(See below.)
Submitted Without Comment
Mood
From The Rogue Columnist:
Yes, I'll be writing about the needless election to save light rail.
But I was struck, forgive the pun, by last week's news that a "city killer" asteroid had passed our planet, coming so close it was only one-fifth of the distance between the Earth and the moon. The rock wasn't one that scientists had been tracking, and it had seemingly appeared from "out of nowhere," Michael Brown, a Melbourne-based observational astronomer, told The Washington Post.
I was strangely unsurprised. My black-dog mood since 2016, when Hillary Clinton won the popular vote by 3 million votes but our fate was sealed thanks to 78,000 votes in three Midwestern states, in a deeply tainted, nay, stolen, election, has yet to abate. One of the most qualified people ever to seek the presidency lost to an astonishingly unqualified quisling for a foreign prince, a mob boss, a man now normalized by the media and heading for reelection.
Since then, everything has been falling apart. And all this time, I have thought: If we were surprised by a deadly visitor from the cosmos…yes, of course. The haunting 2011 film Melancholia, starring Kirsten Dunst, come true. Life, or its end, foreshadowed by art. Bad things coming our way.
We would have it coming having squandered out space program for 50 years after the magnificent achievement of Apollo 11. The world spent $1.8 trillion its militaries in 2018, higher than in the Cold War. Yet nothing is being done to protect the planet from some 20,000 near-earth asteroids. That number is not a typo.
Meanwhile, we are doing little to address a planetary emergency of our own making: climate change. The "President" and his party deny that it even exists. This is part of a broader pattern of destruction by "conservatives" and the Republican Party, now wholly Trumpist. Trump and the shredding of the Constitution is our other genuine crisis.
The Democrats have cracked up, too. The left has gone so mad that I dare not even write about my disagreements for fear of driving away Rogue readers. They will think I have gone off the deep end like Westbrook Pegler or Jim Kunstler. For the left, everything seems to be a "crisis": homelessness, affordable housing, diversity, racism, missing and murdered female "Native Americans," police brutality, etc. etc. Many of these are problems. Many are weaponized words simplifying and even distorting complex social conditions that transcend comic-strip Manichaeism.
Watch the liberal firing squad, the purity demands that can carry Seattle and the Bay Area in a landslide, and see Donald Trump win big next year. Then our experiment in self-governance really will be over. And so will the planet we knew.
We have only two crises: climate and Constitution. The rest are challenges, problems, conditions to which constructive or destructive policies and individual responsibility can be applied.
RC's Front Page Editor, Richard Silc, and I have an ongoing debate. He argues that the United States is heading toward a USSR-style collapse and breakup. I say we're watching the death of the Roman Republic and the rise of the Roman Empire, digital-style. We're too rich to experience 1989 redux. Also, unlike the Soviet Union, we're not made up of many antagonistic one-time nations yearning to break apart (the Russia then was happy to see them go).
The Romans happily sold their rights for bread and circuses (smart phones, streaming entertainment and online shopping), for the stability of an emperor and army (most Americans know nothing about our form of self-government, our inspired Constitution and Bill of Rights). Rome lost plenty of battles and wars, but it endured for almost 400 years in the west and 1,400 years in the east. To be sure, this was before nuclear weapons.
Happy sky watching.
By Your Deeds Shall You Know Them
From John Pavlovitz:
To Young Men and Women of America,
Have you heard us?
Is our message getting through?
We've been talking to you this week, trying to make sure you understand who we are, what kind of America we're building here, the future nation we're dreaming of.
We think we've been clear and compelling in our declarations, and we've done our best not to leave any ambiguity as to our hearts or our plans or our intentions.
We think our tirades and our condescension and our insults and our sneering tantrums have spoken eloquently about us and about you.
We hope Lindsey and Donald and Chuck and Orrin and Mitch and Brett and Susan have made a strong case—but if not, let us be more explicit in these moments, so there can be no confusion. After all, November is coming and we want you to be certain…
To the Young Men of America,
You can do whatever you want to young women.
You can disregard their humanity,
force yourself on them physically,
ignore their pleas to stop,
proceed without consent,
hurt them,
humiliate them,
indulge your urges,
treat them as property,
and silence, slander, and intimidate them after the fact.
You can do this as often as you like, to as many young girls as opportunity and your desires allow.
We will have your back (providing you are white, wealthy, and one day vote Republican.)
We will marshal our every resource of finance and position and privilege in protecting and defending you.
You will receive sanctuary in our midst, regardless of the horrors you are responsible for or the recklessness and brazenness of your conduct.
We will help you in any way we can, to malign your accuser's character, destroy their credibility, and embarrass them further.
We will blame alcohol or her memory or her behavior in the past.
We will talk about your viciousness in ways designed to make it seem commonplace.
We will paint you in as flattering a portrait as we can, so that you actually come out looking like the victim, so that the accusations are actually a help.
We will have no loyalty to the truth or to goodness or decency, if such things pose a threat to either your narrative or our prosperity.
We'll use the invaluable resource of the Evangelical Church to even make supporting you, part of God's will.
If no other option is available, we will simply ignore what you've done. (After all we installed a President that way.)
We will never allow the violence you make young women endure, to prevent you from having opportunity and advancement and success.
We can promise you that.
And to Young Women of America,
You don't matter.
Not your trauma or your pain,
not the innocence you lose,
not the damage you sustain,
not the scars you are marked by,
not the nightmares you are haunted by,
not the peace you no longer find,
not the confidence that leaves you,
not the fear that is ever present,
not the shame that you cannot shake,
not the silence you are imprisoned by.
We simply do not see you as valuable—at least not as valuable as the status quo we're protecting or the legislation we're coveting or the religion we're perpetuating or the votes we're needing.
You are the acceptable collateral damage of our misogyny and entitlement.
Your body, your emotional health, and your sense of safety—simply aren't worth more than a Supreme Court seat.
Of course, should a pregnancy somehow be created by your violation, we will vigorously demand that you be forced to carry it, even if it exacerbates your pain and magnifies your despair. After all, we urgently need to perpetuate the appearance that we are pro-life—just not your life.
We can imagine this is less than ideal for you, but we hope you understand that this is how it has always been, and we are counting on you to indulge us one last time, and we appreciate your cooperation.
After all, ee have a Patriarchy and a predatory President to protect.
So, young men and women of America, we hope you see us with clarity.
We hope that in these days, we are exposing ourselves fully.
We hope you know who we are now.
We'll see you in November.
Sincerely,
The Republican Party of 2018
Also Timely
This is not America, (sha la la la la)
A little piece of you
The little peace in me
Will die (This is not a miracle)
For this is not America
Blossom fails to bloom this season
Promise not to stare
Too long (This is not America)
For this is not the miracle
There was a time
A storm that blew so pure
For this could be the biggest sky
And I could have the faintest idea
For this is not America
(Sha la la la la, sha la la la la, sha la la la la)
This is not America, no
This is not, (sha la la la la)
Snowman melting from the inside
Falcon spirals to the ground
(This could be the biggest sky)
So bloody red, tomorrow's clouds
A little piece of you
The little peace in me
Will die (This could be a miracle)
For this is not America
There was a time
A wind that blew so young
For this could be the biggest sky
And I could have the faintest idea
For this is not America
(Sha la la la la, sha la la la la, sha la la la la)
This is not America, no
This is not, (sha la la la)
This is not America, no
This is not
This is not America, no
This is not, (sha la la la)