Thread by @HMAesq

Our federal government reopens, albeit for 3 weeks. On the second anniversary of his first #MuslimBan, Trump & Co. suffer a humiliating loss.

No wall. (And we'll end the ban soon, too.)

This all started with a bad idea: that a wall was necessary to stop an invasion.

It's white nationalism, which isn't known for its great ideas. But the idea stuck because it was repeated, playing on people's prejudices, permeating political discourse until it became policy.

But there was no alternative given. We just called it what it was: a bad idea.

We who believe in quaint ideas like due process and equality have spent the bulk of our professional lives since that night at the nation's airports scrambling to put out fires caused by bad ideas. We raced to the border. We spoke, we wrote, we advocated, we sued.

But we need to be a little more cerebral about this. Trump just regurgitated words he heard. But they were effective words because decades of thought and money went into them.

We desperately need a new narrative or we'll be relegated to a lifetime of putting out racist fires.

That's a task that can take a whole generation, but we have to do it.

We can do both. We've spent 2 years researching how one hate movement, the anti-immigrant movement, was nurtured.

I have a few suggestions to get us going.

1. Mind your language: Use inclusionary terms like us, aspiring American, diversify, empower. Avoid terms that malign and divide.

2. Think of a society where people's backgrounds are not just tolerated, they are embraced, melded into one's identity.

3. Be proudly compassionate, for compassion is a competitive exercise.

4. Speak truth to power. Complacency is what allows bad ideas to take root. Call out the bad idea generators, and starve them of oxygen.

5. Show up for other communities. Pick at least one.

We really can erase this shameful blot from our histories.