Youth Advocacy
Youth Advocacy
Welcome to Year 5, Week 09. This weekly report is built on a simple premise: we cannot afford the luxury of disengagement while our democracy teetered on the brink. To ensure our community of resistance stays connected across all digital spaces, you can now join my daily advocacy conversations and political updates on social media.
🦋 Connect on Bluesky: Follow my micro-essays, breaking news threads, and real-time commentary Direct Link on Word or Phrase
📘 Connect on Facebook: Join our community page for deep-dive discussions, essays, and updates Direct Link on Word or Phrase
27.05.2026-02.06.2026
REVIEW and ANNOUNCEMENTS
Weekly Review: Standing at the Brink
Dr. Jerry Goebel
Whether it is a presidency teetering on insanity, an economy facing bankruptcy, or a nation dealing with systemic democratic erosion—this week's news brings us straight to the brink. Drawing from 40 years on the frontlines of youth development and alternative justice systems, this week's briefing serves as an uncompromised audit of our modern socio-political landscape. Inside, we confront the deliberate degradation of the Free Press, the corporate billionaire push for a predatory "mudsill economy," and the structural corruption of our military infrastructure. We cannot afford the luxury of disengagement. Read the reports, listen to the music of resistance below, and let’s dig deep to organize for a accountable future.
Visual Stories!
The Power of Creative Resistance: Music bypasses traditional cognitive walls and speaks direct truth to institutional power. In this section, I translate our weekly macro-political and economic critiques into original visual stories and lyrical compositions developed via Canva and Suno.
✊ Featured Single: "Tax the Rich and The Wealthy"
This track is a direct, uncompromising musical anthem demanding a structural rebalance of power against the corporate elite building a "mudsill economy." Listen, reflect, and share it with someone who refuses to look away. https://youtu.be/mV-Pnu7hfL0?si=3fb9JEMkVN7C8UCD
📺 Subscribe on YouTube: Join my channel to explore my fully categorized playlists, splitting my catalog into Social Justice & Reform and Relationships & Personal Growth Direct Link on Word or Phrase
Top Links of the Week
02.06.2026
Use It or Lose It
Adrienne LaFrance, of The Atlantic, gives us an important cautionary warning about our diminishing rights under this administration. Specifically, the right of Free Speech. Those kind few who have read my meanderings over time, might recall that I believe in two sides to any right; there is the right itself, but the flip side is the responsibility. LaFrance points to this when she says, “One requirement of self-governance is the relentless pursuit of truth, which necessarily involves questioning people in positions of power in order to prevent tyranny.” She points out this administration’s tendencies to evict or degrade those reporters that ask the “hard questions.” Turning press pools into herds of sycophants. LaFrance calls out responses from this president to those who have challenged him, she illustrates, “When one woman asked him when the Iran war would end, he called her a ‘disgrace.’ When another woman asked him why he’s focused on beautifying the Reflecting Pool in front of the Lincoln Memorial during wartime, especially as gas prices soar, he snapped that it was a ‘stupid question.’ When a woman asked the president about his administration’s handling of Afghan refugees, he interrupted her, saying, ‘Are you stupid? Are you a stupid person?’ To yet another woman, who’d asked him about Jeffrey Epstein, the president responded, ‘Quiet! Quiet, piggy.’ He has told other Americans that they are ‘horrible,’ ‘obnoxious,’ ‘terrible,’ ‘stupid and nasty,’ simply for asking him serious questions on behalf of the public.” In essence, LaFrance reminds us, “No truth, no freedom.” She also reminds us how important it is for citizens to bear the “responsibilities” of “rights.” Will we pursue truth? Will we listen to it? Will we stand up and even face intimidation for it? These are question each of us must ask to pass on the right of free speech to a new generation.
01.06.2026
How Elon Musk Killed Hundreds of Thousands of People
It was difficult this morning to decide which article was more disgusting; reviewing the work of Elon Musk while he officially worked for Donald T.R.U.M.P. in the White House, or the treatment of prisoners being held in I.C.E. Facilities sponsored by the United States. I’m going with Elon Musk, but they both point to the type of economy the Republicans want to create using the tax dollars of middle and low-income U.S. taxpayers. They want a “mudsill economy,” one in which the “authorized poor” support the billionaire class. If you are not part of the economy that supports them, the rich and wealthy don’t want to support you; they want you to die—and have no problem if you die a torturous death from treatable disease, starvation, or tortured and beaten in a detention center. Apparently, this is the type of United States that a significant portion of the United States wanted because they voted for it… TWICE! The cruelty was evident in the release of Project 2025’s workbook; “Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise.” Those who didn’t read the mandate or read it and voted for this Conservative Party anyway deserve the blame for these deaths and this treatment. This is your U.S.! This is your responsibility! The only way to change this is to shake off any sense of disengagement you might be selfishly feeling and to call attention to this cruelty so as to promote an overwhelming response at the mid-term elections. There is much you can do before that: keep aware of the news (though I know how depressing and disabling—even traumatic—it can be to continue reading about these acts of inhumanity). Share what you learn with others. Write about it, sing about it, talk about it. Support local endeavors to call attention to it. Be resilient, be resistant! The dark vision of the future the people have for your children and you is worse than even the most dystopian writers could have imagined—and this isn’t fiction. This is happening right now, this is happening right away, this is happening all around the world and all across the United States. Raise your voice. Speak your mind. Tell this story!
