Choice?
What’s more depressing — the possibility that the 2016 presidential campaign will be between two near-doppelgänger dynasts, Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush, or the fact that a farceur like Donald Trump’s entry into the race is taken seriously enough that the New York Times covers it?
Pick ‘Em
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Me? I’d almost welcome Scott Walker’s nomination by the Party of God because at least he’s an ideologue. He’d offer us a clear choice between him and anybody else in terms of who we want to be as a nation. Then again, I say “almost” because, honestly, I don’t want him to get the nom. I mean, what if he wins the election?
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Race War Vs. Class War
With the meme of Gen. Colin Powell decrying the racism within his Republican Party making the rounds again on social media, my pal, the Lake County Republican, poses the following Q: Why does Powell remain a Republican? Why doesn’t he just quit and join the Dems? Now, while the LCR fully agrees that the racists and chronic racism within the GOP are abhorrent, he believes there’s a greater underlying philosophical reason why the Republicans are the better party. After all, the LCR himself hasn’t quit the GOP.
Here’s the LCR’s explanation:
I think it is because the actions of a few [Democrats] are despicable [and] the ethos of the Democratic Party is even worse. They appeal to the base human instincts of envy and resentment of those better off….
This, among other things, the LCR posits, makes the Dems “even more corrosive to the nation” than the racism within the GOP.
That’s quite a charge. My take: I’ll bet Colin Powell himself can’t fully explain why he remains a Republican. It may be inertia. Powell grew up at a time when the most virulent racists and segregationists were Democrats. Harry Byrd, George Wallace, Orval Faubus, and Lester Maddox all were Dems. That, of course, was before Richard Nixon’s Southern Strategy folded the Neanderthal wing of the Democratic Party into the GOP.
Now then. The LCR’s charge that the 99% appeal (which precious few Dem candidates are embracing in any case) is worse for this holy land than the racism that has torn it apart since the early 1800s. Sheer lunacy, my friend. Peeps aren’t screaming bloody murder because others are successful or “better off.” They’re hollering because the game is rigged. The way the system works now, those who have dough get more at the expense of those who haven’t got it. The plutocracy more and more controls policy and legislation via lobbyists and campaign moneys. Too many Richie Rich’s didn’t earn their dough; they inherited it. And far too many millionaires and billionaires didn’t get that way through hard work and the production of goods and services that somehow benefit, y’know, people. They’ve been degenerate gamblers who gamed the system to rake in their dirty dollars.
A Crooked Game
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And both the Democrats and Republicans are responsible for this economic world of shit.
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Better Late Than Never
My delayed reaction to Bloomingfoods‘ divorce from long-time GM George Huntington and the subsequent axing of a nearly two doz. mid-level managers at the co-op’s three locations:
Both are good moves, albeit anywhere from two to 10 years too late.
Bloom Mag Photo Of George Huntington By Amber Lynn Brown
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My rec. for B-foods’ next good move? Shut down the East Side and the Elm Heights stores before tomorrow morning. Concentrate on the Near West site and make it a viable local alternative to the new Lucky’s Market and the to-come Whole Foods Market.
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