I thought a French title was appropriate given that, somehow, our current President has inexplicably managed to alienate all of our allies. As much as I’d like to write this post in French, my level is only up to a 6th grader and that simply won’t do for a post about politics.
Let’s begin with what I believe to be root causes about our society that I’ve come to realize through my experiences over the past twenty years.
America has become more of a business than it is a country. We live in more of a marketplace than a society. The pursuit of profit is the engine which makes this country run.
The Statue of Liberty, an undeniably symbol of America, welcomes the poor and downtrodden from the rest of the world.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
‘Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!’ cries she
With silent lips. ‘Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore,
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!'”
But not anymore…. and it was never the case anyway.
America had slavery and the civil rights movement wasn’t even until the 1960s, a very short 60 years ago. Human beings have never done well with other ‘tribes,’ with those different from them. Looking throughout history it is always a case of repression, of conquest, of colonialism, of broken treaties, of slavery, of segregation, of injustice which the more powerful tribe subjugates the minorities or less powerful.
The only two examples I can think of where different peoples may have gotten along somewhat are the Roman Empire where Rome realized they would need the different tribes to increase the might of their army and “convivencia” of Muslim Spain where for a brief period of time, Muslims, Christians and Jews created a thriving culture together which was incredible for that period of history.
For a good part of my life, it seemed like the different people in America were getting along somewhat. In the US we have all types of people which Hitler disparagingly described as a “mongrel nation.” However, it was always the belief that these different people and cultures added to the strength of America and I’ll point to the 1990s as a time, when I perceived, as one of hope and a positive outlook for the future. We were all getting along and although many problems such as inequality remained, things seemed to be getting better.
I’ve always believed that you cannot fix a wound by ignoring it. It will simply fester and cause declining health. Around the 90s America had apologized for putting Japanese-Americans in concentration camps during WWII. The government was helping native tribes build casinos to try to atone for broken treaties of the past, with DEI (now a dirty acronym) we tried to correct old injustices which persist.
We are ignoring old wounds again and the current administration is trying to make them disappear. African American, women and Native American heroes have disappeared from military websites. The administration is targeting foreigners for deportation dehumanizing them by calling them all kinds of vile things such as murders, rapists and so on. But before you classify me as a liberal, I am not. I’ve been both Republican and Democrat and an Independent since 2016. So before I go on with our current and dangerous predicament, let me attack the Democrats.
The Democrats are a very large reason we’re in this mess. I happen to completely agree with the Republicans that the border needs to be fixed and highly support them going after foreign criminals in the strongest possible way. Keep it up! However, my criticism is that the engine for this is racism, a word which the Left has overused to the point of it losing all meaning. The USA has left behind the working class. This is to be expected from the Republicans but disappointingly from the Democrats as well. NAFTA and other free trade agreements brought tremendous profits to the elites while the working class lost jobs. Now, those working class voters are angry and have turned to Trump who can really work a crowd in ways “Insider Trading Pelosi” or “Sniveling Schumer” could only dream of.
So what have the Republicans done? We’ll, they’re using the same playbook which throughout history has always worked well when there is economic hardship. Blame the foreigners! Blame that other tribe! The Democrats set the stage with their failure to secure the border. Furthermore, American imperialism brought in a flood of refugees from places like Afghanistan, Somalia, Haiti and so on.
It had always been my belief that America was a force for good in the world and when it had to pull out of a country when things didn’t go well, I was glad to see we took care of many who had helped us. With blunders such as the Iraq war (did we find the weapons of mass destruction yet?), Afghanistan, some African regions and so on those refugees were welcomed. But how things have changed. People do better with each other in a booming economy but we revert to our old tribal mentality when they don’t. “Those foreigners are taking our jobs!” Yawn. I’ve read this chapter hundreds of times in the history books.
So while I support strengthening the border, of deporting criminals, or any who break the rules immediately, the reasons given in their speeches do not line up with their underlying intentions. It isn’t honest. The Democrats should have fixed the problem long ago and even though deportations had increased under Democratic leadership they didn’t go far enough, nor publicize it as it should have been.
My other big disappointment with the Democrats is that they have completely crumbled in the face of Republican onslaught like a bunch of pansies. Perhaps if they focused more on strength than, what seems apparent to much of America, is the attempt to turn everyone gay or transgender or ensure we know all 78 pronouns and genders then we wouldn’t be in this mess.
