[ADOLESCENT WARNING! THIS ARTICLE HAS A TON OF SHIT AND A FUCK OR TWO]
It has been a while since I've written on politics; a year in reality, however, over two years if you exclude the piece I wrote last May on Pelosi and her reluctance to impeach Donald Trump. Since I've been away, a lot has happened in our world, but really, not a damn thing has happened at all except the 2018 elections and this current pandemic, the matter that brings me back to the arena of political lip flapping.
I would love to think that something I enjoy researching and engaging in so much is more than just creative political opinionating, yet, I am now well aware of how truly foolish politics can become thanks to the last 3 years of pure foolishness we've been reduced to. Of course, this is not to suggest that politics are not important. This is to insist that the day to day exchange of thoughts and ideas in our current political arena has been proven to be nothing more than the last surviving circus in America with a ton of elephants and donkeys rolling around, doing silly tricks and shitting all over the place in the process. If anyone has watched the manner in which Congress has gone about dealing with what should be the most bipartisan issue in the history of bipartisan issues and can describe their behavior any better than I did in that last sentence, I highly encourage you to do it and share the results with me. I am totally curious on how many creative ways there are to describe a shit show.
I enjoy Twitter and Facebook (sorry Google) as much as the next person, but my decision to get away from
writing full blown articles (that I would want to read) about televised political pooping was not easy, but it was necessary. At some point it became obvious that the media was simply using Trump- and other people's anger towards him- for the sake of clicks and revenue, and there was just no easy way to not be a part of all that except to not be a part of all that, so I took a hiatus and decided to write a book instead.
Now that we are all locked down in a pseudo-national quarantine, many of us have had the opportunity to reflect on ourselves and our lives, drink a lot, or drink a lot and reflect on ourselves and our lives all at the same time. Drinking and reflecting typically involves a replay of all the regrets, so I would encourage dancing when you drink and not much reflecting on life. Just a suggestion. Nonetheless, if you have embraced the opportunity to get to know the people in your home, including the one you see in the mirror every morning, you might finally be coming into the realization that nobody, and I repeat, nobody can be the blame for your happiness or sadness. My apologies if I lost you or killed your morning buzz from that comment.
For those who are still with me, I have to confess that I mostly lived by that mantra before the election of Donald fkn Trump. I include the FKN with no intention of disrespecting the President of the United States of America that I have very little respect for, but to emphasize the depth of the hatred I HAD developed for the guy we call president. I'm using all caps to bring strong attention to the word HAD, because I USED to hate the guy. Now, I just feel terribly sad for him and US.
My deep sadness started over 2 yrs ago, when I no longer had the desire to write another word about this man. At the time, I also started that book project, so my assumption initially was that I could not easily co-mingle my brain when it came to writing. While the book is finally winding through final edits, I now realize my inability to co-mingle had very little to do with anything other than the state of depression I was in for American politics. In a way, I have gone through the stages of grief over the death of American politics- my deceased mistress- via the election of Donald J. Trump, which essentially ackn
owledges that I experienced anger, stage two of grief, for way too long towards this man we call president. Most of our denial happened during the campaign, and we can all recall the bargaining we went through of blaming Hillary for being an awful candidate, or blaming non-voters for not voting. We are not over the Russia blame, but that's another topic for another day.
Every divinely authored sermon in life is one you are learning yourself as you are sharing it with others. I used to love sharing the image to the right as a sermon to myself and to encourage other people to take ownership of themselves and dominion over their emotions. In the spirit of a true confession that might help someone else who is struggling with the same issue, I used to hate our fuckin' president and the mere sight of him made me angry. I ran away from talking about him because there wasn't anything new to be said, but mostly, I was mad as hell and couldn't find enough creative ways to say that or anything else.
Today, I acknowledge that Trump used to own me the way he currently still owns a bunch of you. I am writing again today to purge this issue, to hopefully save some of you from the silent chains you bear, and to take back agency with myself and my native realm of artistic expression- political lip flapping. He who angers you might own you......but he who kills your creative spirit is killing you as well. So, I am back to writing about politics again because a newsworthy matter has arrived. But, mostly I am writing because I must.
I am writing again today because pandemics happen about as often as ill-suited businessmen winning the presidency. While we have found ourselves to be mostly vaccinated against the damages of voting for the wrong person to lead our nation, we have also found out that vaccinations against viruses and bad presidents take a while to be created and only work if you take them.
The best option that exists to deal with a novel virus is to self distance, mask up or stay home for the biological ones, and educate yourself on the nuances of the other virus any way you can until it is forced to go away via concerned citizens or term limits, whichever comes first. If you hadn't noticed, pandemics are great for film study or research of any kind. This moment film study/research for me came without intention as I was simply enjoying my morning coffee and scrolling through the movie channels to make sure I get maximum value for the premium channel services I am paying for during this pandemic. Because I insist on getting value out of my purchases, I now know why we are all going through this pandemic like a kite without a string.
