How The Powder Keg of Conservative Male Sexual Frustration and Loneliness Leads to Violence

Please Don't Try to Correct Me By Regurgitating Culturally Indoctrinated Toxic Conditioning

You all make this newsletter happen! Thanks for your sponsorship! I have payment tiers starting at as little as twenty dollars a year [https://walterrhein.substack.com/bf8564a4]. Upgrade at 30% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/b66e5c2e] Upgrade at 40% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/01f1b0e8] Upgrade at 50% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/0d3e6643] Upgrade at 60% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/6a8f4788] I’m so happy you’re here, and I’m looking forward to sharing more thoughts with you tomorrow. My CoSchedule referral link Here’s my referral link [http://coschedule.com/i/walter-rhein] to my preferred headline analyzer tool. If you sign up through this [http://coschedule.com/i/walter-rhein], it’s another way to support this newsletter (thank you). I'd Rather Be Writing is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to I'd Rather Be Writing at walterrhein.substack.com/subscribe [https://walterrhein.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

Shut Up About Graham Platner and Start Elevating Good Candidates

Thanks for your support: 30% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/b66e5c2e] 💙 40% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/01f1b0e8] 💙 50% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/0d3e6643] 💙 60% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/6a8f4788] There are 435 house seats and 35 senate seats up for election. All of these races have primaries. Sometimes these primaries have multiple candidates. But to listen to the grifter media, you’d think the only race currently going on in the US is happening in Maine. Both big media and independent journalists are clutching their pearls over Graham Platner. The one fact that they conveniently overlook is that if they’d done their job a year ago, they might have published these stories in time to elevate a good candidate. Now they’re committed to hand-wringing over Platner to cover up their complicity and to trick you into supporting their worthless publications. Fool me twice, shame on you. Unlike these other “journalists,” I actually was interviewing primary challengers a year ago. My first interview was with Laura Benjamin who was running for Wisconsin 3. It’s a seat currently occupied by Derrick Van Orden. Benjamin eventually ended her campaign, and I’ve gone on to interview Emily Berge [https://walterrhein.substack.com/p/congressional-candidate-emily-berge] five times. She is a wonderful candidate. She deserves all the press that Platner doesn’t. Start supporting the publications that do the right thing and talk about the right people. I was one of the first people on Substack to interview Francesca Hong [https://walterrhein.substack.com/p/meet-wisconsin-gubernatorial-candidate]. She’s an excellent, Mamdani style candidate who is currently the frontrunner for Wisconsin governor. She could use the support of Substack journalists too. Every word wasted on Platner takes us farther from the society that would be well within our reach if people would just wake up. A few weeks ago, I interviewed Ericka Kopp for VA-01 [https://substack.com/profile/32310923-ericka-kopp-for-va-01] and Melat Kiros [https://substack.com/profile/288789937-melat-kiros]. These two brilliant women made my heart soar. If you watch even five minutes of that interview, you’ll see a realistic and achievable vision for a prosperous and humanitarian future. At the end, Melat gives some thoughts on appealing to MAGA that is probably the most insightful assessment I’ve heard since this whole nightmare began. But again, the grifter journalists only want to talk about Graham Platner. For almost a year, I’ve been screaming into the void. I’ve been interviewing every single candidate that reaches out to me. I’ve been doing a lot of work with Citizens' Impeachment [https://substack.com/profile/402634291-citizens-impeachment]. They’ve put together a community of around 150 candidates that are working on a plan to restore our country when they win their elections. But grifter journalists only want to talk about Graham Platner. And don’t think that the journalists of Substack can claim ignorance. I’ve been appealing to them for years. I’ve reached out dozens of times to millionaire funded publications pleading with them to pay attention to these candidates. They haven’t so much as shared or cross posted my big list of interviews: They have unlimited time to write article after article about Graham Platner, but they don’t have time to hit restack? At some point, we have to recognize that the majority of our precious “independent” media personalities are a bunch of phonies. They aren’t really out there on the front lines working to educate the population. Instead, they’re just chasing “open rates” and grabbing liberal money. They know that hysteria about Graham Platner will get them paid, and they’re indifferent about the fact that journalists have the power to get a new generation of quality candidates elected. It’s up to readers to hold publications to that standard. Stop submitting to MAGA conditioning. It’s ridiculous that so called “activists” won’t so much as restack any of the articles I produce. This frustrated me for a long time until I realized that I expected these big publications to be something they’re not. The change needed to defeat authoritarianism happens in every individual heart. We have to put aside our competitive indoctrination, and find our commitment to helping each other. I’ve always aspired to model that. I don’t hesitate to promote the work of good journalists. I do my best to platform writers who are out there giving visibility to quality people. I’ve found that I get a lot more support from writers with small platforms than the “post and ghost” representatives of old school celebrity journalism. Are you honestly trying to tell me that these “brilliant” writers who were fired from major publications can’t see