Protection Racket

Trump is such an infant. Totally primal. He lives from one minute to the next. Does he feel fed and full? Is he comfy? An infant in a grown-up world, however. 

So his wants are a little different. He must be at the center. Constantly reassured. What's more reassuring than being surrounded by people who will die for you. 

Don't underestimate the power of the Secret Service detail and the perks of the presidency. That he wants to stay out of jail is a thing but abstract for Trump. 

Everything he does is much more primal. If he was capable of planning he wouldn't be so under threat in the first place. He simply needs to feel at the center. 

And that someone around him will die for him. That those around him are consumed with him. Which he didn't get from mommy. Bush wasn't much better. 

He had the 'nobody home' look in the eyes. Like his mother drink when pregnant. These are the leaders Republicans offer up now. As a show of contempt.

Because it's all they have to offer. 

The Joy of Flaming Wreckage and the Appeal of Trumpism

Trumpism goes back to the sacrificial instinct. Virgins and Volcanos. We must appease the gods or they'll smite us. And we have a toasted virgin deficit. 

We haven't kept up. So those that subscribe to this thinking like Steve Bannon and other catastrophists love the idea of an age of transformative carnage.

Wouldn't that be cool. Mass killings or die-offs or what have you and by any means. Flood. Famine. Fire. Mutant rodents. Nuclear holocaust. It's all good.

Musk is Out of His Mind

Musk and Thiel and many similar tech high achievers are on the spectrum or have a talent/problem with abstract brain function. Which correlates with Empathy Deficit Disorder. Which I just made up but it's real anyway. These are the last people in the world you want running a society. 

Free the Radicals

Democrats are accused of being radicals and commies and socialists and traitors and baby killers and satanists and every other thing in the book when they have more in common with Reagan than today's Republicans. Not that Reagan wasn't a piece of garbage. 

A stand-in and puppet for the forces of corporate greed and for the vanity of the rich and the desire to have an easy life and be thought better than everyone else. There has never been a viable far left in America. Barely a left at all. Because we're all leftists already. 

It's our political inheritance. 

Our constitution is a leftist manifesto. So we're all conservatives. Called on to preserve the revolutionary founders' call to democracy, decency, and a government of compromise, conciliation and inclusion. Of fair play and opportunity. The founders were radicals. 

The founders were revolutionaries. We're asked again to find our inner radical. To stand against tyranny and authoritarianism. Who's being taxed and exploited to pay for the follies of a rich, increasingly idle inheritor or monopolist class? Average citizens.

It's time to revolt. America's conservatives aren't conservative. That's a lie. A talking point. Bullshit. Propaganda. They're aspiring tyrants. They must be stopped. Free the radicals! We must free the radicals within us to save our system from destruction. 

It Must Not Mean Anything

Avowed Nazis are turning out and turning up for Trump. Finally, a candidate who represents THEM. A political soul-mate for racists and authoritarians. A Mussolini for America. A Franco for the fatherland. But it must not mean anything. 

Not really mean anything. We're not Nazis. We could never be Nazis. Like in evangelical religion, behaviors don't matter. Salvation status matters. It's all that matters. And good works won't get you there. Only saying the magic words,

'I accept Jesus as my ....' 

Alakazam, you're saved! And saints persevere so it doesn't matter what the fuck you do after that. God forgives all. You're home free. Saved and shit. And home is heaven. 

You're impatient to get there. Because life is shit. In comparison with perfection. Creation is full of imperfection. God's creation. Which is a conundrum. So we won't go there. One tribal cult, one identity movement, is as good as another.

And they all support Trump. He's obviously saved and chosen and was destined because, well, just look at him. He's rich and he never did a decent thing in his life. So it has to be God. God put him there. Not the idolatry and heresy of good works. 

Welcome to the island of lost souls. 