"Where's My Roy Cohn" was the documentary I came across and it left me wishing I had researched him back when his name first became mentioned in connection with Trump. I had seen a few pieces about Roger Stone which made me believe I understood a little bit about Trump, but Stone admits in this documentary, Cohn created him too, and you simply can not understand Trump or Stone without knowing Roy Cohn.
For those who aren't old enough or didn't follow the Roy Cohn story close enough to know much about him, this documentary not only let's you know who he was, it tells you everything you need to know about the current ring leader of our Washington D.C. circus, and why he wants the spotlight kept on him and all of his pronouncements instead of any other animal in the act, including the media.
Yes. The media is just another animal stuck in this circus act, because most of the media has no way of knowing how to make it all end, and the rest have no desire to. The media of America is as dirty as Donald says we are even if we have tried our level best to minimize our overt dirtiness with him. Similarly, the Congress of America is as corrupt and guilt worthy as anyone when it comes to how we got into the mess we are in However, no one should read these indictments and consider themselves exempt.
If you are not a part of the media or Congress, you still consume whatever media they give, giving them very little reason to feed you anything else, and you vote- or don't vote- with partisan predictability allowing for life-long incumbents and giving them no reason to listen to you. The real circus used to exist because it had a crowd that made it exist. In America's political circus, you are now either a performer or you are the constituents of the performance, because, the people who refused to go to the circus because it glorified caged animals played as active a role in making the circus go away as the people who got bored with the show.
When I took a look in my own mirror over two years ago, I saw a disgruntled media person as well as an angry constituent who kept buying a damn ticket, and I no longer wanted to be either one. I was covering Donald's latest moment of disrespect towards someone new each day as if it deserved to be talked about like news. Mostly, it was and is just shocking and embarrassing. It absolutely is not newsworthy anymore. Pandemics aside, history will give us all plenty of time to be shocked by this MAGA moment in history that we've created or allowed. With all due respect, with everything at stake and no one steering us through this but YOU, it is not time to keep being shocked by another day of the same shit.
We all know where to go to find his latest tweet if we need a jolt to our senses with a fresh bucket of embarrassment. If that doesn't work, go see the Globetrotters. Unlike the circus, they still have a crowd. Otherwise, nothing has really been newsworthy about this man we are forced to call president for well over two years, and that includes that slow moving, dodge-able bullet called the impeachment trial. By the time Pelosi finally decided she had enough, America was stuck in a "why now" moment of disbelief over her late pull of the trigger. When we all woke up from too many hours of impeachment coverage, we were left feeling as if the thing she finally impeached him for was much less important than the Mueller report, especially considering how Trump openly did towards China the same thing that he was impeached for doing with Ukraine.
Trump is only right about the slime in Washington D.C. because he rubbed shoulders, donated to to both sides and slid smoothly without detection between the slime for years. In essence, he was and is the slime too, so nobody noticed or cared that he was there. In addition, nobody understands the slime or the slimey better than him, however, he told us that from the very beginning along with a bunch of other things that have many of us shaking our heads as though he wasn't up front about it all. Of course, he straight up lied about the taxes, but you get my point. He is who we thought he was, so the rest is up to YOU. You can remain stuck in denial, anger, depression, or bargaining away the blame on non-voters, but its time for acceptance so we can save our nation. In the final analysis, if this pandemic and the presidency of Donald J. Trump does not help us to achieve anything personally, then it will not help us achieve anything collectively because all change begins with YOU.
I am proud that I stared into the mirror over two years ago, saw a guy who was angry over a silly white man with an orange tan, and said enough already. Two years later, I am actually over the sadness and fully within acceptance, but Facebook doesn't really give you a wide range of options to click when responding to posts or comments in regards to Trump, so 😢 wins every time for me still.
Now that I stand here healed and on the other side of my pain, I am also proud to say that I have gone through the stages of grief over the death of American politics too, and it has helped me immensely as we all sit back and watch the kind of disarray in D.C. that we've never seen at historically bipartisan moments when the world desperately needs leaders to lead.
Take it or leave it. Congress is broken and Donald is all we have, which means we don't have much. After watching the Roy Cohn documentary, I now understand how we got him (and Ronald Reagan too btw😳....yes, watch it) and who he is better than I ever did before. At the risk of a spoiler for those of you who haven't seen it, it will explain why Trump pretends everything is a positive no matter how bad it looks. This is what Trump learned from Cohn as the number one lesson. This is what he does no matter the moment before him. This is what has worked for him immeasurably prior to a pandemic, and this is exactly what is going to kill him figuratively, along with countless Americans literally, because a virus with no vaccine and this level of contagiousness will become the kind of bad news that even Roy Cohn could not spin before it is all over.
It all ready is, and you can't simply tell people who are afraid of a virus that is killing thousands, 'you are doing a good job' when you are not. The job will be good when WE the People are willing to go places again. PERIOD!! What our president is doing right now will not bring confidence to anyone, which means he is functionally useless, which means YOU are the only hope WE have left.
