Like pulling rabbits out of a hat, the Democrats took the House and the Republicans managed to hold onto the Senate. Ho-hum!
In the state I live in, the less moronic of the four candidates for governor, well, actually, the less moronic of the two candidates that anyone was paying attention to – you know, the same bland coffee, stuffed in two rather unattractive but different packages, won. Ho-hum!
And now we can turn our attention from the clowns at the circus for a momentary spell, quickly forgetting what we were so worked about a couple of days ago since promises of candy canes and lollipops haven’t kicked in yet but hey, they have been promised to us. Like the usually present geo-engineering of the weather taking place directly over our heads here in the richest country in the world, come January, when the newest set of shysters takes to their chambers, surely, all sorts of sweet offerings will rain down upon us. After all, they promised.
Trump’s platform (promises) was to get us out of the wars, control spending, improve relations with other countries – but damn, those nasty promises always get in the way once elected as none of those promises have seen the light of day, and actually, the wars have continued, the bombings increased, the spending continues to be out of control and our relations with many other countries is reaching the bottom of the outhouse hole in the ground.
But lest one might love to blame all our madness on the guy with orange hair, the tanking of America has been in process for a number of years.
As Constitution attorney John Whitehead recently noted,
We’re being subjected to more government surveillance, more police abuse, more SWAT team raids, more roadside strip searches, more censorship, more prison time, more egregious laws, more endless wars, more invasive technology, more militarization, more injustice, more corruption, more cronyism, more graft, more lies, and more of everything that has turned the American dream into the American nightmare.
What we’re not getting more of: elected officials who actually represent us.
The American people are being guilted, bullied, pressured, cajoled, intimidated, terrorized and browbeaten into voting. We’re constantly told to vote because it’s your so-called civic duty, because you have no right to complain about the government unless you vote, because every vote counts, because we must present a unified front, because the future of the nation depends on it, because God compels us to do so, because by not voting you are in fact voting, because the “other” candidate must be defeated at all costs, or because the future of the Supreme Court rests in the balance.
Nothing in the Constitution requires that you vote.
You are under no moral obligation to vote for the lesser of two evils. Indeed, voting for a lesser evil is still voting for evil.
Indeed, nothing requires one to vote, and in fact, if more of us took an intense disinterest in the shenanigans of these shysters who descend upon us every two years with their bag of promises that are nothing more than absolute BS…and more of an interest in ourselves, our health, our freedoms – and standing fast against allowing these shysters to take away the few freedoms we have left – there might be reason to hope.
Alas! Such courage to stand for truth isn’t easily found among the masses.
It’s always good to let a keener intellect sum up whenever possible – so, back to Mr. Rutherford:
Don’t be fooled into thinking that the only road to reform is through the ballot box.
After all, there is more to citizenship than the act of casting a ballot for someone who, once elected, will march in lockstep with the dictates of the powers-that-be. Yet as long as Americans are content to let politicians, war hawks and Corporate America run the country, the police state will prevail, no matter which candidate wins on Election Day.
In other words, it doesn’t matter who sits in the White House, who controls the two houses of Congress, or who gets appointed to the Supreme Court: only those who are prepared to cozy up to the powers-that-be will have any real impact.
As Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Chris Hedges points out:
The predatory financial institutions on Wall Street will trash the economy and loot the U.S. Treasury on the way to another economic collapse whether Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton is president. Poor, unarmed people of color will be gunned down in the streets of our cities whether Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton is president. The system of neoslavery in our prisons, where we keep poor men and poor women of color in cages because we have taken from them the possibility of employment, education and dignity, will be maintained whether Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton is president. Millions of undocumented people will be deported whether Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton is president. Austerity programs will cut or abolish public services, further decay the infrastructure and curtail social programs whether Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton is president. Money will replace the vote whether Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton is president. And half the country, which now lives in poverty, will remain in misery whether Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton becomes president. This is not speculation. We know this because there has been total continuity on every issue, from trade agreements to war to mass deportations, between the Bush administration and the administration of Barack Obama. – via freethoughtproject.com
Paraphrasing Albert Einstein – doing the same thing over again and expecting different results, is the insanity we continue to accept.
Or, one can wait for the next election cycle to be fooled again, waiting for the political psychopath’s promises of candy canes and lollipops falling from the sky.
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Tonight’s musical offering:
J.S. Bach – Orchestral Suite No. 1 in C major, BMV 1066 – 3, Gavotte 1 & 2 ~ Norwegian Chamber Orchestra
Photo credit: http://www.unsplash.com/@rawpixel
Dispatches from the Asylum 