Rednecks versus Decency, Life, Progress, Prosperity and Joy

Rednecks hate life. So it's an enormous annoyance to them if other people find it pleasurable and meaningful. They try to stamp that shit out, including all justice, mercy and decency. Because their perfect god is an asshole that created the world as a hunk of decaying garbage, temptation and sin for some inscrutable reason. Some people are saved, by the way, and others doomed to hell in the only outcome that matters and nothing they do can change it. Life is torture and God made it that way so it should be shit. Everything good is an insult to their god. Hence Trump. They want to destroy everything. And they hired Trump for the job, because he's well qualified. Do you see they sense of it now? 

Trump Praises Arnie's Arsenal

After wowing Catholics at the Al Smith Dinner in New York City with his character, morality and decency Donald Trump carried on to Pennsylvania where he courted locals by praising native son Arnold Palmer's endowment. Evidently he had a big one.

Trailer Mix

Another Trump administration, with Vance in tow, would mean the values of the trailer park element of white southerners in charge. That's Trump's base and most essential voting bloc. The rest of us will be thrust into an especially hideous episode of Jerry Springer. With nukes. Jerry Springer with nukes. Thanks, Republicans, you pieces of shit. 

Give Me that Old Time Religion

or I'll shove it down your throat. 

Evangelicals are such hypocrites. They insist on a highly individual path to Christ. How is that compatible with shoving your beliefs down other people's throats? And they insist that salvation is entirely individual -- that no group membership or identification or sacramental hocus pocus or raft of good works will get you there, but they're obsessed with the morality of others and the society as a whole. What are they afraid of? Their own corruptibility. Their own weakness. Their own unacknowledged sinfulness and perversion.

One Nation Under Trump

Say what you will, about what Trump represents. We're all living in it now. The shithole is here. 

Start the Steal

Republicans fired up their steal machine, determined to win no matter what. It's no Brooks Brothers Riot, though that crowd will be there. This is a redneck feud. Nothing is off limits. Certainly not your family. Certainly not your job or anything else. They think God is on their side. And theirs is a vengeful God. 

Trump's Time on the Cross

This isn't a presidential election. It's a lottery or auction. Competing marketing blitzes. Content doesn't matter. But that's been going on for a while. 

The newer aspect is monopolization. Monopolization means you're printing money. The monopolization of politics means you're printing votes. 

Heads they win, tails we lose. Monopolies are substates. Once these accepted the system that created and sustained them. More or less. 

Now, not so much.

They seek a takeover. Highly leveraged. This is with our money. A corporate coup, disenfranchising us and financed by us. Pure perversion. 

And led by an aged, demented, incompetent, viciously single-minded and self-serving nepo baby who's portrayed as the biggest victim ever. 

Their savior has been nailed to the cross. The resurrection is planned. We have a Passover Plot. But nobody is going to thrust a spear into Trump. 

This thing might work. No matter, anyway. They've found an heir. Better because he's worse than Trump. Vance. More destuctive potential. 

Which is all they care about. All they're good at. The annihilation of the government so corporations can loot and plunder indiscriminately. 

And we are like cattle or crops. To be used and harvested or slaughtered, as our lords would have it. No rights. No recourse. No justice.

Magical Misery Tour

What sick religions do is strip all the meaning out of life and then ration back to you just enough to make it livable. Barely bearable. Because they're about control. And against freedom, individual attainment of salvation, and any form of conscience. 

Life is a miracle. Rightly perceived it's magical and a source of wonder. The only magic conservatives have to offer is turning everything to shit. 

Rescue Me

I'm besieged by rednecks. The whole country is besieged by rednecks. Parts of the world are besieged by rednecks, to the extent they're entangled with America.

Rednecks are stupid, predatory, proud, backward and belligerent. They're unfit for self governance. They need masters to keep them in check. Ideally, multiple masters.

Give them freedom and they'll throw it out and opt for servitude. Serfdom. They turned Christianity into a fatalistic identity cult, in which they aren't free at all. 

