The Durham report has been released but nobody really cares, nobody on the left anyway it seems. This report is damning, very damning and viewed from an unbiased, discerning position the reader, in anything like “normal circumstances”, would be quite alarmed with the corrupting influence and out and out extreme interference in the electoral process. In fact, if the report was an indictment of Donald Trump, it would be gleefully received and splashed across the entertainment platforms some erroneously call “the news”.
The Durham Report or for a shorter read, Chris Hedges recent article published in Substack are very important pieces that will likely be entirely ignored by the clown media, much to the detriment of our political understanding and discourse but none of this is new. Many of our top award-winning journalists are being black-balled or as in the infamous case of Mr. Assange, much worse than that. “The Public”, that most important and elemental piece of any functioning democracy, continues to look away from unpleasant truths in an effort to avoid any feelings of responsibility or any impulse that might cause them to take an unpopular stand against the corruption and decay of both our media and our government.
Hedges is quite good at making a clear point in his writings but he only touched on one point that I would like to take up here. The notion that trying to combat the “other-side” by becoming as bad if not worse than they are, is some kind of winning strategy. I fear for my country to use an old cliche’ when the best that a party can do is to be worse than their opponent. This contest of evil vs. evil is taking the country to some very high cliffs for us to drive off of and if you ask around, the one thing that there seems to be an almost unanimous level of agreement on, is that we are surely driving ourselves off a cliff.
Strangely enough, the good news that is found in the wreckage of the bad news is that, in the case of partisan politics, both sides in the battle are so extremely bad that we need not waste away our time in trying to figure out which player to support when it is so clear that they both should be dismissed all together and thrown out of our lives at the next opportunity.
To delve into the horrific consequences of this race to the cliff for a moment lets first look over at the Republicans ideas of how to betray the country. Montana, Florida, Texas, Arizona, and most all of those other “red” states are coming up with new legislation that would be well suited for the dark ages, perhaps, but their emphasis on denying basic rights and freedoms, from their assault on women to banning historical information to students, has reached an amazing and alarming level of tyranny and injustice.
The view to the left of the isle is also frightening, alarming and without precedent in its betrayal of the nation with its imperialistic foreign policies and refusal to govern for the real good of the people. The difference that stands out to me in the two evils is that the red team is overt and their agenda is pursued without embarrassment or shame whereas the blue team is very covert and clever at hiding its sins against the nation.
My goal here is not to fill up pages, and pages, and pages, of true tales of the various ways that we’ve been betrayed. Hedges, Taibbi, Mate’, Chomsky, Assange and others have done their jobs and done them very well. So well in fact that they are not only all award-winning journalists but they also, without intention, have moved into the higher echelons of journalism by being black-balled, smeared, censored and disregarded constantly and consistently by the corporate clown media and the sycophants that rally round them. Regardless, you can read them if you choose to do that.
Instead, because I’m inclined towards these things, lets talk about this notion that being the worst in governance is the golden road to awesome power and privilege when in truth it is the pot-holed, black-asphalt, dead-end of all who venture down.
Yes, it really is a dead-end and a gruesome one at that. In our efforts to be the worst we are doing well! Poverty, environmental catastrophe, endless war with the unnecessary deaths of millions of innocents, and a country so divided that there is actually serious talk of violent revolution and/or civil war. The side of the worst is winning, or so it seems.
Every now and then someone makes the mistake of inviting me out into a public space. There I’ve noticed, what I see is an interesting though somewhat depressing phenomenon. If while out amongst my peers, or betters as I like to think of them, I break into some breathtaking descriptions of our imminent doom and destruction full of finger-pointing and horrific accusations, the eager crowd of bystanders generally will throw in with plenty of “ain’t that the truths”, “you got that right”s and so-on and so-forth.
Contrarily, should I attempt to wax eloquent towards the direction of “peace on Earth” or “good wills toward men” the crowd will, like clouds in a hot desert, morning sky, start to dissipate until its just all me, alone, under a vast blue dome. At these times I feel a little like poor Arlo when he first joins the gang over on the Group W bench. If you get the reference.
Interesting that Arlo would enter my mind now as I write because to think of it, he makes a very good point in his story of his adventures there at Alices Restaurant in Stockbridge Massa chutes. Towards the end of his tale, he appeals to his audience (us) that if we want to end war and stuff like that, that we are going to have to sing out a little louder, with a little more passion than we did in the first go round. “That was terrible”, Arlo says when the audience sings along, and he means it.