What are the Democrats doing to fight? They’re holding up “protest paddles.” That’s great and just about as effective as making signs to stop bullying in schools and when bullying does occur they’ll suspend both the bully and the bullied, especially if the bullied fights back. Protest paddles….. what a disgrace.
The decrepit Democratic leadership needs to be kicked out. Here are my main disappointments.
Pelosi
I cannot tell you what she has accomplished in her long career. I read the news daily and here is what sticks out to me as an average voter. The first is her insistence of “single payer” healthcare which crippled universal healthcare. The American people didn’t want it, she pushed it. Being a leader she should have realized this and gone a more palatable route. She failed. When you fail at something that important for most of us corporate people you’re fired. When you fail at her level it seems you just get reelected.
Insider trading. Nancy Pelosi is wealthy. She uses classified information to make stock trades before the rest of the market is aware. She is a crook that San Francisco just loves. Given the amount of crime in San Francisco, this isn’t surprising. However, it seems S.F. may have gained some sense with their new mayor, but I’m withholding praise until they kick out Pelosi who just won’t seem to go away.
Feinstein
She was barely coherent at the end and a touch senile. Yet her team said “this will not affect her job capabilities and she’s not stepping down.” Well, given this stupidity I don’t see any reason why they just shouldn’t throw her old corpse back up to the senate and like “Weekend at Bernies” just make her press the yes/no buttons and continue voting. S.F. voters would elect her I’m sure!
Schumer
What a disgrace. The Republicans have completely thrown out the rulebook, disregard all semblance of decorum and when Schumer had a chance to fight with a government shutdown he crumbles, he ran into his ‘safe space.’ He even has a slimy name, “Oh, no I’ve stepped in a bit of schumer, let me scrape it off.” Because of this weakness I don’t believe I can vote Democrat anymore. I sure has hell won’t vote Republican and for the first time in my life may vote for the independents even though they stand no chance of winning. Actually Bernie Sanders just recommended this so perhaps we’re on to to something.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Like Pelosi, Schumer, Feinstein she is another who refused to step aside, to let new blood in. She let the trappings of power influence her decision to stay to the detriment of the Left. If she had stepped aside perhaps the Supreme Court wouldn’t have a conservative majority. She is also to blame and a disappointment.
On the positive side, I really enjoy Sanders as he still retains his old fire. Like those mentioned above he is too old but he fights and here is the difference. He brings in AOC, new blood, who should be the new face of the Democratic party. Pelosi has been a roadblock for AOCs ascension. Go away Pelosi. I also like Jasmine Crocket because she will give Republicans the same treatment Republicans give Democrats. While the rest of the Democrats hide in their safe spaces and wonder what gender they are, Crocket is a fire-breathing dragon and I love the way she fights.
Those are my gripes and disappointments with the Democrats.
Republicans
As for the Republicans, they are the real terror at the moment. There are articles here and there that point to the real danger we’re in and I can see it plain as day.
What we’re witnessing is the end of democracy. To be fair, this is what the majority of Americans voted for, to end their voting rights. Ironic isn’t it? American voters are disappointing, their critical thinking skills non-existent and they will believe and vote according to their favored propaganda outlets. The Republicans have done a wonderful job of building up those media outlets and now have a force of voters who will believe whatever lies they spew, which are a constant stream 24 ours a day. “They’re eating the dogs, they’re eating the cats…”
The rule of law is being ignored, the Republicans are running rampant, the Democrats (except for AOC, Sanders and Crockett) are hiding in their safe spaces and I am very concerned. I’m so concerned I may have to make my criticisms of this regime offline if things continue the way they do. I have a need to speak my mind, to tell the truth, but I’m too old with too many responsibilities to risk detainment. Amazing, that as an American citizen I even have these concerns. They are real and things can always get worse.
America currently has a fever it cannot shake. Perhaps too many haven forsook their vaccines and MAGA is like the measles outbreak that is currently happening. It should have been eradicated at the outset but has taken root and now a majority is delirious. The fever has run so high there are now Republicans giving Nazi salutes and the crowd laughs and claps…… What the hell has happened here in America. If the WWII veterans were still alive there would be hell to pay. Instead we’ve got multitudes of Karens’ and Red Hat morons laughing and clapping. I want out of this nightmare.
I think another reason for this insanity is the world is changing too quickly. People are inundated with information/misinformation online and need to be told what to believe from places like Fox news. People are taking horse de-wormer, or putting chlorine and sunshine in their ass as a cure for all kinds of ailments for God’s sakes. How can anyone deny that there isn’t a collective fever going around? Fox News could tell their viewership that in the case of polio, you should put on a big red wig and go do the hokey-pokey in your nearest busy intersection as a cure and a good portion of their viewership would do it!
