I remember laughing my ass off, because it was unfailing. For almost the entire four years that Bush has been in power, I have switched off the TV everytime I see his face, or in an instance when I had no choice, simply left the room.
I am afraid of being programmed by these people, so I just avoid any of it. Also, Bush really is an idiot. How can you grow up with a father in the CIA and not be both an idiot and with an 'agenda' to serve.
People have trawled and trumped and said all they can about Bush's drug use, alcoholism, Christianity, etc. etc., but I and I telling you, allyuh don't know HALF, oui! For ever story that surfaces, there are ten that don't.
I have maintained an understanding of what is going on in Iraq, and this bullshit 'War On Terrorism' (what a crock, America are the BIGGEST terrorists in the world, but try telling one of these Bush fanatics that!) but for the most part, there's nothing new to be told.
The American government is acting in the best interests of a few, not the many. Not even the American many people, just a few. Period. Full stop.
Up until now, I've maintained my own opinions and not shared in this space, but I happened to come across this journal yesterday maintained by this guy neocon. The sheer lack of any real ideology and the sniping, the biting, the insistence on his perspective without any balance or logic, was quite frightening.
Look at what America has reduced itself to.
I don't care about either Bush or Kerry. I truly don't. I don't give a shit what party you're in, because ultimately policies get inherited from one administration to the next irregardless of Democrats or Republicans. Those policies include maintaining the economic embargo against Cuba, ostensibly for their position on communism, yet managing to reestablish ties with the Soviet Union, prior to its breakup. It includes demonising Castro, but making chummy with China.
It includes activity in Haiti I find reprehensible, I mean, truly awful shit and Haiti is the closet to my heart. It includes covert attempts to topple other democracies in countries like Venezuela, yet claiming to be about bringing democracy to the poor Iraqis (it's fucking pronounced IH-raq, not Eye-Raq, you WANKERS! It's Carib-Bee-AN, not Kuh-rib-bean. There are no Kuhribs there... fucking kiss me ass wankers!).
It includes intolerable policies towards everybody who opposes America in any way, and includes the duping and enslavement of it's own citizens. This is not a Democrat plot or a Republican plot, it's a power and control plot by people who don't care about you and or me; not even rabid Mr. Neocon.
I just don't even want to start on Iraq.
All that is just window dressing for the real deals going on behind the scenes.
'Writers', and I do use the word loosely, like Mr. Neocon (which I am sorry, but I must point out is a little too close to sounding like NeoNazi) are representative of a whole class of Americans who, like sheep follow these political parties like yard fowls.
They're so busy cannonising these evil men, they don't stop and count the human cost of what they're doing and that seriously worries me. I have American friends, the great love of my life is/was an American, and when these fuckers invariably bring the house down around their ears, everyone will suffer and the aforementioned few will sit in their bunkers waiting out the aftermath.
I don't business, oui? I just don't business.
There are Bush supporters like Cathy Seipp, whose writing is not only funny, but compelling, even if I wholly disagree with her perspective. I may not agree, but at least she makes what she says interesting because she actually has a vocabulary and has an indepth understanding of sentence structure.
I have mostly stopped reading her political commentary, and just go there on the chance that she writes about something else. Bidinotto isn't too bad, but you know, too much politics, oui? neocon is unlikely to see me with any regularity whatsoever.
These are the 'flame on' kids that freak me out the most. They're just spouting vitriol, regurgitating that O'Reilley jackass without any kind of internal analysis of any kind. They have no writing skill to speak of, and are just going off pell mell without any kind of real balance in what they're saying. Again, they do not accurately weigh the spiritual and human costs that these men they support are incurring. Maybe they agree, to me they all look like Brown Shirts or SS Officers in Hitler's army. It's facism, don't fool yourself into believing otherwise.
Yesterday, I read Neocon's supposed dis of a 'Dumb Teen', accusing him of just repeating the 'liberal' media and not basing it on anything. Yet he's doing it, just for another camp.
The sad thing is, most of these Americans are such fucking wankers, they don't even care what they are doing to themselves. They are driving themselves onto the points of their own swords, laughing like the idiot savants, 70 percent of them tend to be.
Ah fuck it. Maybe my mother is right. Americans have many sins to pay for. She just keeps saying she hopes the rest of us don't suffer for American arrogance.
They cry over 3000 people who died in the World Trade Centre bombings, but where are the nationwide mournings for the children of Beslan? Where are the mournings for the prisoners of Abu Al Ghaib?
Selfish, self-absorbed and without a clue as to it. Maybe they know they're selfish and care not, who knows. Hence the wanker comment.
Every civilisation sows the seeds of their own destruction, believe that.
