Republished with permission from Lucian K. Truscott IV
Puerto Rico is not a joke.
Women’s lives are not a joke.
Black lives are not a joke.
Guns are not a joke.
Haitian immigrants are not a joke.
Mexican immigrants are not a joke.
Central American immigrants are not a joke.
Muslim immigrants are not a joke.
Mass killers using AR-15’s are not a joke.
Murdered school children are not a joke.
The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is not a joke.
School breakfast and lunch programs are not a joke.
The right to contraception is not a joke.
The right to abortion is not a joke.
The right to vote is not a joke.
The right to privacy is not a joke.
The Affordable Care Act is not a joke.
Asylum seekers are not a joke.
Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) is not a joke.
The United States military is not a joke.
Veterans are not a joke.
Arlington National Cemetery and the service members buried there are not a joke.
The Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA) is not a joke.
The January 6 insurrection is not a joke.
The lives of D.C. and Capitol police officers are not a joke.
Ukraine’s war against Russian aggression is not a joke.
Teaching the history of racism in America is not a joke.
Transgender rights are not a joke.
The right to marry whomever you want is not a joke.
Social Security and Medicare are not a joke.
Threatening to use the Department of Justice against political opponents is not a joke.
The North Atlantic Treaty Alliance (NATO) is not a joke.
Political violence is not a joke.
Lying to the American people is not a joke.
Promising to be “a dictator on day one” is not a joke.
Get out there and vote as if your life depended on it, because this election is not a joke.
Lucian K. Truscott IV
Lucian K. Truscott IV, a graduate of West Point, has had a 50-year career as a journalist, novelist and screenwriter. He has covered stories such as Watergate, the Stonewall riots and wars in Lebanon, Iraq and Afghanistan. He is also the author of five bestselling novels and several unsuccessful motion pictures. He has three children, lives in rural Pennsylvania and spends his time Worrying About the State of Our Nation and madly scribbling in a so-far fruitless attempt to Make Things Better.
