Brooks Marries a Bigot

David Brooks has been wrong about everything. It never stops him. Now he has swooned into the arms of Anne Snyder, a religious bigot, his former research assistant and apparent mentor in a conversion to another brand of unintegrated thinking and confusion.

Brooks is written about in a recent New Yorker. Snyder steps in to correct David’s misconceptions about grace, dragging up the Catholic straw-man beloved and imagined into existence by Calvinists, that you can earn your way into heaven with good works.

Catholics never believed this.

Catholics believe in an interplay of discipline and the “spirit” and that someone can never assume they are saved—hence the need for discipline. Calvinists experience salvation like an electrical arc or bolt from God, breaching the chasm between the spirit and "the flesh." They are forever changed and saved in persevering perpetuity. They can’t be unsaved.

All of that, from a visit to a revival. Jimmy Swaggart is there. Franklin Graham will help. Hell, the NRA will help. A chasm it is. Catholics believe creation is good. Calvinists believe it is shit. Catholics believe in free will. Calvinists believe in fate and predestination.

Catholics believe in love. Calvinists believe in hate.

Catholics believe in community and commonality, Calvinists in superiority. That was surely the lure for Brooks. He had suspicions and inklings of superiority. Remember, it was Calvinists who said the Bible supported slavery—predestination applied to matters of race.

Republicanism is Calvinism applied to politics—superiority and exclusion.

Right wing superiority has its new apotheosis in Donald Trump, the choice of evangelicals everywhere. Brooks is keeping characteristically good company. Let him try to deny it. And, he is still getting paid to write dross and drivel. Now he knows he is saved.

Supremacy or superiority, it’s all the same thing. Welcome to the New Jerusalem—white dominance, Calvinist utopia and Trump’s (same thing) reign of hate. Brooks had suspected he was superior. Now he knows. He was chosen. By Anne, and himself, at least. They can bask happily together in the certainty of salvation, superiority or whatever:

https://www.wonkette.com/is-david-brooks-being-compelled-to-christ-by-new-wifes-vagina-we-are-just-asking-questions

Another Red Herring

Trump is fighting to keep his taxes and financial records private. He is fighting for fun, and to keep Democrats tied up in a battle that can only have an anticlimax now. We already know he’s a crook. Democrats, don’t take the bait.

Generation W(orthless)

What do you do when you’re given everything and it isn’t enough? You elect Donald Trump.

The Baby Boomers, the generation that inherited it all, could never measure up to their parents. Inside there was a vacuum. They thought the world was made for them and lived only for themselves. They could only prove themselves through destruction, by wrecking what their parents had made.

To be on the safe side, and because they can, they will destroy all of civilization. They are that mindless. They are such pigs. They are that greedy and self-centered. The world must die with them, used up and discarded, to show their significance. Look at Trump. It is all embodied in him.

Forbidden Planet

Erect the force field. The alarm has sounded. Donald Trump’s hideous id is at the perimeter, a monster imagined into existence.

Not that it isn’t real. It is more real than any necessary threat. It is more real because it’s the externalization of our fears.

We destroy ourselves by fighting it. Necessary threats might be resisted. This one must be dealt with otherwise because it’s inside of us.

It isn’t just Trump. It’s the American id. That’s how he got elected:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYFr3UyVpRA&feature=share

The Asshole Continuum

The age of assholes is upon us in America. Assholes are running everything. They have their asshole king—their great belittler. America is now the land of cheapshots, gratuitous insults, kicking people when they're down, bullying, baiting and other forms of assault and abuse.

I never dreamed there were so many assholes among us. Congenital assholes, I still think, are rare. But people are weak. Fox News and the Republicans are asshole creating machines, relying on lies and fear to turn average people into frightened, aggressive automatons.

What We Can Infer

The Republican takeover, heist and destruction of our democracy is instructive if painful. The longer lessons might take the perspective of history to sort out but, shorter run, we can see how the scumbags did it. Earlier perpetrators are retroactively exposed by the extremity of the current gang of crooks, cowards and traitors.

