Saturday, March 12, 2016

Spring Ahead

Don't forget to set your clocks ahead tonight, so that one more hour of your time can be extracted in the name of capitalism. But don't worry. It usually happens while you're asleep. You won't even feel a thing. Unless, of course, you get into a car accident on the way to one of your precarious jobs because you or a fellow motorist is exhausted as well as broke, hungry, and road-raged.




***

Speaking of rage, did you catch the Benito Trump Cancelled Rally last night? I watched it unfold on MSNBC as the ridiculous Chris Matthews did the play-by-play. He is shocked, shocked that Fascism has come to America right under his very elite nose. He is clueless, clueless that nonstop coverage of Trumpism and the presidential horse-race spectacle by his and other networks have led citizens to believe that politics is an infotainment sporting event sponsored by the WWF. He pretends to not understand that the corruption extends not only to his profession but to his own family circle. His guests and fellow-commentators are heavy contributors to wife Kathleen's multimillion-dollar congressional bid, one of the most expensive in lower House history.

As far as the "unrest" at the Trump arena went, it was pretty tame compared to, say, Ferguson and Baltimore. For one thing, police presence was very scanty -- too many white kids. Rahm Emanuel didn't send out the troops because he didn't want a repeat of 1968, when the Democrats ended up losing to Nixon.  So the Trumpenproletariat and the protesters were asked to leave. And aside from a few made-for-TV scuffles, they did. From what I saw,  most of the kids seemed more interested in taking selfies than rioting and beating each other up.

 If you were there and able to get close enough to snap a pic of a black guy and a white guy screaming at each other, then you made the producers of what passes for participatory politics very happy indeed. The media/political complex relishes the "divisiveness" of the lower orders as they flatter themselves that  "bipartisanship" is the highest virtue known to humanity.

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Speaking of selfies, did you happen to catch Barack Obama at the SXSW conference? Just as the scuffles were breaking out in Chicago, our prescient president was warning us to not to "fetishize our smart phones." As long as the government can already "rifle through your underwear," he said,  you are very silly to keep defending the privacy of your electronic devices. You are all child molesters or terrorists until proven otherwise.... not that they'll ever bother proving otherwise.

From the New York Times:  
“If, technologically, it is possible to make an impenetrable device or system, where the encryption is so strong that there is no key, there is no door at all, then how do we apprehend the child pornographer?” Mr. Obama said. “How do we disrupt a terrorist plot?”
If the government has no way into a smartphone, he added, “then everyone is walking around with a Swiss bank account in your pocket.”
And Chris Matthews thinks that Trump is the only charismatic face of totalitarianism?

***

Speaking of terrifying cluelessness, Hillary Clinton has again attempted to revise history, this time claiming that the Reagans were warriors against the HIV epidemic back in the 80s, -- when, in fact, the Gruesome Homophobic Twosome went out of their way to ignore it. In later admitting her mistake, Hillary said she'd confused AIDS with Alzheimers, the latter of which Nancy publicized only because it affected her directly. I suppose we should forgive Hillary, though. When  Nancy was First Lady of the Land, Hillary was First Lady of Arkansas and probably too busy supervising her prison convict slave help to pay much attention to an epidemic affecting gay men.

Or. she might have experienced a Reagan moment and thought she was a contestant on Jeopardy rather than having a friendly funeral chat with Mrs. Alan Greenspan (Andrea Mitchell) on MSNBC. "I'll take 'Diseases That Begin With A' for $675,000, Alex!"

Hillary always brags that she's been tested. Is she sure about that?

Whether it's President Trump or President Clinton, we can expect another long slog of psychopathology and stupidity on top of the ingrained insanity.

Hopefully it will be neither. The words and actions of these candidates just yesterday alone is all the more reason to vote for Bernie Sanders. At his own rally on Friday he called for inclusiveness among the classes and the races and the generations.

Unlike Obama before him, he didn't smarmily call for cooperation between Republicans and Democrats, between red and blue states, among establishment elites. He called for solidarity among people.

That is not at all sending a giant thrill up Chris Matthews' leg. It is, however, sending a giant chill up the spineless spine of the Closet Fascist Collective, for whom dividing and conquering the electorate is not only their main governing strategy, it is the only governing strategy that they still have left.

