All day, I've been watching the news, reading blogs, and preparing for Ethics class. (More the first two than the last one.) Lots of heartbreak today, coupled with astounding anger. They're the only rational responses for progressives.
From La Di Da, via Twelve Frogs:

I now realize that most Americans do not vote their economic interests, but vote on social issues, especially gay marriage and reproductive rights. I live in a country in which the majority fears sexual self-determination, civil liberties, and women's autonomy more than it fears poverty, war, and disease.

And I also live in a country who has now effectively told the rest of the world to go to hell. Before, other countries gave American citizens some benefit of the doubt. They have no reason to do that anymore. I take some comfort in the fact that I finally (finally!) live in a blue state, but that doesn't change the fact that I live in this country.
So what are the options?

• Move elsewhere. Except we just started doctoral work here. Our families are here, and members of them are aging quickly. And I'm the only one who really wants to go.
• Ignore things. I've seen this option put forth by a lot of bloggers today: "I'll just keep my head down and tend to my things and four years will eventually pass." I must say, this one of the first thoughts that occurred to me. It would be so easy to make a decision to ignore everything except my work on this degree. Just concentrate on the coursework, on presenting, on publishing, and on getting the hell done. It'll take the entire presidential term plus a year, and it's a very productive way to fill the time. It also takes unfair advantage of my somewhat privileged position. After all, I can mostly afford to ignore this, since my university probably won't collapse in the next four years, my Big State U health insurance probably won't be cancelled, and my funding probably won't be cut off unless I do something stupid.
• Reconsider intentionality. Concentrate on getting this degree, on coursework, on presenting, on publishing, and on getting the hell done. Suspiciously similar to Option 2? Yes, but with a difference in intentionality. My PhD will be in Rhetoric with a focus on Intellectual Property. I'm also doing a hell of a lot of work in the Law School. As Dorothea points out in the first seriously purposeful post I've seen all day, preservation and protection of information is going to be crucial in the coming years, as is access to it. This has been a peripheral focus for me, but I'm going to make open access a bigger part of my research agenda. (I was headed that way anyway, but today's events make it imperative.) As a rhetorician, I'm also in a position to make sure my students understand the fine line between persuasion and coersion. I can study and teach the workings of argumentation. I can make a difference through small, consistent, daily actions.

And I can start right now by supporting initiatives like the Progressive Teachers Blog, "a coalition of individuals, interest groups, and caucuses who feel that language, writing, and literacy are inseparable from issues of social justice and public policy. " (via Earth Wide Moth) Large-scale initiatives may or may not be fruitful at this point, but these small actions by small people will count. I'm reminded of something one of my mentors tells people who ask why she teaches something as boring as technical writing when she could be teaching literature: "My students will understand how to write a persuasive letter, how to write an effective memo. They will know how to create a solid presentation. And those are the documents that create policy and alter society. Those are the small documents that change the world."