After watching Fox they’ll then attend their nearest mega-church, listen to Jesus warn against the dangers of riches with passages like the following.
“If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”
“No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.”
Then the preacher will preach the “prosperity gospel” as a justification for their own private jets and mansions. 10 – 15 MILLION Americans attend mega-churches so they can be whipped up into a frenzy with entertainment instead of the quiet introspection which has been the hallmark of almost every religion since the dawn of time. Can you imagine a 13th century monk, or Imam, or Buddhist breaking out a guitar to get the congregation on their feet?
Once leaving church they’ll throw on their MAGA hat, buy the Trump bible, perhaps put a tampon on their ear and send a donation to Trump after receiving a letter that Trump was “very disappointed not to see their name on the recent donor list.” Our current society is in the worst hallucinations of fever and refuse to take their medicine.
Unexplainably, Trump has managed to make enemies of our allies, who are our allies in the first place due to similarities of culture. Let’s first look to the war in Ukraine to explain my overall theory. Trump is right that NATO expansion is a big reason for this war. The USA pushed things too far as no country wants to have an adversary at their border. Russia wants access to the Black Sea for its navy as all their other water ports freeze over. The fault of NATO expansion gets very little press except maybe on the Right which I do not watch. In a perfect world, you’d just ask Ukraine, “Hey Ukraine, would you rather be part of the West (NATO) or on Team Russia?” Of course they want to be part of the West but this isn’t acceptable to Russia and given Russia’s power and how geopolitics work, that should have been taken into consideration. So I fault NATO 70% for the current war and 30% for Russia’s inherent need for that warm water port. Trump is right on this and even though I consider him to be the antithesis of everything good, he is correct from time to time.
So what is the game plan as far as I can see? He gives Russia what they want in Ukraine and in his deluded grand-scheme takes Greenland and Canada with Russia’s blessing. It is horse trading at a geopolitical scale. With the USA and Russia cooperating who is going to stop this? China wants Taiwan so perhaps that is part of the deal, a grand realignment with the most powerful gobbling up weaker countries. Europe has been asleep at the wheel, very content to let the USA pay for their defense while not contributing their agreed upon dues. This is another area where Trump is correct. Well, they’ve just woken up like a young boy pushed out of the protective family home to go make a man of himself. From the news, it seems Germany and France have realized this with perhaps Britain to a lesser extent.
Well, I’ve said what I wanted to say and so will end the post with this.
We’re in a time of great change and nobody is able to tell what the outcome will be. Change such as this is always scary but things couldn’t continue as they have. It has always been my belief that the overriding responsibility of governments is to take care of their people. The USA has a hard time with this due to its history of racism so the current solution is just to delete any mention of that racism and revise the past. A grave blunder in my opinion as I will point to that festering wound example. Healthcare for example would be much easier if we were one tribe such as Japan which has no problems with healthcare. Yet, my business background warns me against people becoming lazy and so they must work. However, we have incredible inequality with the oligarchs hoarding all the wealth while the people are worse off. History tells us this leads to demagogues and that’s exactly what we’ve got.
I’m in favor of universal basic income, of healthcare for all. This is what Jesus would support. With those two things people wouldn’t have a reason to gripe (although they surely would anyway being the nature of people). The richest nation in the history of the world should take care of their people to a level where they won’t starve, won’t die because they cannot afford to but not so much as they lose motivation to improve themselves. That’s not where we are. We’re at a point where even more money is funneled to the top and people like Musk, or any large corporations can buy those in power.
So what will I do, at this time which should have a huge place in the history books unless a future administration wants to erase it? I’ll continue reading the news to keep a pulse, but also do my meditations, enjoy the beauty of sunrises and sunsets, breathe the ocean air, not contemplate anything about genders or pronouns, and hope that there will not come a time where I’ll have to pull any and all criticism about my government offline. I am not hopeful at the moment about that last point.
I hope that one day I can tell my grandkids about these dark times in the past tense. They will listen but history has a way of simply being relegated to the history books and as Calvin from “Calvin and Hobbes” says, “That’s us, live and don’t learn.” History may not repeat itself but it certainly rhymes. I hope this rhyme only highlights the positive aspects but it just doesn’t seem to be in this administrations nature to pursue the path of good.
Profit above everything else is the engine on which America runs.