the value of elevating good politicians? They’re grifters. They don’t really care about fighting authoritarianism or reforming our government, there out there making a buck. Now, to be clear, I don’t have any problem with people who have written a few notes or articles about Graham Platner. There are people out there who have assisted me with interviewing independent candidates who have strong opinions on Platner. You’re allowed to express your opinions. My issue is when massive platforms with massive reach pull out their hair about Platner and completely disregard all the brilliant people who are running. Every time they write about Platner, they miss an opportunity to elevate somebody better. That’s an abdication of their responsibility. Over the last few days, I’ve felt a shift. I’m seeing a lot more pressure directed at major media personalities that aren’t doing the work. This article [https://nickthefrick.substack.com/p/meidas-touch-is-a-racket] is an excellent example. The reality is that even so-called “left-wing” journalism often follows the MAGA model. Their engine is hysteria, rage, and reaction rather than any productive strategy. They operate on division. They create drama and anger. Take a second to scroll through the supporters of some of those big money publications capitalism has indoctrinated you to admire. Check and see how many of their supporters are nameless profiles without a picture who only sponsor one publication. It’s suspicious. At some point, readers have to be more discerning about being turned into a product. These publications that spend all their time spewing rage content about Platner are only there to distract you from learning about good candidates like Francesca Hong, Emily Berge, Melat Kiros, Ruth Fortune, or any of the dozens of other candidates I’ve interviewed. Notice that all the ones I’ve mentioned are women. Now, stop and ask yourself why you’re supporting major publications that refuse to platform women? It’s time to stop allowing yourself to be the unwitting tool of the tech bro robber barons. They know that our minds have largely been captured by toxic scrolling algorithms. They want to continue to command your attention so you feel powerless and you never realize how easy it would be to win back our country. Graham Platner doesn’t deserve this level of media attention. The second a publication dedicates an article to him, you should revoke your support. Be deliberate in the information you consume. Get out there and learn about the valiant women and men of integrity who are actually fighting hard to save our country. Stop giving all your money and time to the grifters. To date I’ve interviewed 28 excellent candidates (imagine if all the big publications did that): Abel Chavez [https://substack.com/profile/415454879-abel-chavez], Chris Bennett [https://substack.com/profile/475630976-chris-bennett], Joel Lava [https://substack.com/profile/9520418-joel-lava], Melat Kiros [https://substack.com/profile/288789937-melat-kiros], Ruth Fortune [https://substack.com/profile/442873713-ruth-fortune], Andrew Rice [https://substack.com/profile/412842428-andrew-rice], Joseph Perez-Caputo [https://substack.com/profile/326662357-joseph-perez-caputo], Robert People for Congress [https://substack.com/profile/314550454-robert-people-for-congress], John Liccione [https://substack.com/profile/149044626-john-liccione], Nick Alex for Congress GA [https://substack.com/profile/369599628-nick-alex-for-congress-ga], Joey Ruz [https://substack.com/profile/85384845-joey-ruz], Elldwnia English [https://substack.com/profile/325816646-elldwnia-english], Alex Rikleen [https://substack.com/profile/355767117-alex-rikleen], Whalen for Congress [https://substack.com/profile/394912943-whalen-for-congress], Shelby Campbell [https://substack.com/profile/333988768-shelby-campbell], Doug Chapin for Congress [https://substack.com/profile/388882141-doug-chapin-for-congress], Erik Terwey [https://substack.com/profile/353346906-erik-terwey], Melissa Bird [https://substack.com/profile/124093758-melissa-bird], Brittany Jones [https://substack.com/profile/500908207-brittany-jones], Liza Hameline [https://substack.com/profile/5798468-liza-hameline], Ericka Kopp for VA-01 [https://substack.com/profile/32310923-ericka-kopp-for-va-01], Salaam Bhatti [https://substack.com/profile/477902606-salaam-bhatti], Robert Tracinski [https://substack.com/profile/1833763-robert-tracinski], Ace Parsi [https://substack.com/profile/511448856-ace-parsi], Emily Berge [https://substack.com/profile/13306714-emily-berge], Ginger Murray [https://substack.com/profile/311149191-ginger-murray], Chris Armstrong for Congress [https://substack.com/profile/151039348-chris-armstrong-for-congress], Francesca Hong [https://substack.com/profile/323459494-francesca-hong] Also check out Citizens' Impeachment [https://substack.com/profile/402634291-citizens-impeachment] What you can do Restack my big list of candidate interviews. Restack each interview individually. If one of those candidates is in your district, go and volunteer. Also, pressure big publications to platform them. I want to see 10,000 shares on that big list. Do you want to save democracy or not? There’s no reason to be clutching our pearls over Platner all the time. Let’s demand that publications platform good people, and if they don’t you should take back your time. Demand better!. Stop supporting publications that do NOTHING and support those doing the work (LIKE ME): We’ve got to join together and support decent people. We have to elevate each other. We don’t need a commitment to the grift, we need an active, cooperative resistance! Thanks for your support: 30% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/b66e5c2e] 💙 40% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/01f1b0e8] 💙 50% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/0d3e6643] 💙 60% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/6a8f4788] I'd Rather Be Writing is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to I'd Rather Be Writing at walterrhein.substack.com/subscribe [https://walterrhein.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