I mean, I mean…here we are in a time when every election has become “the most important ever” and we don’t even have any good songs. Hey Ho, Hey Ho, this-c-h-a-n-t–has got to go, is not really grabbing the hearts and minds, inspiring the masses that is, the way maybe a good protest song should.
When it comes to today’s political opportunities within the established parameters of our highly orchestrated elections another classic tune comes to my mind now, I think it was Hall and Oates doing their hit “I Can’t Go For That, (No Can Do)” or something like that.
Seriously! At what point do the people finally say no to that? Do we secretly enjoy being taken for fools? Do we have an underlying self-hatred that even television and recreational drugs can’t eclipse?
Now I know that I’m no different from others, you should see the way that I let my best girl-friend treat me, but fortunately with her its only loneliness and despair for me instead of the end of the world for everyone, although in my own despair it feels like the end sometimes. People tell me that I should get a new girlfriend and, what do you think? They’re probably right.
Sorry, I let my mind wander for a minute there…You see whether we’re talking about our significant other, our group of companions, our favorite cult or our GOVERNMENT, if we are in one of those dysfunctional relationships that I’ve heard about on day-time T.V. shows and we don’t make at least some effort on our own behalf, well, we are shamefully complicit in our own self-destruction. We are enablers, abused and afraid to run.
I know that I’m constantly going on about this but that’s because I think it’s true. We “the people” have not only the right but a duty to keep this government under control. We know what happens if we don’t. That’s right, the government will control us and they are not, in the present configuration using their control to take us towards a utopian village they are taking us to somewhere that is like a Brave New 2024 dystopian nightmare.
I used to be proud of my country even with its sordid history of indigenous oppression and destruction and the horrors of slavery. I bet that there was a time when you too had at least some little love and respect for the US even if it was naïve’ or simplistic. The faults of our past however have not stopped Natives and/or African Americans from loving both the ideals of the American dream and the country itself. We all built it up. We all died to preserve the ideals and the country that claimed those them. We have at times been able to see past our faults and mistakes so that we could focus on the promise of todays life, liberty and happiness. We were able to find inspiration, passion, courage, strength and inclusion in the great experiment and in those ideals that we, as a people, once proclaimed and professed to believe in.
Although proclamations and assertions are not the same as “doing the thing”, they represent clear and realistic goals. Ideals today are often derided as impossible day dreams, something that someone once stood for, something that once mattered and brought people from here and around the world together. Who chooses for us the importance or significance of the great ideals? Who chooses whether or not they matter?
If we have lost sight, as we seem to have done, of the significance of our ideals, as we fight among ourselves over legislation that either is not earnest in the fulfillment of those ideals or rejects them all together, we will be like boats without oars or rudder in a very fast-moving river headed for a fall.
Of the twenty or so people who read my rants I would guess that about 97% are lefties, about 60% are Democrats, about 40% are independents, about 20% are off the charts and the rest are Republicans. I mention this not because I’m a lover of numbers but because I want to get the jump on my readers!
Here it is…
I, RS Owen, am not a Putin Puppet…ooops, wrong schtick.
Do Over- I, RS Owen, am not a MAGA Trump lover. Never have been, never will be.
Furthermore, I do not ever want to see Donald Trump or ANY Republican in the White House ever again! Whew! I hope that is clear..I’m trying to avoid mis-information.
Which finally brings me to the point of this article.
Democrats! What in the name of Ron and Nancy Reagan do you think you are doing? Isn’t it enough of an insult to the good people of this fine country that we should have Donald Trump on our ballots? Must you leave a burning bag of poo on our doorstep in this manner by asking us to vote for Joe Biden? Have you lost your…no wait, don’t answer that.
Either way, as a participant or as an observer, I find myself overwhelmed by the choices that we, the American people, out of 350,000,000 people, have come up with to lead our Great and Lovely Country into the future! A contest between Wiley Coyote and Yosemite Sam would probably make more sense and be less damaging in both the long and short run of things.
Now you can call me names, it’s been done before, but frankly when someone, friend or foe, tells me that they are dedicating their vote to one or the other, either one that is, of these men to lead, rule, run, or preside over this country I get a little embarrassed for them.
Now comes the pitch!
Listen folks, if we can’t do a little better than to foist either of these candidates onto ourselves, our children, our children’s children, our grandmothers, neighbors, the rest of mankind, then maybe we shouldn’t bother at all. We could save ourselves a lot of grief and embarrassment that way.
I don’t know, maybe there are some other options.
If not, what does that mean?