It seems silly that we have to explain why one candidate is better than the other in this election. One candidate is an accomplished attorney with a degree in economics, and the other stood on a stage at a campaign event talking about the penis of Arnold Palmer.
Are we really that unserious as a nation? How does any of that make sense?
It’s not normal. These words from a person that is supposed to represent us to the world are not normal. They aren’t sane. This person is wholly unfit to be in office.
From the chaos of freezer trucks holding hundreds of bodies during the height of the COVID pandemic to the rolodex of presidential spokespersons, to injecting bleach, shining lights in our assholes, and so many other very weird things that this “person” has said, I’m just very concerned that my fellow Americans are either really as stupid as their candidate, or so desperate to preserve what they feel entitled to that they will dive into any cesspool that appeals to their baser nature. The idea of a society that really works for everyone, is terrifying for them. FOMO (fear of missing out) is feeding this fear.
I took a trip recently to Japan and Korea. Both countries have had wild histories and pretty intense political seasons. However, the things that work in those countries are things that would improve the lives of everyday Americans in great ways. Improved transportation, better healthcare, support for small businesses, etc., these are things that only ONE candidate is discussing during this election. That candidate is a woman and we know how America fears the power of the female.
The other person, “My father gave me a small loan of one million dollars,” can’t possibly understand what a regular person needs, but he’s the poor guy’s idea of what a rich person is like. Bloated and crass, but rich. To them, that equates to his understanding of how to run an economy. What they are ignoring is that his economy is the one that is currently costing them more money in regular goods. Those tariffs cost the consumer and bloated deficits will eat up revenue necessary for many projects that Americans need.
I’d love to understand the root of the delusion that makes him a candidate that we have to discuss but I’m not sure there is any simple answer. There are a lot of disillusioned people who have felt entitled to an America that didn’t include Black people, Brown people, Immigrants (legal or otherwise), etc. They want to close ranks around resources they don’t want to share despite the fact that all of these other people have and will continue to exist, work, live and die in our nation because very simply — they are also Americans.
America is more than the Ozzie and Harriet dream that many of “his” voters aspire to. In all nations, not just here, the Ozzie and Harriet is only a small part of what real lives look like. People are flawed and that type of family is hard to maintain and doesn’t really make sense to all of the ways that people live. There are too many variations in basic humanity to think that those values make sense for a whole nation.
Further, they don’t even make sense for the candidate these folks support — three wives, countless affairs, calling not getting an STD his “Vietnam.”
Entitlement breeds resentment. When you think something is yours, you want it regardless of what it means, and who you have to crush to get it.
But what if… as Woody Guthrie sang and you took to heart as a child… this land is a shared space.
It was shared by indigenous people, who in turn allowed, and shared with invading Europeans. The entitlement started there, and has spread continuously like a cancer through the centuries of America, and now with our parents — the Boomers— aging, their last gasp is that desperation to hold on, and to possess something that was never really theirs to begin with.
Ergo their lord and savior, the Orange Führer. He tells them what they want to hear and he promises them that he will get it even if it means destroying the nation, the constitution, the rule of law they claim to care about.
I’m not talking about all boomers and I have neighbors younger than myself who are riding this broken train to their ruin as well.
The bottom line is, one person is talking about policy and the other is hurling insults and admiring dudes’ dicks in public.
I’m just spitballing but the choice seems pretty cut and dried, and it isn’t the dude talking about amazing penises or awkwardly swaying to music onstage for half an hour. Some shit doesn’t make sense but the choice for president, a job that requires focus, seriousness and a sense of real structure seems pretty fucking clear.
We’re with the woman. That other dude can kick rocks and admire all the penises he wants, out of the public eye, forever.
This article appears in Oct 23 – Nov 5, 2024.
