I’m baaaack!
With Trump gone, I thought I could just focus on reading, writing, and publishing in this blog, what fiction writers blather about all the time (after all, why shouldn’t a blog reflect its writer’s interests?). With Biden et al saving the nation, I made that assumption. Wow! Was I ever wrong! Narcissus le Grand (Trump the Chump) was only symbolic of a more general problem in the US and around the world: Representative democracy fails to represent the people. Politicians are the problem!
They might not be as evil as Trump (Minority Leaders McCarthy and McConnell, Governors Abbott and DeSantis, PM Orban, Witchy Marine le Pen, and others come very close)—Trump basically represented no one except himself and his family—but I don’t know any current politicians who selflessly put constituents’ interests above their own personal agendas, although I’ll give you that the latter many times just reduce to getting re-elected. Incompetent political hacks are the norm, and pols driven by greed and power are common enough that a lot of people suffer.
Consider NY senators Gillibrand and Schumer, perfect examples of the latter. They jumped on the bandwagon to mercilessly attack Governor Cuomo. That bandwagon is pulled by a lynch mob with greed- and power-driven pols, including the two senators, at the reins and a scandal-crazed media pushing from behind. It’s so weird to see that George Floyd’s murderer receives more due process than Cuomo! Talk about a twisted plot!
I’m not saying that Cuomo’s innocent. He might at least be guilty of creating a toxic work environment. Most people working in a corporation have experienced one—the VIPs there can be real SOBs—I know that because I experienced them in academia and R&D. But people can overreact, innocently or otherwise, making mountains out of molehills. A woman went after one VIP in one of my workplaces for telling her she was “glowing” as a compliment—she was in a family way. That’s perhaps being insensitive, not a sexual assault!
US society often carries political correctness too far, and I’m sick of it, all the more so when people join a lynch mob that allows political hacks to jump in and further their own agendas. That includes Senators Gillibrand and Schumer, of course, who have stepped over a lot of dead bodies on their way to the top. Every pol has committed some of those sins. For example, Gillibrand went after Franken only to increase her own chances in the primaries—fortunately people saw through that scheme of the ex-member of the Good Ole Piranhas.
There’s no reasoned discourse anymore, only ten-second soundbites, often snarky gotchas that make me sick because they only encourage the media’s feeding frenzies. There’s no competence anymore either among politicians, only incompetent hacks posturing to win the next election so they can continue to ruin our lives!
This country and the world have many critical problems that require solutions if humanity is to survive. I repeat: Some solutions are needed so humanity can survive! (I suppose Gaia might have a different opinion about that.) For sane readers of this blog, I shouldn’t have to enumerate them. Ask yourself if your senator and representative are working to solve them. Our representatives are demonstrating many times over that they have no clue at the least and, because of their greed and desire for power, working against humanity at the worst. What do we elect them for? The answer I see now: Obviously not to do the job that needs to be done!
In future blog posts in this category “New Op-Eds,” I will elaborate on this theme. It’s a bipartisan one (although one US party will probably believe that less than the other). This is the least I can do to wake people up so they’ll vote out the pols who do so little for us. I know it won’t help sell my books because some readers will boycott me. So be it!
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Comments are always welcome.
Around the world and to the stars! In libris libertas!