In Trump and his supporters we can see where it was always heading. All their reassurances have proved false. They are not patriots. They are not fiscally responsible. They are not preservers of traditions and values. They are not democrats, republicans or loyal citizens. They are worthless, self-serving, treasonous scum.

LGBT#@$%&*!

I support the rights of everyone. But I am sick to death of having the issues of small groups and protected classes of supposedly aggrieved and persecuted citizens thrust in my face while the entire world is coming to an end under the evil rule of Republicans.

This navel-gazing bullshit on the left is ruining our hopes of electoral success.

Crack Fiends Run Amok

Investors are playing chicken again. Republicans put gas to the economy no matter what the circumstances. There will be winners (mostly) and losers even among the financial elites. It’s all a game.

They live to play again. That lesson was learned in the last economic collapse, caused by them. The destruction is all passed downward, to innocent civilians. Our capitalists are now crack whores.

Donald’s Big Adventure

Little Donnie Trump’s daddy told him he was a winner—that he was meant to be a king. But Donnie’s daddy had so much money little Donnie could never prove himself to himself.

He started out on top, with lots of room to fall and not much to rise. Donnie set out to make a splash. He would surround himself with people who would tell him how great he was.

And Donnie would do it in Manhattan, drawing attention as his father never had. But the people there saw through him. They saw he was a fraud. They didn’t admire him.

Not the people from whom he really wanted admiration, anyway. So Donnie struggled. Finally, and almost accidentally, he landed the presidency. But Donnie was a congenital fuckup.

Remarkably, for this job, he didn’t owe anybody much. He could have accomplished some interesting things if he had the sense but he was too stupid to see, let alone seize, his chance.

At last he could have been a hero and he blew it, only showing what a clown he was in front of the whole world. That is the end of a story not yet ended but with a determined outcome.

FAILURE.

He is too stupid to see it, maybe luckily for him. He only perceives it dimly. He thrashes around and lashes out. It is not so lucky for us. He embodies our worst faults and weaknesses.

Donnie’s daddy set him up. He assumed something Donnie could never achieve, a sense of self worth. That comes from real accomplishment. Everything was handed to Donnie Trump.

It is emblematic. A failing president for a failing society. Both were given too much.

The Ease of Destruction

Here are two things to understand:

Firstly, Republicans have been unbelievably victorious for the past forty years. Ignore the occasional victories of the Democrats. Look at trends. The entire field of play has moved so far rightward it is unrecognizable. The values of Democrats are repudiated preemptively. Traditional American values and ethics are mired in confusion. Rational government isn’t possible. Radical, destructive, racist, reactionary values rule.

Secondly, this “accomplishment” was made easy by Republican treachery, like flying a plane into a building, not that I wouldn’t credit them with cunning. Winning is easy for cheaters. Winning is easy when someone doesn’t care about consequences. Winning is easy when one's “opponents” are blackmailed and bullied into submission. Think of how an alcoholic or mentally ill parent can dominate a family. Only one defense is usually possible, to leave.

But this is a national version of a family and therefore even more complicated. There are MANY innocent people to protect.

We are stuck with these deranged, delusional Republicans. They would rather destroy everything than lose, by compulsion. These are our choices—adopt their tactics, risking catastrophe and abandoning the hope of a return to normalcy, or sit back and wait, praying they end up in the ditch and are forced into their own reckoning before they destroy all of us, leaving the country a shell and husk of itself, incapable of redemption.

Republicans are political paramilitaries, assassins, rogues, guerrillas and terrorists. They will be incredibly hard to stop.

Irreversible Damage

Destruction is policy. Republicans want our country so ruined it can’t be reconstructed. They want average Americans so powerless and disenfranchised they can’t reclaim their dreams. This is the Republican New World Order.

