Rebecca McCartney

Traveler & realist; Tour de France super-fan

[Hunter Biden @HunterBiden]

The Lessons I Learned from My Dad

I am not the man my father is.
I am trying. Some days closer. Some days farther.
He never sat me down and explained these lessons. He lived them. I’m still learning them.

Show up.
The kitchen table. The hospital room. The funeral. The picket line. The call from the son who won’t answer.
Show up.
Most days that’s the whole job.
My whole life I watched him do it. Not for cameras. Not for headlines. Not because there was something in it for him. He showed up because someone needed him.

I learned that grief doesn’t make you special.
My father buried a wife and daughter. He buried a son. Yet he never treated grief as a claim on other people’s sympathy. Instead, it made him notice theirs.
A mother who lost a child. A father sitting beside a hospital bed. A kid scared about what comes next. A son who lost his mother, his sister, his brother.
He always noticed.

I learned that power is not the point.
The people who chase power eventually confuse the office with themselves.
My father never did.
Whether he was a county councilman, a senator, vice president, or president, he was the same man.
The title changed.
He didn’t.

I learned that family comes first.
The train from Wilmington wasn’t symbolism.
It was every night.
He read to us. Showed up to games. Sat through hospital rooms. Waited up for children who were lost.
And when the day came that the country and the family could not both have him at full strength, he chose family. He relinquished the last chapter of how he wanted to be remembered. And he never complained about it.

Most of all, I learned that love is not soft.
Love is discipline.
Love is showing up at one in the morning when nobody is watching.
Love is answering the phone.
Love is staying.
Love is getting back up after life knocks you down and doing it all again tomorrow.
That love saved my life.
I’ve failed at many of these lessons, sometimes in very public ways.
He loved me anyway.

That’s the last lesson.
I am not trying to become my father.
I am trying to carry what he gave me.
And if I can do that, even imperfectly, that will be enough.

Happy Father’s Day, Dad. I love you.

[Bob Golen @BobGolen]

About sums up this week

[Republicans against Trump @RpsAgainstTrump]

Here’s Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth in April announcing the end of the military’s mandatory annual flu vaccine requirement, calling it “Not rational.”

[Mike Levin @MikeLevin]

A brand new bridge between Detroit and Canada is finished and ready to open. It would speed up traffic for millions of trucks, cut delays for American businesses, and help the auto industry that employs people in every state. There is just one problem.

Donald Trump won’t let it open.

Here is why.

The family that owns the old bridge stands to lose business when the new one opens. So in January, they gave one million dollars to a pro-Trump super PAC.

Weeks later they met with Trump’s Commerce Secretary.

He called Trump.

Hours after that, Trump announced he would block the new bridge. The opening was set for June 12. It got canceled the day before. The bridge sits there finished and empty.

Now here is the part that should make every taxpayer angry.

Canada paid for the entire bridge.

Every dollar. And the United States already owns half of it for free. Trump is holding up a bridge we got for nothing, to protect a donor who wrote him a check, while picking a fight with our closest ally and biggest trading partner.

This is corruption in plain sight.

A billionaire pays, and the President delivers. American workers and businesses pay the price.

Open the bridge. A government should work for the people, not for whoever writes the biggest check.
https://t.co/9o9Gz9UrBo

[Rebecca McCartney @becluvstravel]

@BillKristol 🤮

[Team Ossoff @TeamOssoff]

Ossoff: Last September, the President of Kazakhstan calls Donald Trump and says he wants to grant tungsten mining rights to an American company. And the very next month, Eric and Don Jr. get a stake in the American company pursuing the mining deal.

Six days later, six days after Prince Eric and Prince Don get their stake, Kazakhstan announces this company will get, “The largest known undeveloped tungsten resource in the world.” A few more weeks go by, and then the U.S. government, run by their father, sets aside 1.6 billion of your tax dollars to fund and finance their mining project. In Kazakhstan.

All this while you pay more for gas, for groceries, for health care, and that's just the tip of the iceberg.

[James Talarico @jamestalarico]

There’s been a lot of talk in this race about what makes a "real man."

A man does what’s right when no one is watching. He upholds his commitments to his family and neighbors. He doesn’t lie, cheat, & steal his way through life.

Real men serve others. Weak men serve themselves.

[Jamie Bonkiewicz @JamieBonkiewicz]

This is what happens when everyone around you is too afraid to say, “Sir, that’s fucking stupid”

[James Talarico @jamestalarico]

Ken Paxton was indicted for scamming his own friends.

He convinced them to invest hundreds of thousands in a company while secretly pocketing a commission.

Paxton sold out his own friends for a quick buck. What makes you think he won't sell you out in the Senate?

[Republicans against Trump @RpsAgainstTrump]

Megyn Kelly, who endorsed and campaigned for Trump in the 2024 election:

“I didn’t expect the corruption to be quite as widespread as it has been. The self-dealing, the lining of his and his family’s pockets. It’s shocking… You look across the board at the Trump family, I’ve never seen a family get so rich off the presidency.”

[Tamie @RealTamie]

I find it interesting that Trump supporters have never seen these videos. They claim there is no footage of that day. 😳 I watched it in real time on TV when it was happening, just like Trump.
1. FYI, the footage is all over the internet.
2. You can CLEARLY see them breaking windows. The law says that’s breaking and entering.
3. I’ve been to the Capitol, you have to go through security to enter. You don’t enter through broken windows. That’s just a fact.

[Jake Justice @jakecobb]

They want you to forget. They don’t want you to see this.

Keep sharing this so we can’t forget what they did to us that day.

[Jenni @hashjenni]

Imagine having this many gun incidents near the President (staged or not), and believing a $1 billion ballroom is the solution instead of gun regulation and mental health programs.

[Rebecca McCartney @becluvstravel]

@gtconway3d But is JD a better option? Real question.

[Rebecca McCartney @becluvstravel]

@buitengebieden WTF. Amazing. I learned something today! ⛵️

[Liam Nissan™ @theliamnissan]

Never forget

[Andy Kim @AndyKimNJ]

My son has a soccer game this weekend. He'd like me to go. I'm going to try. I said, this is not good timing for me. He's a person I've known for a long time.

[Acyn @Acyn]

McGovern: It took us forever to compensate the victims of 9/11, and here you have this $1.8 billion slush fund that doesn’t go through any committees or hearings. All of a sudden, they have the money to compensate convicted felons—people who attacked our democracy and tried to overthrow a free and fair election.

This is the most corrupt administration in our history.

[Harry Sisson @harryjsisson]

Bruce Springsteen appeared on Stephen Colbert’s show tonight and COOKED Trump and his goons

“I’m here in support tonight for Stephen, because you are the first guy in America who lost his show because we got a president who can't take a joke…. and because Larry and David Ellison feel they need to kiss his ass to get what they want. Stephen, these are small minded people. They got no idea what the freedoms of this beautiful country are supposed to be about”

[Jake Justice @jakecobb]

Keep posting this so people don’t forget how truly bad this event was.

Don’t let people gaslight you into thinking it was peaceful and worthy of 1500+ pardons and slush fund payoffs.