Wake the hell up...
Ever since I was a teenager, every time I heard the phrase “This is not who we are.” after some miscreant or group of miscreants did something reprehensible, I would roll my eyes in disbelief that someone other than a member of the clergy would have the temerity to say that.
Why would I be cynical at age 13? I was born in the early 1950’s: all we saw on TV were outlaws, murderers, thieves, liars, adulterers, child molesters, kidnappers, embezzlers, abusers of women (both societally sanctioned and criminal), shoplifters, assassins, malicious pranksters, tax cheats, angry and resentful teenagers and adults, traitors, perjurers, con men, blackmailers, and a whole bunch of creative and innovative villains of all stripes which the police, state police, FBI, CIA, Secret Service, and mysterious governmental agencies were employed full time with tens of thousands on the payroll had to battle.
Of course, in early TV and film, the bad guys would have to be somehow defeated but we knew that that wasn’t always the case. Many of us were acquainted with people and even whole families who’d gotten away with all kinds of stuff for years. All the righteous sanctimony was out the window as far as I was concerned: the laws were enacted to attempt to dissuade most people from doing what they’d really like to do, which is harm. Harming people, harming family, harming retail establishments, harming insurance companies and the rest.
This tinhorn Mussolini we’ve got in what’s left of the White House allowed a great number of Americans to live their fantasies of lawlessness, adultery, lecherousness, overindulgence, outright denial by almost proudly lying, and the constant expression of both victimhood and the id as Freud defined it. It is the realization of the Twilight Zone episode “It’s A Good Life” which Rod Serling himself wrote. It is a horror beyond horrors and we are living, somehow, through this.
It is however, the beginning of the end for him. Entropy, both political and physiological is increasing. The McConnell situation is a portent of coming attractions. The next chapter of this saga is in outline form and about to be written. I would say however, that if anyone had written a series of scripts for a miniseries and simply had had a glimpse into this future, it would have been rejected at every level as being too unbelievable even for a gullible audience. That is how absolutely outrageous this time has been.
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My suggestion is for anyone who attends a Dem. Campaign event with an open mic … pose this question:
WHAT IS THE PLAN? Election cancelled? Election denied? What is the plan?
I can’t wait to hear the answers, because right now it is crickets.
Let us not forget that the Twilight Zone episode was based on a story by Jerome Bixby.
Just looking out for my fellow Jeromes.
Like you I grew up in the late 50's and early 60's so that's my time frame. Catholic schools were known for their discipline, and those nuns were something else.
Any time any kid messed up, there were consequences. You got a "zero" as your test score, or you had to stay after school, or you had to stand in the corner while your friends sniggered at you. Sometimes the principal called the parents of poorly-behaving students. Nuns were even known to paddle students when they really messed up, but it was almost always one of the boys. I don't think a girl was ever paddled, but I could be wrong.
My point is that we were disciplined and most of us learned quickly - there ARE consequences, we WILL be caught, and it's almost NEVER worth it. Those who didn't learn this important lesson became examples to the rest. By the time we were sent off to high school, our patterns were already formed for life.
I've lost touch with grade school-aged children, (my own grandson is already in college) but I don't believe any of this is being done any more. Certainly not in the public schools and there are very few nuns teaching in Catholic schools these days. It's a bygone era.
(and 1984) (1)
The same dark forces that manipulated Romans ages ago still rear their ugly heads and drag out the old fascist playbook.
Visionaries warn us, and we ignore the "signpost up ahead"
I do advise that rather than try to "change hearts and minds" (2) which takes ages, if at all, that we concentrate on the manipulators, the "Epstein Class" that opens that book and plays it.
And this year, it is resonating with many.
(1) The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism, by Emmanuel Goldstein
https://genius.com/Emmanuel-goldstein-the-theory-and-practice-of-oligarchical-collectivism-annotated
(2) https://democraticunderground.com/100216524810