Now We Know

Now we know. Wealthy Republicans will support ANYONE who will implement their failed policy prescriptions, no matter how horrible the person is. Those policies are...

a) Cut taxes on the rich (because it’s THEM)
b) Increase defense spending (bankrupting the government, with the above)
c) Attack social services (justified by bankrupting the government)
d) Deregulate everything (so they can plunder even more)

Trump is as sane as Charles Manson. Charlie had a knack for turning people into drones and puppets, using racial hatred as bait. Similarly, Donald gets others to do his dirty work. And, if you think he cares if people suffer and die because of him you aren’t facing reality.

Republican money is POURING in to re-elect Trump. The “American Dream” is dead. Rich Republicans killed it. They don’t care about anybody but themselves:

https://www.politico.com/story/2019/04/22/trump-campaign-donors-1283459?cid=apn

Move to Trash

Trump is spam. Move him into the Trash.

He is Risen

Baptists favor Easter over Christmas. Baptists emphasize redemption. God’s primary message to them is not about love and the goodness of creation but about sin and despair.

Their God fancies fatalism and human depravity. People are hopeless. Baptists toddle off this morning to worship their horned god. They were entrapped with promises of power.

Baptists have their power now. They hold sway. Creation is deemed garbage. They divert it to destruction, enthralled by their chosen slate of sins. Souls were sold. Satan is risen.

The real Savior is still hanging from His cross, the offer of redemption shit upon by Trump. They are not their brother’s keepers. Fuck everyone else. Deport. Torture. Hate. 

Despise and humiliate your brothers. Baptists want the apocalypse. The Trump apocalypse is here. Baptists long for escape from the misery of creation. I long for escape now too.

I long for escape from them. Trump is their Baptist savior, assumed by them to herald the end. About that we agree. But it’s not the glorious thing they suppose, just annihilation.

My Orderly Retreat

I look out at the world around me dumbfounded. None of it makes any sense. Maybe it makes sense if you have so many millions of dollars you think you’re only looking DOWN—a perspective of removal and insulation. From the perspective of any level of involvement in the actual mechanics of living—fulfilling basic needs and maintaining an awareness of the everyday economies, material and spiritual—all is madness.

Extrapolate over time and it’s even worse. Where we are is bad enough. Where we’re heading is terrible. Rich people don’t want to be told what to do. They don’t like paying taxes, being in any way constrained or acknowledging that they aren’t yet more deserving than they currently feel. They want what they want and have the power to get it—at our expense, if necessary—through the treachery of Republicans.

I don’t want to play anymore. I think I will retreat as much as possible, making my immediate circumstances as sane and humane as I can.

The Mueller Report, Condensed and Interpreted

Donald Trump is an unimaginable piece of shit. He isn't even trying to do his job. Hounds from hell surround him and will do anything he expects or demands. 

He thinks he is above the law. In fact, he has such a hangup with authority he will refuse to do what is required of him just to make a point, trying to prove what a big man he is. He is too stupid to be effective at anything, doesn't know what the law is and isn't even interested, though he is sworn to enforce it.

Unfortunately, that vacuum has been filled with flaks and hacks, the most corrupt and evil of which are the only ones left. The most powerful offices in the world are in the hands of the worst possible people. Sarah Sanders is a lying sow. All information coming out of Trump’s administration is to be presumed untrue. 

As an agent of destruction Trump is perfect. What he can't accomplish by direct intent he will accomplish by ignorance, neglect and ill will.

Honoring Trump at Easter

I'm trying to think of a way of bringing Trumpism to Southern Baptist services this Easter. Baptists love Trump. All I can come up with is having chants in church instead of hymns.

"Loser, Loser, Loser, Loser!" What kind of nobody and moron, after all, with unlimited power at His disposal, chooses death and humiliation for the uncertain benefit of others? 

That is not the way of Trump, that's for sure.  

My Fellow Americans:

I want you to consider, this Easter season, which is the greater apostasy among Christian conservatives, their betrayal of Christ or of their country. I believe it is their betrayal of Christ.

Sarah Sanders, to pick a randomly depraved example, says her faith comes first. And, if she or some other purported Christian were to return to true faith, responsible citizenship would probably follow.

Not so, the other way around. Let's say Jeff Sessions or another sick, freedom-hating misfit stopped betraying his country. He could easily continue on as a repugnant racist scourge on humanity.

