Atticus
Atticus's JournalAn oldie worth repeating:
A billionaire hedge fund manager, a union worker and a non-union worker sit down at a table with a plate holding a dozen cookies in the center.
The billionaire immediately grabs eleven cookies, leans over toward the non-union worker and whispers "If we don't get rid of that union guy he's gonna take your cookie!"
Nina Turner has recently been so childishly spiteful in her comments about those who
supported her victorious primary opponent that she has begun to sound---dare I say it?---Trumpian!
Gee, I wonder why she continues to turn off Democrats?
I'll take the hide if any believe that's appropriate.
I DEFY YOU to come up with something SO ignorant, SO vulgar, SO transparently STUPID
and SELF-CENTERED that Trump would never do or say it.
Go ahead. I'll wait-------
If a reasonably informed American adult living in the 1960's had been plucked from their
daily life and transported by Time Machine to 2022, I think that after looking around, listening to what now passes for political discussion and reading a couple of days worth of MAGA/Q-anon social media posts, they just might totally melt down and wind up staring into space while mumbling "In America? In America? In America?"
We elders have made the journey from then to now in comparatively small slides and lurches. Each moved the body politic a little further away from what we had been taught was our small "d" democratic birthright, but few had any immediate adverse impact on our personal lives and we had mortgages to pay and kids to clothe and feed. We "moved on".
But, the totality of changes in our national "character" amounts to a disastrous loss---forfeiture, actually--- of what we had been led to believe---no, what we KNEW---made America special. We were never perfect, but our intent was always to be fairer, kinder, more just, more tolerant---better. Today, this determination to leave our children a more moral world is increasingly viewed as quaint foolishness that only "suckers" pursue.
I did not get here via Time Machine, but I do occasionally find myself mumbling "In America?"
Sorry about the tone of this. It's just been "one of those days".
Let me see if I have this right--- a statutory "buffer zone" around the perimeter of an
abortion clinic is unconstitutional as a violation of the protesters' 1st Amendment rights BUT---peaceful protesters outside the homes of "Justices" like Alito and Kavanaugh are terroristic hooligans who MUST be stopped.
Is that where we're at?
Is it maybe time to be loud and disruptive? Color outside the lines? Engage in mass civil disobedience? Call fascist misogynistic bastards what the are to their faces? Get arrested?
Someone we thought a lot of called that "good trouble", didn't he?
Remember when we said---"Trump will never win the GOP primaries!"
"Trump could never win the Presidency; people aren't THAT stupid!"
"This will do it! This is the end of Trump!" ( X ??? times)
"The GOP will never get rid of Roe v. Wade. They're not THAT stupid!"
"Fascism can never happen here!"?
And, NOW we're saying---
"Trump won't be the Republican candidate in '24."
"Book burning in the US? Don't be ridiculous!"
"These concerns about the SCOTUS ruling against same-sex marriages and contraception are just alarmist nonsense."
"American democracy is too strong to be replaced by an autocracy."
""No need to get all excited---someone will fix this. They always do."
And, STILL: "FASCISM COULD NEVER HAPPEN HERE!"
Can I borrow your imaginations for a minute?
Pretend you're a bigshot in some business enterprise and a senior vice-president has you and other managers into his office to explain his idea for a drastic change in how the corporation operates.
"It's really verh simple" he begins, "what we've been doing for the last 50 years has been egregiously wrong. Wise men in the past---okay, the 'distant past'---understood that women are not intelligent enough to even make decisions about their own health so, obviously, they've not competent to make management decisions in a business. Therefore, all female employees above stenographer or file clerk are hereby discharged."
How long would it take for that misogynist tight-ass to be shown the door?
(All similarities between the above and recent events is intended)
First, the weary sun faded from saffron to a brassy copper tint as thin eastbound clouds
began to shroud it. Now, it blends shades of apricot and plum as it seems to at last surrender to the gravity of the coming night.
Mourning doves and whipporwills begin the evening's soundtrack, but are soon replaced by spring peepers, crickets and an early bullfrog at the far end of the pond.
Mother's Day brought our children home for chocolate cake and coffee al fresco. Mrs. A was honored as she should be.
Today, life here is good.
I think truck drivers will confirm this. Inexperienced drivers sometimes wind up in a ditch
on a windy day---because that's where they steered their rig.
If they were west bound on an interstate through the wide open spaces and there was a 30 mph wind from the north, they had to "hold right" in order to counter the wind and drive straight down the highway. And, then----they went under an overpass where some state or county road crossed and were instantly shielded from the wind.
Look out! "Holding right" now steers them off the pavement!
I think maybe the GOP has been "holding right" against legal abortions for decades. If in June, legal abortion stops, will they wind up in the ditch without the "baby-killing socialists" to oppose?
At first, I thought I wanted one of those "Let's Go Darwin!" bumper stickers, but then
I realized: most of the people it is intended to mock have no idea who "Darwin" was.
Mrs. A and I once wore matching tees to a DC March that had "TEA PARTY" writ large in blue inside a bright orange circle with a bright orange slash angled through the text.
We were amazed when obvious Tea Party supporters kept smiling, giving us thumbs up and pointing out their Tea Party tees, caps and posters.
I think the Tea Party motto was "DU-U-UH!"
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