“The Government Can’t Be Trusted” Was the Motto of the Confederacy

Thanks for your support: 30% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/b66e5c2e] 💙 40% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/01f1b0e8] 💙 50% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/0d3e6643] 💙 60% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/6a8f4788] My cousins grew up in Kentucky. It was through them that I learned the phrase, “You can’t ever trust the government.” Even when I was little, I had problems with this concept. After all, weren’t we supposed to respect and revere the military? Wasn’t the military part of the government? When I asked these questions I was met with mockery at best and hostility at worst. “Are you trying to be smart? Obviously we’re not talking about the military.” “But...” “I’ve heard enough out of you. You’re being disrespectful.” Then came the ableist insults that have regrettably become so commonplace in our modern political dialogue. Conservatives are always more inclined to respond to questions with insults rather than answers. Throughout my life, conservatives have always attacked social benefit programs as if they’ve found them personally offensive. They’ve always referred to social security as an “entitlement” even though it’s funded through a tax on our earnings. For some reason, any plan that allows millions of Americans to escape poverty is somehow considered unacceptable to conservatives. But rather than say they want to hurt people, they insist they simply “want small government.” Unfortunately, over time, conservative ideology has become the status quo. The general population is so indoctrinated to defend conservative ideals that they think nothing of appointing a lying, cheating, con artist to the highest office in the land. As long as he claims to stand by “conservative values,” all the gatekeepers step aside to let him pass. Even laws that were written to prevent insurrectionists from taking office are ignored in deference to the conservative ideal. “We can’t create a welfare state,” they claim. “Any time you allow the government to take care of the people, you clear the way for abuse.” Again I ask, “But don’t we depend on our military to take care of us? Isn’t that why we pay for the military?” I never get an answer. Lately the responses are more hostile and more abusive. One of the things that’s become appallingly clear is the lack of understanding the general population has when it comes to history. We’ve all turned over our brains to digital oligarchs. Our children have been programmed by malicious devices. Little by little, we’ve allowed nefarious forces to erode our right to choice. Algorithms select what we see on streaming services and on social media platforms. Soon, AI will dominate search engines as well. Thanks for your support: 30% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/b66e5c2e] 💙 40% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/01f1b0e8] 💙 50% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/0d3e6643] 💙 60% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/6a8f4788] There are ongoing efforts to defund public schools and libraries. Book stores and record stores are already a thing of the past. The text books which are used to teach history are printed in the Confederate south. They’ve swapped the truth for the Lost Cause narrative, and we’ve all been conditioned not to ask questions. When people say, “the government can’t be trusted,” we nod along in agreement and never think to consider the origin of that phrase. I first heard it from my cousins who grew up in Kentucky. They referred to the Civil War as the War of Northern Aggression. “You can’t submit to doing what the government tells you,” they’d say. They repeated this with pride, as if they were rebels. Did they know that these words were first spoken by plantation owners? Did they know that these plantation owners were aggrieved because the government dared to strip them of the human beings they felt entitled to claim as property? In modern America, we don’t have universal healthcare. Conservatives will come forth and insist that it’s not the government’s responsibility to protect the people. They say the same thing about fair wages and education and worker protections. The root of this ideology was born from the rage when the government stepped in to say rich people were no longer allowed to own human slaves. That behavior was recognized as a crime against humanity, but the rage has never gone away. Modern conservatives are the descendants of the confederacy. For years, conservatives have operated on the assumption that government cannot work. They leverage the inherent difficulty of survival, and use it as an opportunity to place false blame on anyone who is honestly trying to offer aid. “If they were sincere, why didn’t they solve every problem in the world already?” Then the people cheer. The conservatives get appointed to positions of power, and they deliberately sabotage any mechanism that was put in place to help humanity. “See?” they cry as they dismantle every humanitarian program, “That never worked anyway!” Today, we are all looking upon the wreckage of a dismantled nation. Conservatives have defunded the pandemic response team even as an Ebola outbreak threatens the world population. Women have been deprived of their right to bodily autonomy. Children are regarded as the property of their parents. An entire elite class of billionaire child traffickers is enjoying the protection of multiple branches of government. Even now, the American public thinks there is some merit in being mistrustful of the government. At some point it should be obvious that government is a tool. We shouldn’t fear the levers of power, we should fear the ambitions of corrupt men. Conservatives always claim they stand for limited government. Another thing the general population seems to overlook is that when conservatives gain control, the government always expands. They run up the debt. They spend a fortune on war and concentration camps and secret police. They don’t want a smaller government. The only thing that makes them mad is a government that protects human rights. Conservative ideology has been infected with a grievance mentality left over from angry, entitled men who felt they were robbed of their right to torment human beings. We have a rape class today. They allow wages to stagnate. They’ve take our healthcare and education away. Conservatives did this. The population of the United States of America is due for a rude awakening. At the heart of everything is the need for a critical change of perspective. For too long, malicious forces have blamed the concept of government for everything that’s wrong in society. It’s time that we taught our children that government can be good as long as we ensure it’s entrusted to women and men of integrity. The government isn’t the problem. We’re still beholden to the sins of the Confederacy. They’ve taken possession of our whole society, and it’s long past time that they faced accountability. When all this is over, we have to put to rest the fundamental deceit that government can’t be trusted. In fact, we must demand that our government stands as a beacon to defend the unalienable rights due to all of humanity. Those that attack social justice programs are actually waging war against common decency. This is the legacy of the Confederacy. We’ve allowed them to erase their crimes from the pages of history, and that’s condemned us all to endure their tortures once more. We have to tell our children that government can be trusted provided we never allow conservatives, Confederates, or the enablers of cruelty near the levers of power ever again. They must be peacefully, legally, and lawfully removed. Then we can start to rebuild. This is a lesson that must endure. The next time somebody says, “We can’t trust the government,” understand that it’s the person who says those words who likely can’t be trusted. People are the weak link, not the ideals we hold most dear. Thanks for your support: 30% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/b66e5c2e] 💙 40% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/01f1b0e8] 💙 50% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/0d3e6643] 💙 60% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/6a8f4788] I'd Rather Be Writing is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to I'd Rather Be Writing at walterrhein.substack.com/subscribe [https://walterrhein.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