Jesus Fell a Third Time...

and Trump laughed and called him a loser.

Manufacturing Content

This is not your daddy's spin. The conservative alchemical end-point, turning gold into shit, is being realized. They are no longer playing off-of reality they are manufacturing it. Reality is conforming itself to the spin through self-fulfilling mechanisms.

Black and brown people are substandard participants. They are undeserving, in conservative eyes, so conservatives create cultures of deprivation among them. Voilà. Black and brown people reinforce the prejudices, underperforming because of their circumstances.

Everything is tracking this way. The world's entire connection with reality is breaking down.

Awaken ye Puritans and Get Lost

Democrats, we can't go there. The puritanism of the Republicans is bad enough. Let them have their City on a Hill. It's a graveyard of dreams--the impossibility of human perfection.

Better yet, point out how they have created its inverse, a hellhole bereft of compassion. A "woke" version of that gets us nowhere. Strive not for perfection. There is nothing there.

Hence, "Utopia" arises, the unrealizable form of perfection.

Notre Dame: the Trump Fart Connection

Clearly, the Notre Dame fire is a message from God. Sixty percent of white Catholics voted for Trump. He then typically demanded they inhale his farts by appointing CALLISTA GINGRICH ambassadress to the Vatican. I hope she is not wearing leggings.

Newt--a reprehensible, arrogant, vile piece of shit even by Republican standards--is now waddling around Rome feasting his ass off on our dime. Well, he was going to be feasting his ass off somewhere or other. Callista's only qualification was adultery. 

Welcome again to Trumpland--and another shitshow fueled by emissions from the gurgling anus of Herr Donald. Let us pray no one gives him an excuse to start a war. We're still trying to escape that last one, begun by another incompetent Republican lad. 

Avoid the deadly vapors. Keep your head down and hope to survive the reign of Trump.

One-Trick Pony and the Party of Fixations

Donald’s trick or shtick is his own unrelenting egotism and aggression. That fits with the hollow shell of Republicanism he inhabits. Deregulate and reduce taxes on the rich--Republicans insist these are the cures for everything, whatever the reality. 

Fixations reflect compulsion, aggression and fear. Rational policy and adaptation are out. There is no long term. They are survivalists fighting an imaginary emergency. Fear sucks the life out of everything. Get stoked on fear and stock up at Fox, the fear channel. 

See policies arise on-air before adoption. Fox feeds ideas to Trump, their brainless drone-of-doom and surrogate. We witness the snowballing of fear, tracked by the degree of lunacy and desperation. Fear the fear. Didn't someone say something like that once? 

We should have listened.

Rand is Trump

On inspection, we realize that the spirit of Ayn Rand has entered the body of Donald Trump, or that they are the same person or emanations of the same spirit. Rand was a loathsome entity, and pathetic and ignorant, but infused with spirits of intolerance, superiority, ambition and contempt.

She was as denigrating of others as she was deserving of denigration, a miserable failure in her own life, demanding fealty in place of friendship and submission in place of love and companionship. We observe these traits in Trump, an equally loathsome person and a menace to society.

He, however, is in a position to do immense harm.

With Rand only those already sick and degraded were called to a life at her altar of meaningless, self-defeating egotism. Trump is in a position to enforce his horrible, vile and cruel opinions on millions of innocent people. He is a black hole of humanity. Everything within his orbit dies.

Citizen Cain

Citizen Cain's offerings were never pleasing to God because his heart was impure. His heart lacked humility. He was full of hubris, constructing towers to the heavens, his Xanadu. His name was plastered everywhere in large gold letters, idolatry for the world to see. If God could not love him, or so he was convinced, he would rival God. 

Citizen Cain would show God. 

He would play God on earth. He would demand fealty. He would demand offerings and oaths of allegiance. He would demand NDAs. He would persecute his brothers, jealous of God's love for them, not understanding that God's love is available to everyone. But Citizen Cain spurned God. His Xanadu grew, a blackened "white" house of vanity. 

