Stand with the Bucks County Commissioners Against Unhinged Attacks!

Counteract Disruption: Support Our Bucks County Commissioners

It appears that some are employing tactics to undermine our democratic process by hiring hecklers to disrupt the Bucks County Commissioners' meetings, aiming to embarrass our Democratic representatives.

Take a Stand and Make Your Voice Heard!

We need your presence to show strong community support for our Commissioners. Meetings take place on the first and third Wednesday of each month at 10:30 AM. To participate in the public comment period, please arrive 15 minutes early to register. Meetings are held at:

• Bucks County Administration Building
  55 E Court Street
  1st Floor, Commissioners' Meeting Room
  Doylestown, PA 18901

The video below captures just a glimpse of the aggressive and often irrational criticisms faced by the Bucks County Commissioners during public meetings, held on the first and third Wednesdays of each month. In these challenging times, it is crucial that we show our steadfast support and appreciation for their dedication.

This support becomes even more vital as Bob Harvie steps up to run for Congress in PA-1. Let's rally behind our commissioners, defend their records, and ensure they receive the respect and encouragement they deserve.

Let's ensure our Commissioners feel supported and respected as they work for our community's best interests. Join us and help maintain the integrity of our local governance!

Join us in making a positive impact at the next meeting. Your presence matters!

The concerning literacy crisis affecting Americans' ability to make informed decisions

In a compelling New York Times opinion piece (Producing Something This Stupid Is the Achievement of a Lifetime), David Brooks delves into a troubling trend: the decline of reasoning abilities among Americans. Citing alarming data, Brooks highlights that a significant portion of the population struggles with basic literacy, akin to that of a 10-year-old child.

He opens with: “You might have seen the various data points suggesting that Americans are losing their ability to reason.”

Here are some other salient points from the piece:

• Andreas Schleicher from the OECD supports this view, stating, "Every third person you meet may have difficulty reading simple texts." This literacy crisis underpins our ability to process information and make informed decisions, impacting everything from personal life choices to political stances.

• Brooks argues that the erosion of critical thinking skills leads to poor decision-making at both individual and governmental levels. He points to Donald Trump’s tariff policy as a prime example of policy-making disconnected from reason, evidence, and expert advice. Describing the policy as "jumble-headedness exemplified," Brooks criticizes Trump for his impulsiveness and disregard for coherent strategy, characteristics that have led to predictable chaos.

• Brooks reflects on historical shifts from oral to literate cultures, expressing concern that the emerging dominance of screen culture might be diminishing our depth of understanding and engagement with complex ideas. "Civilization was fun while it lasted," he concludes, suggesting a grim outlook if current trends continue.

• This piece underscores the vital role of education, not just in schools but throughout life, as a pillar of informed citizenship and effective governance. As we face complex global challenges, the need for critical literacy has never been more urgent.

• Lifelong out-of-school learning, is really valuable critical in making good choice in life, like who to vote for!

• “Back in Homer’s day, people lived within an oral culture, then humans slowly developed a literate culture. Now we seem to be moving to a screen culture. Civilization was fun while it lasted.”

Our Police State Has Arrived

M. Gessen, writing in the NYTimes, explains that unmarked vans, secret lists, and public denunciations are the hallmarks of a secret-police state:

“It’s the unmarked cars,” a friend who grew up under an Argentine dictatorship said. He had watched the video of the Columbia graduate student Mahmoud Khalil’s abduction. In the video, which Khalil’s wife recorded, she asks for the names of the men in plainclothes who handcuffed her husband.

“We don’t give our name,” one responds. “Can you please specify what agency is taking him?” she pleads. No response. We know now that Khalil was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, an agency of the Department of Homeland Security.

Those of us who have lived in countries terrorized by a secret police force can’t shake a feeling of dreadful familiarity. “I never realized until this moment how much fear I carried with me from my childhood in Communist Romania,” another friend, the literary scholar Marianne Hirsch, told me. “Arrests were arbitrary and every time the doorbell rang, I started to shiver.”

It’s the catastrophic interruption of daily life, as when a Tufts University graduate student, Rumeysa Ozturk, was grabbed on a suburban street by half a dozen plainclothes agents, most of them masked. The security camera video of that arrest shows Ozturk walking, looking at her phone, perhaps to check the address where she was supposed to meet her friends for dinner that night, when an agent appears in front of her. She says something — asks something — struggling to control her voice, and within seconds she is handcuffed and placed in an unmarked car.

She has seen how a police state acts, fleeing Russia twice, first as a teenager, then again as an adult.

M. Gessen is an Opinion columnist for The Times. They won a George Polk Award for opinion writing in 2024. They are the author of 11 books, including “The Future Is History: How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia,” which won the National Book Award in 2017.