29.05.2026
Has Trump Corrupted the Military? (Part II)
https://www.theatlantic.com/podcasts/2026/05/has-trump-corrupted-the-military/687329/
I didn’t have the room yesterday in my blog to cover the interview section of David Frum’s podcast, so I thought I would add that today. Frum interviews Jason Crow, who represents the Sixth District of Colorado in the United States House of Representatives. As Frum points out, “Crow was first elected in 2018. He serves on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and the House Armed Services Committee. Also, “Crow is a veteran of both Iraq and Afghanistan. He fought with the 82nd Airborne Division and the 75th Ranger Regiment. He completed three tours of duty and rose to the rank of captain. He was awarded the Bronze Star.” Crow is often seen these days sparring with Pete Hegseth, the madman/sycophant that T.R.U.M.P. appointed to oversee the Department of Defense. This interview analyzes how deeply political and morally corrupt military leadership has become under Hegseth. Indeed, Crow says Hegseth is “M.I.A.” But one might think that it would actually be better if Hegseth were “missing.” Less damage would be done in his absence than in his presence. Like the presidency, this cabinet appointment no longer cares about defending the United States; it only cares about defending Donald J. T.R.U.M.P..
28.05.2026
Has Trump Corrupted the Military?
https://www.theatlantic.com/podcasts/2026/05/has-trump-corrupted-the-military/687329/
David Frum does it again. His commentaries are always a wealth of insight, leaving me often nodding my head in agreement and sometimes stopping his podcast midstream to consider what he articulated. But he always gives me plenty to talk about with those in my circle. This week, Frum looks at this administration’s murmurings of a peace plan in the Iranian War-of-Choice. He points out this is entirely Trump’s war. He decided he wanted to go it alone because he didn’t want to explain it, he didn’t want to be questioned about it, and he certainly didn’t want anyone to block it. Now, he owns it—entirely, and he’s losing it—miserably. But, as Frum leads us to analyze, he is responsible for the job. Not just the mess he started in Iran, but the mess he’s made of the United States (indeed, the world). T.R.U.M.P. was never presidential material. He never sought to serve the hopes of the citizens, only the support of his radical cultic followers. Now, in his second term, he cares even less about being a “President for the Country,” and even—apparently—a President of his party. Frum points out how the President—in responding to a recent CNN report—remarked (when questioned about his failing poll numbers) that he has, “100% support of the Republicans. Whoever told him that news (probably in one of his “Cabinet Adoration Gatherings”), was lying to him and the President—not amenable to checking his own sources once he has formed an opinion—latched on to it. No one in this President’s inner circle will tell him the truth, or perhaps they are all duped too. This administration is under attack on the left and the right. His grift and war have left him isolated, a laughing stock internationally and an embarrassment nationally. Thank you, David Frum, for your insights again and for “telling truth to power.”
27.05.2026
36 Republicans vote against law banning child marriages. Some cited the Bible as justification.https://apple.news/ACcvvlga8SROHq4thDAHsHQ
Oklahoma is a bellwether state for radical white conservative ideology. From her loins sprang the mandate forcing schools to post the Ten Commandments in all classrooms. Now, its legislature is legalizing child marriage on Biblical and Constitutional grounds. According to journalist Daniel Villarreal of LGBTQ Nation, one of the rhetorical questions asked, in a recent legislative session where child marriage was sanctioned, was by Rep. Jim Olsen (R), “How old was Mary when she married Joseph?” Also, reported by Villarreal, was this doozy of a quote, by state Rep. Justin Humphrey (R) who asked, ‘This bill has nothing to do with pedophilia. Do you know what socialism looks like? It’s when the government comes in and tells you what you’re going to do.’” Clearly, underage sex is rape—even if President T.R.U.M.P. wants us to believe it is not. What Oklahoma legislators want us to embrace is aligned with the beliefs of the world’s greatest pedophiles, like Epstein, Maxwell, and the current president. If these Republicans have their way, the U.S. will become another country where sexual slavery is not only legal, but legally ratified.