A palace of degradation and depravity. He thought he rivaled God now. Talk about a lack of perspective. He thought he was above the law--that he was the law--but he was nothing. His continuing striving only proved it. Abels abound, awaiting slaughter. Innocence must be destroyed. He belittles everyone he can in an insatiable and futile quest for power. 

He can never rival God. Oh, but the damage he can do while trying. We thought we had escaped the ancient stories. But the stories of human folly, glory-seeking and grandiosity are still with us. Humanity has never changed. The old weaknesses are worse now because we have spurned God. Say your prayers, my friends. Accountability awaits. 

Our Satanic Government

Not to be inflammatory, but I think it’s fair to say that the American Government is Satanic. Welcome to Hell, where everything is its inverse and cruelty is the rule.

https://indyweek.com/news/right-wing-worship-ayn-rand/

Antichrist Donald

Which is more horrifying? To think that Donald Trump is the Antichrist or to think how many Americans would welcome it if they thought that he were? Sarah Sanders, our daughter of chaos, would be thrilled to be a handmaiden to an agent of the end times. Wish granted!

More Like the Borg

Republicans are turning into the Borg. Even stodgy, old-school William Barr's individualism has disappeared. Maybe it was gone already. He is a part of the Collective now. 

He has been assimilated. Trump is the Borg Queen but still only a manifestation of the will of the Collective. He is replaceable. Everyone is replaceable. Individuals mean nothing.

They are one mind under Trump. If Trump goes will they suddenly be saved? No, there are other hosts--other controlling entities. Their consciousness is functionally decentralized.

Fox News is an organizational manifestation, but core aspects of the operation of the Collective are spontaneously reallocated. Their consciousness thereby conserves itself.

Try to fight them and you will find out. The Collective must survive and they will die to save it. They will sacrifice themselves. There are no rules. Victory must be had at all costs.

We will all be assimilated. Look into their eyes. Look into the eyes of one like Hannity. There is nothing there. His soul has fled in horror. If they instill horror in you your soul is intact.

Protect it. Guard it. Shield it. Resist the fear as best you can. But don't be complacent. They are coming after all of us.

Dear Republicans:

You might not have noticed, preoccupied as you are with your stock portfolios and playing golf, but your piece-of-shit President is coming completely unglued. Please pull the plug on him before it is too late.

Sincerely,

James M. Flanagan

SPECTRE

Welcome to SPECTRE, the SPecial Executive for Counterintelligence, Terrorism, Revenge and Extortion. 

Comrade Blofeld has been replaced by Donald Trump. World domination is still the aim. Barring that, annihilation would be okay. This change might disappoint some, since Trump is so obviously stupid and therefore potentially less menacing, but his position as head of the executive branch of the United States Government makes up for his idiocy.

Sleep well, my friends.

Pence v. Buttigieg

Mike Pence doesn’t understand that licking Trump’s ass for a living changes everything. So what if he and Pete Buttigieg once had a good working relationship. Pete would have been doing his job. Who knows what Pence was doing. But we know what he’s doing now.

Pence is licking Trump’s ass for a living.

Dualism and Fear

People who believe the material world is garbage have no faith that things will take care of themselves. If creation is in some dim way a reflection of God you can have faith. Humanity will muddle through. Human life, however sloppy and disappointing, has that reflection of divinity within it.

Nature, and thereby God, asserts itself with its own inevitability and checks and balances. This is why people can be judged by their behaviors. They condemn themselves by and through false witness. Witnessing is fundamentally the act of seeing. Someone can't relate what they haven't seen. 

If the world is bereft of God seeing the truth becomes problematic, relying on irrational means and prone to superstition, idolatry, and psychosis, like an electrical arc or lightning strike resulting from a buildup of dissociated energy. I choose to believe the universe is an integrated, intelligible thing. 

I choose justice, intelligibility and life.

Leverage

I think American evangelical Christians are going to destroy the world. They will do it through leverage. Leverage is how a minority exerts oversize influence. 