Their soul's destiny was set at birth. Once their own serfdom is achieved they demand everyone else serve their same sick lords as a show of submission and fervor.

JD Vance was already rich. But he had to have a master. Sorry, masters. So he has Thiel, Trump, and a perverted, authoritarian, fascist form of Catholicism. 

And he's after all of us. We must all be brought to heel. Adhere to his precepts. Worship his gods. Kowtow to his kings, Trump and the lords of capitalism. Conform and obey. 

Or they will crush you. While being servile. My God these are sick people. Give them something good and they'll trash it. Friendships are supplanted by feuds. 

The way of the redneck is destruction. No wonder they love Trump. 

His Cheating Heart

Wow, Trump doesn't know how not to cheat. Just like, having a choice between making money while destroying someone and making money while not, he would take destroying someone. I don't think he enjoys it in the normal sense, because he's not normal, and there's nothing normal about enjoying destroying someone in any circumstances. 

But it makes his fragile ego feel a little more secure, I guess. I don't know. And, in his world and that of increasing numbers of Republicans the feeling of exercising power is a reward, no matter the consequences. We're all inconsequential in this. They're asserting their right to do wantever they want with impunity no matter how it harms anyone else.

Deprogram or Deport

The germ of truth in Trump's mania for deportation is that somebody deserves it. Trump voters. MAGA maniacs. If they can be deprogrammed and reeducated to be responsible citizens in a democracy -- to stop destroying it -- we'll let them stay. If not they're gone. 

Mark All as Red

Who are the commies here? The people supporting Putin, to begin with. The commies as we've known them have turned out to be fascists. And Republicans have turned out to be fascists. 

Power lust is the commonality. Consolidation of power into the hands of a few. Or of one. A belief in the inevitability and transcendence of the class war is at the essential core of communism. 

And the belief that class warfare results in unsustainable concentrations of capital. Republicans believe in class warfare so they're trying to win. They've achieved the consolidation of capital. 

To a ridiculous degree. They're the commies. Everything else is secondary. Coming up with a system that prevents class warfare from occurring and getting lots of people killed is the point.

What that system is, and how extreme, is not essential. It's up for discussion. Up for testing, perhaps. Trial and error. But Republicans want the class war. And we've got it. And they're winning. 

Because the other side isn't even fighting back. Many on the side of those being abused are implicated and working against their own interests, as dupes or paid stooges. But that might change. 

The Friends of Destruction

I have made it my goal to try to get through to innocent Democrats how inconceivably fucked up southern white people are and especially white evangelical Christians. Hurricane Helene is instructive. They love this stuff. Tragedy, disaster, the hand of God at work. Suffering. Man, they love suffering. And they don't mind much if it's their own. 

Whatever happens it's God's will by definition. Or it wouldn't have happened. So there. This is fatalism and it's tautological as hell. A world without meaning. Shit just happens. And then you die. Since salvation is predordained your behaviors don't matter. Though there are signs. If you know how to see them. Wealth is a sign of God's favor. 

And it's better if you're an asshole. That means you haven't engaged in good works like the doomed Catholics who are all going to hell even if they're on the Supreme Court and voted for great sadistic shit. War makes for strange alliances. And evangelicals are at war, With the world. Because creation is shit and nothing but temptation. 

It was some cruel, incomprehensible joke on the part of God to trap our wonderful, pure souls in this world. The pre-born are actually better. Being born is a big step down. The further you get from independent life with it's nagging responsibilities and sinfulness the better. Death is purity. So evangelicals want to destroy the world.

 

And that will be God's will and intention as well. 

Enhanced Injustice

Evangelicals love injustice. They find natural disasters reassuring. They're actually excellent at helping out  when shit goes south. However, they consider injustice the model for the things we can control as well because it appears to them to be God's way. Their God is a dick.

So they want life to be arbitrary and mean and unpleasant. That's there social model. And it's how you get to Trump, the guy who fucks up everything he touches beyond belief. 