Keeping Fear Alive is their only motto.

8 comments:

Cirze said...

I love it.

You are one in a gazillion.

And I thought no one else had noticed.

And Chris Matthews thinks that Trump is the only charismatic face of totalitarianism?

Pearl said...



Bernie Sanders won America’s largest Arab community by being open to them http://interc.pt/220vQiF by @ZaidJilani



Interesting concern by Bernie in view of the mistreatment of Arabs living in Israel and surrounding areas.

Jay–Ottawa said...

Yes, last week's news was awful, embarrassing; and it ain't over.

The back and forth slosh of democracy and fascism inside the American pond has become more agitated. The brownshirts have been emboldened by Trump and an array of hotheads in the western states to exit of their caves with fists and guns mostly under the Republican banner.

Do not fear for the Democratic Party. I have no doubt the diehard supporters of Rahm Emanuel, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama can match the Republicans in the streets or the suites any day of the week.

Then there's Bernie Sanders, who proposes to energize our better angels to advance a civil society. Well, well, good facing evil once again. Who says American elections aren't a morality play?

Never mind big money as a fix of the fight. Never mind propaganda and dirty tricks as distortions of the public will. American politics never was a fair fight. Queens Rules don't apply here. Think back: tarring and feathering––could be a killer. The last recorded lynching was in 1981. Bullying, gouging and blows below the belt have been allowed in the American rulebook––or at least gone unpunished––since before the Revolution. No? Then go and punish me a Wall Street banker. See what I mean. The higher the stakes––and they keep getting higher, the harder it is to limit the tactics, all the way up to robbing the national treasury or egging on a civil war.

The best measure of the forces in contention in this periodic free-for-all will be found in the delegate count at the conventions and then of voters in the general election. We are so lucky to have ringside seats through the summer and fall of these interesting times.

But then will it be over? Will things quiet down? Will the knuckle draggers along with our better angels make peace with the results, call a truce and settle back in the ooze? I'm not so sure this time around.

Pearl said...

Jay: frightening possibilities ahead. No matter what happens to Trump, those people (so many of them) screaming for his agenda are here to stay and will poison the waters behind the scenes no matter who will be running the country. And they are influencing others when they are gone.

The whole system has to be revamped in order to allow fresh air in but can even a Bernie in full bloom do the job is the question.

The biggest shock to me is how many angry people there are that are trying to destroy the best parts of the nation and the people yearning to be free. We will not have any answers in our lifetimes as it will take a while to balance the ship of state. We can only do what we are doing and hope our progeny will continue the battle. My reward is seeing the best in human beings shining through at Bernie rallies even if for only a short while.
Your comments are always so well described, Jay. And now we are facing the future of Canada where you and I live which is not as rosy as we would like.

CNN is broadcasting a series of the events of the past under different presidents which is a reminder of how bad it has all been over and over and over again. I am not planning to watch it especially when we are clearly shown what went wrong and why and which may continue. I only hope the young people speaking out in the U.S. have strong stomachs and hearts to steer things in the healthier direction which may become a necessity for survival.
I also find some consolation in seeing Hillary becoming more and more exposed and beginning to fray. Wonder if she will survive politically.

Jay–Ottawa said...

Worrisome times, you agree, Pearl. Still you hope, therefore you are. Keep on truckin' down that road. Me, I can't help it: I worry, therefore I am. We make a balanced twosome.

Kat said...

Some of my best friends are black presidents... good god, read the comments to the awfuuly headlined article
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/13/us/politics/proud-of-obamas-presidency-blacks-are-sad-to-see-him-go.html
So many people announcing --gamechanger-- they're white and they love him too! The words "grace" and "dignity" came up a lot. Sadly, there was no "credit to his race".
Hardly anyone questioned the conceit of the headline- that all black people think alike.

Pearl said...

Whats Wrong with Hillary Jeff Greenwald

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/03/hillary-clinton-2016-whats-wrong-with-hillary-213722

Pearl said...

Wonderful responses from readers of Krugman's latest: Trump is no accident including yours Meredith.
I do not know of any other major newspaper keeping on a columnist who is so unpopular with its readers. It shows how much to the right the media and PK has swung.