Fright Fest '24

a Who needs Halloween when the politicians and the pundits are already force-feeding us so much doom and dread candy that we're apt to fall into a mass post-apocalyptic coma before the actual Apocalypse even gets a chance to happen on November5th? We may be so overdosed on manufactured terror that we won't even have the strength to shamble to the polls like the good patriotic zombies they want us to be.

There hasn't been this much  manufactured hysteria since the Y2K disaster turned out to be a big fat epic  bust. I will never forget how disappointed I was on waking up on Jan. 1, 2000 to discover that the clocks were still working.

I suspect many of us will feel the same way on Nov. 6, when a presidential winner will have been announced and the world has not come to an end. Even if there is no clear winner, we can at least count our blessings when the campaign ads and money-grubbing emails and robocalls suddenly stop and we can get back to the same old comforting consumer cons of yore.

Not that whatever the outcome, we are well and truly screwed. All this talk of the fate of  Democracy itself hanging in the balance  seems so quaint, given that democracy  has become just a code word for the neoliberal capitalism that's destroying the  planet and causing mass economic inequality, along with war and genocide. Why else would the corporate media be keeping such a breathless scorecard on which candidate is winning the billionaire sweepstakes?

The funniest-scariest headline I've read all week was the one that screamed "BIll Gates Has Privately Endorsed Kamala Harris," as though that pronouncement from the billionaire buddy of Jeffrey Epstein will send thousands of wavering voters to the polls in a burst of trans-class solidarity.

Meanwhile; Donald Trump has snagged the currently reigning world]s richest man, Elon Musk. It is now predicted that should Trump win, he will install Musk as his top White House adviser, if not his de facto co-monarch.

The media are also making a big deal over Kamala Harris finally daring to Go There and call Trump a fascist. She made the stunning accusation at yet another corporate-sponsored staged "town hall"  event. This was during the same week that her campaign had to clap back against the vile rumors that Harris is not a loyal and full-fledged supporter of the joint US/Israel genocide of Arab populations in the Middle East.. It is so unfair that Trump keeps  accusing her of being a radical Marxist and a hater of imperialism and mass death. That is rank disinformation, given that Kamala has worked tirelessly to advertise her neocon values, what with dragging Liz Cheney to so many staged events that you might even think she's secretly dumped Tim Walz from the ticket, leaving him to languish in the woods with his pheasant-shooting gun. The least the veep candidate could do is to emulate Liz's own creepy veepy daddy and shoot somebody in the face  with i tand then demand an apology from his victim.

Meanwhile, we must not let the manufactured doom and gloom get us down. We must look forward to Barack Obama pivoting from his current stand-up routine of guilt-tripping black male voters and making fun of Trump's McDonald's stunt, not to mention his faltering mental capacities.

It was Consoler-n-Chief  Obama, remember, who comforted the nation after Trump's 2016 victory, by insisting (correctly) that the Duopoly is really an intramural team, all playing within the same cosy 40-60 yard line.

Maybe he can tweak the platitude just a tad, assuring a divided nation that  the players are cosily scrimmaging within the 10-20 yard line  or whatever real estate is closest to the right-leaning goal post. They are all part of the same fascist team. Both are financed by billionaires, both are beholden to white supremacy.  Donald is the snarling fascist, and Kamala plays the "compassionate" fascist, each giving the wealthy exactly what they want, giving the lucrative "defense" industry exactly what it wants, all under the guise of a two-party system whose only internal differences are in  style and cultural tastes.

Meanwhile,  we will have to endure fantasy scenarios of what will happen under a second Trump term and even consider the possibility that Trump will still  take over the whole country even if Kamala wins.  He will  deport immigrants, ban Muslims and throw his political enemies in jail by fiat.  Thankfully, though, Congress has appropriated far more funds for the construction of shiny new prisons than it has for affordable housing. These elite enemies won't be out in the streets or living under bridges during the Trump dictatorship that they have so thrillingly forecast for our Halloween viewing pleasure.