Establishment Republicans and Conservatism, Inc., are on their heels. Ignore the swamp, and fight for your home.

The law of exponentiality holds that small, almost imperceptible events slowly build until what appears to be a major cataclysm suddenly unfolds. It is the building of tiny cracks over time that eventually leads to the dam breaking, causing unimaginable destruction.

We are witnessing those tiny cracks now at an increasing rate in the political, economic, and cultural systems in the West, primarily the United States. They are building toward something that just a short time ago was unthinkable: the crumbling of the globalist American empire.

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Of course, those who manage the empire rarely call it that, but rather use such amorphous terms as “the rules-based international order,” or the “post-World War II consensus.” My favorite is “global leadership.” Regardless of what you call it, the fact remains that a set of policies and institutions placed the U.S., and the U.K. before it, in the position of dictating a wide range of actions around the world. After 75-plus years, this system is collapsing, as is plain to see just looking at the international chaos.

Recently I was invited to attend an event that was, for me, one of those tiny cracks in the wall of the American empire. Its existence was telling, and in an odd way it provided me with unintended hope.

The event was billed as a gathering of high-dollar donors appalled by the failure and dishonesty of the large political fundraising institutions, such as the Republican National Committee, well-known political PACs, and the various “Conservatism Inc.” organizations. For example, consider that in 2020 the Republican National Committee spent more than $30 million retaining a legal team to deal with election problems, yet after the election in November there was no one on the ground to help; money was raised and spent supporting swampy legal firms that were mostly AWOL when needed.

This meeting was supposed to be private, with no press, and only for people who were seriously interested in supporting small and effective organizations out of range of GOP, Inc. We were told we would learn about such an organization. This was during CPAC week in Orlando, but I was told it was not part of CPAC. When I arrived I recognized several people that I knew shared my unwillingness to be part of GOP, Inc., which tells stories to take your money and then spends it on the Swamp. I let myself become optimistic.

I was being foolish. Just as the meeting was to begin, in walked Matt Schlapp, the head of the group feasting on conservative donors at CPAC. Schlapp is the very definition of Conservatism, Inc. He provides the RNC and other establishment mouthpieces platforms to spin their views. And now, here he was purporting to offer a real alternative. It saddened me beyond words. After Schlapp’s presentation, replete with pep talks from a number of career operatives about how we could send money to a new and better organization, I realized the whole event was a head-fake to convince donors who are unwilling to support the Swamp to give money to a Swamp organization disguised as an anti-Swamp organization.

The good news is that the predators of GOP, Inc., and establishment conservative groups believe they have to pretend they are something new now, because the donors are simply walking away from their tired hustle. I and some others walked away more convinced we should not fund these grifts. More and more, people realize the futility of contributing to big GOP organizations or the fat, bloated battleships of Conservative Movement fame. They know their money goes to overhead, big salaries, lucrative consulting contracts for friends, fancy offices, and precious little actual engagement with voters or lawmakers.

More and more, people know that a “Republican Congress” for two years did nothing to stem the tide of illegal immigration invasion and endless wars. They know that Republican political operators will use the term “America First” as little more than a mantra hoping you will fall in line. But they can’t define what it means to put America first, let alone believe in it. Today we are being subjected to demands that America protect the borders of Ukraine, from politicians who have done nothing to protect our own borders and fellow citizens.

But more and more people have seen the path forward, and it does not include any of the major GOP organizations, which do not provide the promised results but only enrich their ranks. It does not include one “think tank” or advisory group. It does not include a single D.C.-based partisan organization.

What the future demands is local action—organizing and seeking and realizing results on the local level. Like parents are already doing across the country in school board meetings, like moms who want their daughters to have a fair shot in the sport of their choice, like the county sheriffs along the border with Mexico, like the pastors and neighborhood activists in the African-American community, like the citizens fighting destructive Soros-supported district attorneys who wreak havoc in their communities—all of these and more are taking matters into their own hands. Most of these efforts have no paid staff. All are local with demands that can be met immediately, if only the power structures will bend. And bend they will.

As local action begins to blossom, there is no reason to send your hard earned money to the big organizations of GOP, Inc., or Conservative, Inc. As someone once opined: Starve the beast. The Swamp is asking for money promising to drain the Swamp. We all know better than that.

A school board in a rural state being forced to stop teaching anti-American racism or a group of parent activists forcing gender-sanity in girls’ sports may not seem to rise to the level of global and international affairs, but it most certainly does. As the supports of globalist empire erode, every day the entire structure becomes more unstable, closer to the ultimate collapse.

That is exponentiality. We do not know exactly where in that process we stand. But what Schlapp and his fellow Swamp monsters have shown us is that we are much further along than they would ever like to admit.

So, live local, give local, act local, and refuse to support the destructive designs of the tired hucksters.

George D. O’Neill, Jr. is an artist who lives in rural Florida.