Thing is, they make it so rational people are discounted and abused, and they make fun of people whose opinions are different, yet claim to be trying to make a better world. It's also hypocrisy.... rampant, oppressive hyporcrisy.
Something is spiritually wrong with these people. Spreading the gospel by sword has created nations of fucking idiots.
On the whole, the system the world is using to elect leaders who decide for everybody is wholly flawed.
It is flawed, because no matter who is in power, there is no real equality, no real democracy to speak of, or communism, or any other kind of 'ism' or 'cy' people can think up.
We are using systems of government and electing leaders who do not care for anything other than their own power. People like neocon hand their own power over to these people wrapped up neatly in a bow and say, "Gimme more, massa!"
Somewhere I read, "A man who seeks power does not deserve it".
None of these people deserve their positions. Not Kerry, not Bush, not Tony Blair or any man or woman who seek out political power.
We need to innovate a way to run this place, because what we've been doing for the last couple thousand of years, one system built on top of the other, is rubbish.
I may not have all the answers, but certainly, what is going on now is invariably not it or even one answer in many. It is no solution at all to the world's problems and has immeasurably added to it.
It's an attitude I am talking about, not party colours or ideologies. It's an attitude.
---
I took off Bob's prohetic words in favour of something I pinched from ying:
The 14 Defining Characteristics Of Fascism
Dr. Lawrence Britt has examined the fascist regimes of Hitler (Germany). Mussolini (Italy), Franco (Spain), Suharto (Indonesia) and several Latin American regimes. Britt found 14 defning characteristics common to each:
1. Powerful and Continuing Nationalism - Fascist regimes tend to make constant use of patriotic mottos, slogans, symbols, songs, and other paraphernalia. Flags are seen everywhere, as are flag -symbols on clothing and in public displays.
2. Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights - Because of fear of enemies and the need for security, the people in fascist regimes are persuaded that human rights can be ignored in certain cases because of "need." The people tend to look the other way or even approve of torture, summary executions, assassinations, long incarcerations of prisoners, etc.
3. Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause - The people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe: racial, ethnic or religious minorities; liberals; communists: socialists, terrorists, etc.
4. Supremacy of the Military - Even when there are widespread domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized.
5. Rampant Sexism - The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Divorce, abortion and homosexuality are suppressed and the state is represented as the ultimate guardian of the family institution.
6. Controlled Mass Media - Sometimes to media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in war time, is very common.
7. Obsession with National Security - Fear is used as a motivational tool by the government over the masses.
8. Religion and Government are Intertwined - Governments in fascist nations tend to use the most common religion in the nation as a tool to manipulate public opinion. Religious rhetoric and terminology is common from government leaders, even when the major tenets of the religion are diametrically opposed to the government's policies or actions.
9. Corporate Power is Protected - The industrial and business aristocracy of a fascist nation often are the ones who put the government leaders into power, creating a mutually beneficial business/government relationship and power elite.
10. Labor Power is Suppressed - Because the organizing power of labor is the only real threat to a fascist government, labor unions are either eliminated entirely, or are severely suppressed.
11. Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts - Fascist nations tend to promote and tolerate oprn hostility to higher education, and academia. It is not uncommon for professors and other academics to be censored or even arrested. Free expression in the arts and letters is openly attacked.
12. Obsession with Crime and Punishment - Under fascist regimes, the police are given almost limitless power to enforce laws. The people are often willing to overlook police abuses and even forego civil liberties in the name of patriotism. There is often a national police force with virtually unlimited power in fascist nations.
13. Rampant cronyism and Corruption - Fascist regimes almost always are governed by groups of friends and asssociates who appoint each other to government posiitions and use governmental power and authority to protect their friends from accountablility. It is not uncommon in fascist regimes for national resources and even treasures to be appropriated or even outright stolen by government leaders.
14. Fradulent Elections- Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other times elections are manipulated by smear campaigns against or even assassination of oppossition candidates, use of legislation to control voting numbers or political district boundaries, and manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control elections."
WARNING: FULL ON RANT
The thing is, I would care if elections really mattered, that they meant something. They don’t.
Don’t fool yourself.
Kerry and Bush are just two CEO’s duking it out for Slavery Incorporated.
That’s a line from this brilliantly esoteric film, Waking Life, in which one of the characters is driving around the city, belting out this rant on a loudspeaker.
I remember thinking, “Buddy you got something to say, but driving around like that, all anyone is going to hear is snatches of your vitriol.”
Thing is, the character made some good points about US politics.
Me personally, I find it sickening.
I happened to be staying in Washington D.C. in last days of the 2000 election, and it was mind numbing. I was stayingwith this cool lady, Susie (who I should have stayed in touch with, but haven’t) and everytime George Bush opened his mouth during the debate, she shouted “Asshole!” at the television.
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