Stranger in a Strange Land

That's called being an American, lately. We're either never who we thought we were or we've been invaded and conquered. Some of the former, maybe, but mostly the latter. The Confederacy has won the Civil War, in the end. American apartheid never left, but the government's back in support of it. A racist dystopia is the choice that's been made. 

Informed and Empowered

American southern systemic racists informed Hitler's racism. America's laissez-faire capitalists caused the Great Depression which put Hitler in power. And that exact coalition has taken over America. 

The Billionaire Boys Club

What are we to make of these men? They aren't normal men by any means. Normal men aren't billionaires. Lord Musk, we should call him. Perhaps, Lord Musk of X. He would like that. 

All of them, we should call them lords. These rich fucks. To remind us they live in another world. That we have nothing in common with them at all. And to show deference. Because they own us now. 

Are American Rednecks the Worst People in the History of the World?

I grew up in a place that had both rednecks and relatively poor, pissed-off black people. The black people we could understand. The rednecks were the worst. Every opportunity was open to them, in the most fortunate historical circumstances ever. And they choose shit. They always choose shit.

And now, through affiliation with the larger group of idiot-voting evangelical southern white people, the whole country has gone redneck. They were the lowest of the low and they've drug us all down. We're awash in guns and needless violence. Country is a feud and we're stirring up shit elsewhere. 

All because of the redneck code of ignorance, belligerence, servility and weirdly overweening pride. They'll never admit they've done anything wrong and they've done everything wrong. They think they're being attacked when nobody gives a shit about them but they're always on the attack. 

Tell me rednecks haven't won. Decency and fairness are done. Democracy -- once assumed to be a thing we all agreed on, no matter which side won -- is being openly attacked. Intimidation is in the air. Threatening entire families is normal if you disagree with them -- totalitarian stuff. Tyranny.

Despotism. Tyranny. Republicans are the American Nazi Party. And they're running everything. 

Nazi versus Normal

Not a hard choice, one would think ...

Cowboy Flunkies

Look at Republican ideals. Powerful, beneficent white men running things and stepping in with a heroic response when something goes wrong or the times demand it. Then look at the losers they have at the top. Mitch McConnell no Marlboro Man. None of them meet the standard, cowering under Trump. 

Indulgence and Discipline

Depending on where I was in some respect I don't understand I would either indulge myself when something went wrong or I would have some discipline. The first comforted me and the latter gave me a feeling of control. Maybe I'd do some of both and of course we all have that choice all the time even when things aren't going wrong.

But it's more obvious when they are. America always chooses indulgence. Maybe because we're rich. I think more because we're irresponsible. We're spoiled. And we've turned the country over to the frat boy crowd. Their response is to throw a party, get drunk and trash shit. We're living in Animal House. And, Bluto for President! 

Oil is our beer. Consuming something. Consuming anything. But 'Drill, Baby, Drill' is our response -- the frat boy, Republican response. It's a compulsion now, the only thing they know how to do. And they're running everything. 

Party Without Principles

Republicans have no vision or intelligible goals. They want to wreck stuff. But, meanwhile, they're happy to suck off of everyone else as its convenient. 

Powerballs

In the extreme the normal dualities the interplay of which create balance both diverge and meet up. It's a paradox. Men are completely without all of the traditionally feminine attributes. Women, similarly, discompnnect from their masculine aspects. So, in a way, they're polarized.

Unnaturally separated from one another. 

But together they inhabit the island of lost souls. And what they've lost is their humanity, in fantasies of dominance and submission. But it all looks exactly the same. Like in a cult. Leaders and followers with lost souls, indistinguishable in their inhumanity. And there's a death wish all around. 

In the absence of balance and humanity everything becomes about power. And it becomes a lottery. Arbitrary as hell. Who gets to have the balls, to be on top, while everything comes unglued. 