They are a critical, relatively unified voting bloc in the most powerful country in the world. America assumes a certain level of rationality and responsibility. 

The country belongs to the citizens. Why would they trash it? Evangelicals FEEL disempowered, having lost the battle over segregation. It was their Versailles treaty.

The insult and injury had to be avenged. Watch the vengeance now, slowly but in real time, through their most recent agent, Donald Trump. There are there to destroy. 

Authoritarian Takeover

Pay attention, people. An authoritarian takeover is occurring in Washington. It might be reversible but don't count on it. Obama's presidency now appears to have been a respite in an authoritarian ascent. Republicans will not stand up for America. They will not respect the rule of law.

 

It's a huge power grab. Barr is a Trump toady. He will not respect Congress. He will act on political imperatives and protect the president. Mnuchin is a Trump toady. He defies the will of Congress. Republicans are asserting that they alone are the real Americans. This is a slow motion coup.

Our Country is Full of Shit

Just correcting an apparently typical typo or Twitter blunder by Trump here. The country is so obviously not full.

Misery Loves Trump

Even more startling than Donald Trump’s hideous existence is the support he receives. His reign only becomes more and more horrible, coming down now to himself and the two advisors most filled with hatred for Americans, Stephen Miller and Mick Mulvaney. 

"Professional racist." So must read the resume of Miller. "Unrepentent asshole" describes Mulvaney. Why do poorer people support this? We know why the rich guys do. Trump's poorer supporters must be miserable themselves. Misery loves company. Misery loves Trump. 

Only the Atrocious

Trump’s administration is refining itself through the distillation of evil. Mick Mulvaney and Stephen Miller are rising to the top, the elements most determined to rain destruction on their fellow citizens. These warped personalities crave vengeance. Persecution and intimidation are the rule.

Barr Hacks Away at His New Job

William Barr immediately shit all over his new job, degrading himself for Trump. Trump encourages this behavior. Remember, however, this is supposed to be America's highbrow political party—the lace-curtain crowd of money and manners who speak and dress better than the rest. They are assumed to be bred and schooled better as well.

What happened? An invasion of body snatchers? Yes, kind of.

All they wanted was to win. They really thought they were more suited to rule but they represented a wealthier minority and corporate interests, a recipe for political frustration and inconsequence. Opportunity knocked, however. George Wallace was as a racist lunatic and the Deep South slavishly lined up to vote for their favorite (bigot) son.

Eureka! All Republicans had to do was lay it on with the racist innuendo. The South became solidly Republican. Surely those people knew how inferior they were and would never dream of spoiling those wonderful, rich Yankee cocktail parties with their presence, let alone deeming to dictate policy, not when there were dog fights to attend. 

Oh, but they did want something.

They wanted social insanity in return for their votes. Republicans were in too deep by the time this became clear. They would have to own years of their corruption, deception and incompetence, thereby going horrifically backwards politically and descending into disgrace. They sucked it up, held their noses and entered the sty. Oh, the stench.

Now they don't even smell it anymore. The corruption is unprecedented in America. The party of dignity, restraint and tradition is wallowing in shit. They are so accustomed to shit-wallowing they rebrand it as something else. Yes, the cocktail parties still go on in some circles but it's a travesty now. Barr somehow rationalizes sucking up to Trump.

Or, maybe he is in denial but they all do it, from the Ivy Leaguers on down. 

The Self-Refutation of Republicanism

How much failure do they get? Republicans are in total flight from reality now. Why? The complete collapse of all of their policies. Our "conservatives" are so ideologically bankrupt and morally bereft all they can do is hide behind lies.

They lie and lie and lie. That brings us to issues of character, ethics and loyalty. Republicans first retreated into PARTY loyalty, betraying their country. Now they collapse into PERSONAL loyalty--survival-mode--betraying their humanity.

Republicans are running for the exits, leaving us behind in the disaster they created.

High Dudgeon Redundancy

Trump really tests the limits of one's vocabulary, expression and comprehension. He is so abnormally abnormal and so insistent about it. He has gotten me past any problems I had with repetition. I now support repetition and redundancy. How many ways can you say "piece of shit" in English? Should we resort to Latin, making it sound more diagnostic? 