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Watch any 4 television commercials in a row like I did, and
see if you notice any trends or similarities in the theme? If
you can't already tell, YOU are the only hope for this economy.
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Scared people need honesty over bluster. S
cared people realize viruses don't know your political affiliation so they want truth in times of fear and not Roy Cohn derived political spin. To watch Donald do his thing before I knew about Roy Cohn was infuriating and terribly confusing before I grew to accept it for what it is. To watch him now that I know what he is doing and why he keeps doing it despite watching it not work day after day is enlightening to the point of almost refreshing in a way. What this pandemic and that documentary has shown me is that, Donald can't lead any other way, and he might not be interested in learning after all of these years of using the media to simply spin the narrative, just like Roy taught him.
In a way, this pandemic has proven to everyone still evaluating what we currently have in a president versus what we are being offered by way of Joe Biden, that Donald only knows spin....and golf. He might know real estate, but he has failed a lot in that arena and we have yet to see those taxes to determine if he's particularly good at real estate, so the jury is still out on the topic.
Through his two hour daily televised circus events, Trump reveals his style of leadership for all to clearly see. In a moment when the playbook has already been written for him, in simple words with large text, Trump is floundering and can't seem to read this Dr. Seuss book or listen to Dr. Fauci's advice. Recent polls suggest only 35% of Americans are still listening to him for guidance through this pandemic. While some of you might be focusing on the number I just shared and evaluating who in the hell that 35% could be, I am focusing on the fact that someone decided we needed a poll asking who are you listening to right now. As I publish this piece, I am two days removed from my 51st birthday, and I am hard pressed to recall when such a question has ever been asked. Ever!!
If you watch Governor Cuomo (NY) each day, you quickly realize this should be so easy to do, yet, all Trump can do is the same thing he has done from day one. In this crazy circus of elephants and donkeys, the ring leader turns just so happens to be a one-trick pony.
For every other situation prior to this pandemic, his song and dance has been enough to at least satisfy his base and satiate Mitch McConnel and Republicans from the urge to preserve the now mythical co-equal balance of power that WE were falsely made to believe would protect us from tyranny back in grade school.
Most importantly, WE. Me. You. US, now know that WE are the straw that stirs the drink. Without us, all the ingredients could be available, but the sugar will settle to the bottom and the drink will taste so awful that it doesn't matter what price you put on it, WE won't buy it. The signs were always there if you listen a lot of news. Whenever they talk about the economy- under Obama or Donald- they define the strength of it as being one thing and one thing only. CONSUMER CONFIDENCE! If WE can't trust what you are selling us, WE surely won't trust dying over what you are selling us, will WE? I love the taste of well made Kool-Aid just like the next person, but not enough to die for it, especially when I can just make that shit at home.
In the name of home-made kool-aid, I'm back into this arena of political lip flapping because my brain is no longer co-mingled, and there is finally something worth flapping about, which is this current conversation over CONSUMER CONFIDENCE; aka., YOU and me. I started my mirror moments over two years ago, so I am fully into this process of self realization we are all enduring during the era of Trump in general and the pandemic specifically. At the risk of over inflating my own value, it seems clear to me that me, and people like me, will determine when it's time to get Taco Bell back to normal business levels, not elected officials. If you fools who aren't taking this seriously could save the economy by yourselves, the current businesses that are still open would not be down 40% in sales, but they are, and, even with a return to everything open, everybody won't be outside buying Taco Bell until everyone can be made to feel safe while doing it.
I ask you, random consumer reading this post? Are you rushing back to any place that is crowded and has a potential health risk just because its one of the places who has an owner deciding to open so you can regain your sense of normalcy, or are you willing to let the other people buy shoes at an understaffed Ross until you feel confident that it is safe?
Don't answer that. You don't need to. Without question, only consumer confidence will work to save our economy. Period. There is a window for business owners with limited liquidity to ride the storm to save themselves by offering stock options instead of money, so they can retain staff with the promise of future wealth sharing, but that is also much too close to Socialism and much to close to right to ever happen. Because fighting to become the powerful makes some people afraid to share what they've gained, many powerful people will practically risk and lose everything they have rather than willingly let go of their power. Donald J. Trump is exhibit A for this dynamic as he holds on to his powerful way of manipulating the world at the risk of losing the presidency and millions of lives during his watch.
If circumstances play out as they are currently headed, we will get to witness a mass realignment of power- be that actually or just conceptually- as WE all are forced to fully reckon with the reality that capitalism is controlled by the consumer and no one else. In other words, how often you stare yourself in the mirror each morning and the message you deliver to the person standing there will determine the future of your individual financial situation, which will determine the future of our nation. In other words, this post and our future is all about YOU.
In the face of a pandemic, getting to know yourself is kinda' not optional unless you intend to drink yourself broke to avoid all of that. For those of us embracing our mirrors and saving our money, it is clear. WE the People are the only hope for our personal survival and for the survival of our nation, and the rest of the world is anxiously waiting to see what we'll do next. Not just about opening our country, but whether or not we will return to who WE used to be for ourselves and the world at large.