Arrest Donald Trump

I've decided it's time to arrest Trump. If they can do it to Diddy they can do it to Donald. Reviewing his history, there's so much criminality there the thing is to simply arrest him. On whatever charges. Then go after him with everything. 

If Biden needs to get involved, with the superpowers and immunity conferred to him by the Supreme Court, that's fine. Declare a national emergency and martial law or whatever. That's what Trump would do. That's what his advisors were recommending over nothing. 

And Trump is trying to overthrow the government and destroy the country. Throw the son of a bitch in jail. Put him in with Diddy. They can talk about their rapes and shit. 

The Life of the Party

There are two possible outcomes to the election. Trump wins the election or Trump tries to steal it. Are we really ready for this?

Actually there's a third possibility. That Republicans make it impossible to know who won. It which case it should default to the Democrat. 

Which they'll disallow. Trump is his Party. Its his. He intends to do that with the country. Somebody is going to have to do something.

Republicans, say after me ...

'I don't give a shit how many people I get killed.'

Elizabeth Warren reminded me (article, not in person) how hard Republicans tried to kill Obamacare and how close they came. We were saved by John McCain, probably not because he's a decent guy but because of some honor thing. Trump is still saying he'll replace it with something wonderful that will apparently come to him in a dream or be concocted on demand by Stephen Miller and Steve Mnuchin or other such idealists and recognized humanitarians. But you can bet your ass corporations will make a shitload of money on it. Getting rid of Obamacare will kill people. And they don't care. 

The Baiting Habits of Republicans

I hate baiting. It's disrespectful and incredibly aggressive. A form of assault. But it gives the practitioner deniability and an opening to unload blame on the victim. No, you're the one. I didn't do anything. Why are you attacking me. 

Unlike any kind of honest disagreement. 

Trump, of course, as in so many other things, blows the curve and makes it easier to see what Republicans have been routinely doing since Reagan and especially since 1994 or so, when the vile Gingrich gang began their attacks. 

Attacks on what? Democrats.

Republicans claimed the high ground, of course, saying they were patriots, the real Americans and, typically, Christians and saved and all that shit. What assholes. Trump belittles and maligns people like no one has ever seen. 

If someone fights back, they're 'nasty.' He's the biggest victim. Downtrodden, disrespected and unfairly treated. Poor little Donny! So sad! Abused in relation to what he deserves, which is a world centered entirely on him. 

That sums it up, what Republicans believe in -- privilege. Getting something for nothing. Lives of blessings arbitrarily bestowed on them. Which is why they have to lie. All the time. Because the whole thing is a scam. 

Girl Hands Trump His Ass (in Debate)

And Trump didn't recognize his own ass. He was, like, "what's this?" But nobody can say he's capable of self-awareness. Maybe someone should have said "sir, it's your ass," or words to that effect. Then he might have learned something. 

Sorry Puppy

On Trump's sudden concern about dogs, since 1) I don't think he's ever owned one and 2) he wouldn't give a shit about it if he did, someone must have offhandedly called him a sorry puppy or something and then he felt threatened by any talk of bad stuff happening to dogs. Because Trump cares only about himself, one of the few certainties about him. That, and that he's an idiot. 

Trump for Resident

I'm renewing my extremely generous offer from 2016 and 2020 to allow Trump to stay in the country but the conditions have changed, in part because some forfeiture of his New York assets is already probably pending in relation to a court imposed fine. In addition Trump and his family continue to do illegal stuff right and left and try to subvert the government so the country is still due restitution and further damages. 

The thing remains doable but if a deal can't be reached he will have to forfeit all of his domestic assets and leave the country. And, if it comes to that, the culpability of his kids will need to be determined separately and individually. Trump's sons and the Kushners are clearly in deep shit while Barron is a novice and apprentice at graft and thievery but he is being initiated into it with a crypto scam, to give you an idea. 

