Pacifica Forward National Mobilization
By Zack Kaldveer, Pacifica Forward PNB Director and KPFA Rep Candidate
Now more than ever, we need independent media like Pacifica’s five stations and 250 affiliates — institutions willing to expose concentrated power, document the human cost of democratic erosion, and create space for the structural conversations corporate media too often refuse to host.
We are living through an inflection point.
When a convicted felon — sexual abuser, rapist, and pedophile protector, pathological liar, authoritarian, egomaniacal narcissist, and virulent racist — presents narratives divorced from fact, humanity, and basic decency, the moral lines are not blurry.
When he and his enforcers:
- Dismantle environmental and public health protections.
- Gut worker safety enforcement.
- Slash food, health, and housing programs while protecting tax cuts for the wealthy.
- Use tariffs recklessly, raising costs for working families.
- Enrich themselves while railing against “corruption.”
- Float crypto schemes and constitutional workarounds that erode democratic norms.
- Protect pedophiles while evading accountability for their own conduct.
- Deploy masked, quasi-militarized forces into U.S. communities, undermining civil rights and democratic norms.
- Threaten alliances that have stabilized the globe for generations.
- Expand militarism while devaluing civilian life.
- Normalize cruelty as governance.
Opposing that — through voting, marching, and calling out lies — is the easy part.
Necessary — absolutely. But easy.
The harder — and more important — task is what comes next.
Because if the response to authoritarianism is another version of corporate, neoliberal politics, we will lose again. And again. And again.
Working people — especially the marginalized and increasingly precarious — will lose. Concentrated power will win. Crony capitalism will win.
We must break that cycle. We cannot defeat demagoguery by returning to the very political model that created the conditions for it to thrive — by backing politicians who:
- Stand more firmly with corporate donors than with working people.
- Show more courage defending military aid to Netanyahu than fighting for single-payer health care.
- Talk climate leadership while protecting fossil fuel expansion.
- Manage inequality rather than confront it.
- Seek “balance” between labor and corporate power instead of shifting power toward workers.
That model doesn’t inspire. It doesn’t mobilize. And it doesn’t deliver lasting change.
What wins — and what addresses the real crises of our time — is a commitment to structural change that:
- Confronts concentrated wealth.
- Expands worker power.
- Treats healthcare as a human right.
- Ends blank-check militarism.
- Centers climate survival over fossil fuel profits.
- Stands clearly against genocide and authoritarianism — everywhere.
- Builds democracy from the workplace up.
Opposing fascism is the floor. Building a just, democratic, worker-centered future is the ceiling.
We will not meet this moment without independent journalism and democratic media infrastructure that investigates power, informs the public, challenges dominant narratives, and connects movements for change.
Pacifica Forward candidates have a strong track record — and are preparing for what comes next.
Please keep your KPFA, KPFK, KPFT, WPFW, or WBAI membership active and nominate, endorse, and vote for Pacifica Forward candidates — to safeguard Pacifica programming, signals, staff, and the public trust we hold at this crucial hour.