There is no "piece of shit" diagnosis in the mental health manuals. 

Anyway, fragmen stercore is "piece of shit" in Latin. NOW I wonder how to say “raging piece of shit” in Latin. Do you see what I mean? This doesn't get us anywhere. I'll stick with "piece of shit” and say it over and over again. One shouldn’t be pressed to be inventive, in these difficult times, when speaking the truth because the truth is in retreat.

And, indignation. I feel indignation all the time. Should I call it high dudgeon? No. Stick with the primal sense of outrage over Trump and describe it in simple terms. Over and over and over again. Though, “worthless flotsam from the shipwreck of Republicanism” comes to mind as a “piece of shit" alternative. Yes, this is hard to articulate and capture.

Repetition and redundancy are tools of intensification. 

Intensification is our friend, though no amount of it can capture the worthlessness and depravity of Trump and his followers. It's impossible. We must face it though we can't express it. Most importantly, we must take him down.

Blame America First

My rule for understanding the machinations of Republicans is to start out assuming EVERYTHING they say is a lie. Try it. You will achieve greater understanding. 

Similarly, try blaming America first. The correlation is not as strong but it's necessary to counteract normal human vanity and ignorance. The truth will set you free:

http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2018/06/we-owe-central-american-migrants-much-more-than-this.html

SOCS

Sons of Confederate Scum is a paramilitary wing of their movement and terrorist [501(c)(3)] organization. They are fighting for statues instead of statutes and symbols instead of laws and judicial appointments. Characteristically, they are too stupid to realize they have been completely victorious in Washington. There the Confederacy rules, together with their propertied, privileged, unprincipled corporatist allies. 

This is the problem with cannon fodder. 

They can't know they are suckers but imbeciles are incredibly useful when physical intimidation and violence are needed, no matter that these are illegal. That never stops them. The troglodytes must remain enthralled. They ARE submissively mesmerized by Trump, just as they were pathetically, irrationally reactive under Obama, running around like retards. People THAT delusional are hard to control. 

Handlers fear this, that their dogs of war will get impatient for some slaughter. Occasionally, even the trainers are known to get attacked but it's more likely the pack will assault the innocent victims with which they are baited, Democrats, causing a constitutional reckoning or social crisis. Then the country might react and return to democracy, majority rule and equal protection, rejecting the racist precepts of the Confederacy. 

Or, we might fall apart completely. Americans don't seem to think this is possible, making us vulnerable. We assume too much.

The Shitshow Redemption

How in the world are honest people supposed to maintain normal, hopeful lives in the Republican prison, plantation and sanitarium of corruption the United States has become? Only crooks are fully enfranchised. Only people without a conscience feel free. The rest are saddled with guilt and despair.

Every form of corruption thrives within the Republican corporatocracy--graft, bribery, murder, blackmail, usury, fraud, tax evasion, money laundering, stock manipulation, embezzlement, intimidation... you name it. We are imprisoned and implicated no matter what we do. Escape is impossible. 

Someone can only aspire to carve out an island or subculture of decency but Republicans are constantly scouring the land to stamp out accountability. Their criminality must continue unchecked. The longer it goes on the more fearful they are. Every tool in the criminal arsenal is employed.

Mexico might be a place to go. There they have honest corruption. Everybody knows it is corrupt. There is no pretense or denial. And everyone knows that most of it originates with America's demand for drugs and insistence on a weak government that keeps poor people down and disempowered.

America is a thug country if not a country of thugs. The guards and wardens are worse than the prisoners. WE are the prisoners. The country is a criminal operation and we're just along for the ride. America invaded Iraq, based on lies. The economy got destroyed, based on lies. Trump got elected, based on lies.

Republicans get consistently richer and increase their control. THAT is the underlying reality. America's story or myth might have once made some sense. Now it is all a mass of Republican lies. America is dead. Long live America! The ideals are still alive but entirely subverted by Republican lies.