music: Lee Perry- Arkology d.1
It was determined earlier today that George W. Bush will be our president for another four years. I’m profoundly disturbed by this. I don’t really talk about formal politics too often because I find the whole enterprise pretty repulsive but this is worth a quick, sharp rant.
I voted for Kerry yesterday because I don’t like Kerry less than Bush. I think that generally speaking politicians at the CNN-coverage level are exactly the wrong people to have in leadership positions precisely because they all had the audacity to run for their respective offices. (sort of like everyone who has a degree from Harvard had the audacity to apply to Harvard…) I find Bush’s opinions and platforms especially deplorable in this light; in many ways he is the posterchild for a false sense of self-entitlement. Texas boy grows up filthy rich, blows off classes at Yale and Harvard and inherits the family business, then through deals with Big Business slowly ensures himself and his inner circle of more riches, security, and most of all social capital. What I am worried about most is that with someone like Bush at the helm people begin to believe in an elite aristocracy more deserving and entitled than everyone else, that Might actually does make Right, that the ends always justify the means. I am worried that the haves will further distance and exploit the have-nots, that taxes will actually get cut and we will actually get what we (don’t) pay for. I am worried that it will be acceptable to integrate religion into government. I am worried that people will be sent off with gun in hand to fight and die because the brave leaders of this country have us still convinced that we have to swing at shadows to feel avenged for a terrible hate crime that happened almost three years ago. This Bush fellow is emblematic of everything that will end up working against humanity in the long run. I suppose, though, that if it all bends but does not break in the next four years then Bush will step down self-assured and justified in all his decisions and leave the mess for someone else to clean up.
That’s not what worries me the most. The big problem is that after yesterday, the precautions set in place to balance power and protect all interests was grossly upset. The Senate and the House of Representatives now leans significantly towards Bush’s camp. The projections are that at least three Supreme Court slots will be filled during this term. Those whose political leanings favor self-gain have a lock on Washington for the short future. I only hope this country can endure the imminent attacks on the equitable distribution of resources and more accepting and tolerant ideologies. Those of us who still are believers in liberty and justice for all have a tremendous challenge ahead of us.
I was thinking today that all great nations have at some point folded. Greece, Rome, Persia, Egypt, China only lasted so long. We would like to believe that we are more enlightened beings now, that we have something on the Greeks, Romans, or Egyptians, but I think that the opposite is true. After all we’ve done in the past 150 years to this world, this great nation is living on borrowed time. Never mind the debt we are incurring to Mother Nature, never mind the millions and millions we are alienating with our military presence, never mind the unsustainable practices and lifestyles our government has perpetuated and embodied. We are setting ourselves up to be ripped open from the inside. It was not so subtle a point that the election maps looked suspiciously like maps from 140 years earlier: Blue v. Gray, 1864. The only difference now is that this time around, the Good Ol’ Boys of the Confederacy have poked into Ohio.
Four more years. We’ll continue to fight like only underdogs can.
Posted by davidtaus at November 3, 2004 10:47 PM