Dismantling the Deceit and Indoctrination Inherent to Conservative Ideology

This was a great talk with Deuce Davis [https://substack.com/profile/82506717-deuce-davis]! He likes to “reality check” a lot of conservative publications and I think that’s critical work. I absolutely loved this conversation and I look forward to talking with him again. You can find him here: Thank you Evan Stern [https://substack.com/profile/20571446-evan-stern], A. Eevie Bateman [https://substack.com/profile/443649430-a-eevie-bateman], Skutt Hope [https://substack.com/profile/26188583-skutt-hope], Stuart Cohen [https://substack.com/profile/351205065-stuart-cohen], Ms.Yuse [https://substack.com/profile/322112054-msyuse], and many others for tuning into my live video with Deuce Davis [https://substack.com/profile/82506717-deuce-davis]! Join me for my next live video in the app. I'd Rather Be Writing is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to I'd Rather Be Writing at walterrhein.substack.com/subscribe [https://walterrhein.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

How The Powder Keg of Conservative Male Sexual Frustration and Loneliness Leads to Violence

You all make this newsletter happen! Thanks for your sponsorship! I have payment tiers starting at as little as twenty dollars a year [https://walterrhein.substack.com/bf8564a4]. Upgrade at 30% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/b66e5c2e] Upgrade at 40% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/01f1b0e8] Upgrade at 50% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/0d3e6643] Upgrade at 60% off [https://walterrhein.substack.com/6a8f4788] I’m so happy you’re here, and I’m looking forward to sharing more thoughts with you tomorrow. My CoSchedule referral link Here’s my referral link [http://coschedule.com/i/walter-rhein] to my preferred headline analyzer tool. If you sign up through this [http://coschedule.com/i/walter-rhein], it’s another way to support this newsletter (thank you). I'd Rather Be Writing is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to I'd Rather Be Writing at walterrhein.substack.com/subscribe [https://walterrhein.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]