It's a never-ending torrent of illegality and corruption with these people.

Ars Longa Trump Brevis

"Art is long, Trump is short."

Trump the Entertainer

The Great Donaldo had a bad night at the magic show. Normally he pulls something interesting out of his ass but last night at the debate he pretty much lit his farts on fire. 

Nepo Baby Melts Down

It's tantrum time for Trump. 

The Charge of the Right Brigade

Into the valley of death rode MAGA. Determined, but nothing can make up for idiocy at the top. And the guy at the top is as clueless an imperial moron as any normal British lord.  

A New Dawn. A New Day.

To think we might one day be rid of Trump. 

We'll be stuck with MAGA but it's a start. Though I still believe the world as we've known it is ending, maybe it doesn't have to be so horrifically bad. I didn't watch the debate. I won't watch clips. I can't take seeing the orange asshole in action. 

But much credit to Kamala for doing as well as she did. 

The Personification of Sin is Trump

Sin is something somebody does wrong, though an intention has to qualify and contributing in a not obviously material way to a culture of malevolence or corruption or deceit or grandiosity has to count. What's right can is defined in relation to what's wrong, and the big distinction between a simple lapse or failing and the denial that life is intelligible and that it matters if you get hundreds of thousands of people killed because, well, you're a person too, has to be bigger than the distinction between sinning an not sinning, I think. 

Thar She Blows

Trump is both Ahab and the whale. He's his own obsession. America's puritanisim has finally caught up with it. Everybody dies in the end. Because that's the desired outcome. 

The Calm Before the Sturm

This election will determine the fate, I think, of the American Nazi (Republican) Party, and so the fate of America since they run it. And it's going to be close.

The Shifting Sands of Conservatism

Conservatism doesn't stand for anything. Look at its history. It's a system for control -- I was going to say -- but it changes too much in response to circumstances to be called a system. It's more like a drive. The drive to be on top. To win. Which, you would think, means they believe in class and hierarchy but even that's hard to pin down since their need for order might result in aristocracy or oligarchy or some kind of monarchy or another kind of despotism but they want shit nailed down. And if that means nailing you down or to a cross that's fine. 

I'm saying Jesus was a liberal. Jesus was a reformer. Jesus was anti-authoritarian -- except when the authority came from God. And conservatives are personal authoritarians. But no person can be the authority. No clan or tribe. No government or confederation. No Masons or Moose Lodge. None of these unless they answer to God, according to Jesus. And what is God in this? The entity that validates our humanity. The Logos. God gives our lives meaning. Divisions within humanity are false, because they are arbitrary. But conservatives love arbitrary. 

They don't love God. They're looking out for themselves. And new technologies have made them nuts. The opportunities for control are greater than ever -- the surveillance economy and data mining and all that. They say they want small government. Then what's up with the massive surveillance state they created to 'keep us safe' from some ill-defined threat? Who's being protected? Not average citizens. Corporations and the rich. Always corporations and the rich. Because only they matter. To conservatives. And they're running everything.

Donald's Day Off

Did you ever stop to think that Donald has never worked a day in his life? All he's done in screw around. And screw up. Every day is Donald's day off. 

Trump's 'Weave'

Someone was trying to tell him he's a basket case.

We Break You Fix

uBreakiFix is an actual business. I wish them well. We Break You Fix is also a business -- the Republican Party.

Shitstain for President

Vote for Trump. Because you don't give a fuck. 

The Tao of Trump

The Tao of Trump is collapsing and inward moving -- not a higher consciousness, a lower consciousness. Or, the loss of consciousness, character, identity and humanity. Giving up on everything. A brainstem or digestive kind of function. Mere existence. Meaningless existence. The plunder and ruin of every higher capability. 

Vance's Mamaw Was a Degraded Piece of Shit Bigoted White-Trash Redneck

And his mama was a slut. JD Vance is calling for less political correctness and coddling in the discourse. Fine with me ...