[John Riley]

I built and ran a YA nonfiction publishing house for about 25 years. If you count the years I worked writing and editing and shipping at night after my day job writing tech manuals it's 30. I'm very proud of the work we did. Award-winning books and series on science and science history, music, mathematics, literature, biographies, and more. But the business went away, fast, when schools and public libraries, but the schools most of all, stopped buying books. That isn't an exaggeration. They stopped buying books. Now everything is on Canvas and only the big corporations were able to get into that.

Yesterday, I was sent a tic-tok link from a former author. The video was of a school librarian in Florida standing by giant boxes, the type a school copier or some other machine may have come in. There were four of them, and they were filled to the top with books that state investigators had taken off the shelf. The former author sent me a link because there was box covered with books from our Civil Rights Leaders, Civil Rights Movement, and History of Mexico series. There they were, the familiar covers strung across the top of a huge pile of books. I have no idea how deep into the box our work went. We also did a series on Women in Literature, Women Writers, and a series about Francis Perkins and Victoria Woodhull and Shirley Chisholm, Rosland Franklin, and on. I didn't see those books but if the library had them I know where they are now.

We did high-quality work. While other companies did books on pop stars and sports and such--supposedly to appeal to "reluctant readers" but really because they'd sell more easily than a book about The Great Depression. We won award after award, as well as individual authors being awarded. Our biography of Dietrich Bonhoeffer won so many awards and labels the author complained of having to write them all his thanks.

Now they're all in the trash bin I know about in Florida and I'm sure in other states. This isn't conservatism. It's the opposite of conservatism. I don't care how damn high the price of cheese is, if you vote for these people you are supporting an anti-American, anti-modernity, racist, and most of all frightened, existentially frightened, tumor in America's bloodstream.

I won't call you a fascist if you vote for this. That's not adequate. It's not wise to think it's a mere repetition of what came before. I know enough history to know that to think anything is a repetition of what has come before is always wrong. It may have the same traits, but not have the same limits. This is the end of the United States that was created in 1787 if it isn't stopped.

(BTW, I volunteer as an English and Social Studies tutor at the local high school. You would not believe how behind these kids are. Ninth and tenth graders who don't know what a declarative sentence is or what Congress is for. (And, it has to be said, unfortunately, they are not all African American. My kids are probably 65-35 white/black.) These are the people who will grow up and vote for this tumor. Their appeal is to the weakest, deepest dark in humans. People who will never have use of a declarative sentence.)