
But it also is one of the ways that (0:40) cortisol moves out of your body. When you have too much cortisol, which by the way, (0:46) kills your brain, kills your ability to learn. It is, it is very hard stress for your body.

(0:54) It leaves your body through water, it leads to tears, it leads to your urine, (0:59) and it leads to your sweat. If you're sweating it out, go take a shower right after. (1:04) But beyond cortisol, it's time to choose.

Choose one thing, choose something safe, (1:13) and choose what you can sustain. Make sure you also choose self-care, (1:18) because it's going to be a long road. It's going to be a long time.
There's a lot. (1:24) Don't reinvent the wheel. If it is something that you are interested in, choose a non-profit (1:32) that is already in existence and already doing good work.

It can be as simple as volunteering (1:38) to help put mailers together at your local ACLU. It can be as simple as going to Planned Parenthood (1:50) and asking them what kind of volunteers they need. Maybe you don't want to be a volunteer (1:56) that is between you and the protesters, or between the patient and the protesters, (2:01) but there are other things you can do.

Maybe it is in learning how to be, how to be someone who (2:11) works on the 9-8-8 line. Maybe you are a person who is ready to help with the domestic violence (2:21) in your town or such. It needs to be a safe place for you.

That's going to be different for (2:29) everybody, because safe in a target is an issue now, and it's going to continue to be an issue. (2:38) It also needs to be something that you can sustain through self-care because it doesn't (2:43) drag you down mentally and physically and grind you into nothing. (2:48) Maybe what is best for you is to become a volunteer at your local library.

(2:54) Do the things that you need to do to help be a light in all of this, to be able to continue (3:03) to say things are important to me and I have a voice that matters. We don't just go and give up. (3:14) We can't.

We cannot do that, and we know that. Is it going to be hard? Yes. Is it going to be tiring? (3:21) Yes.
Pick one thing, because if you try and scattershot across all of the different places (3:29) and all of the different areas, it will destroy you. It will destroy your energy. It will destroy (3:37) your soul.
It's too much. Pick something you're interested in and do that. Trust yourself enough (3:49) to say, okay, I've done this for six months.

This is breaking my heart. I can't do this anymore. (3:56) Take a week off or a weekend or a couple of weeks and choose something else and get involved there.

(4:05) We need you. We need you to be the beautiful, bright light that you are. We need you to continue (4:13) to do the work that you have done, and we cannot let them take that away from us.
(4:21) We are more than that, and we will continue to be more than that. There are always ways (4:28) to fight back. We're going to find them.
​
We're going to use them. We're going to lose (4:35) more than a few, and the truth is we're going to lose people, and that's part of our grief right (4:41) now, but that doesn't mean we give up. It means we find a way through and that we be a light for (4:48) others to see that none of us are alone.

I did my civic duty and I voted early and by mail.  I voted for democracy and for the smooth transition of power.  Having been in politics since a very young age, and active since I was 14, I believe this is the defining election of our time.  

It's urgent that we vote to give women back the rights to their own bodies, so they can make decisions between themselves and their doctors.  

And it's important that we vote knowing that no one is above the law.  We need a lot of reform in our country, because we do not have an equal justice system. And part of that is in our elected officials knowing they are not above the law, and are held to higher standards and accountability.  

And the ideas in project 25, no one writes that and then doesn't plan to use it.  Rolling back protections for the environment, for health, for schools - all of it is unacceptable.  Personally I live next to an environmental disaster area, and we are sick and we can't get help fast enough with the laws we have now.  Without protections, it's unthinkable. 

I truly worry that if we don't all come together and vote, and make our voices heard that democracy may not hold.