All Fall Down

With so many signs of a nation unravelling —

  • the budget-squandering, shame-spawning militarism;
  • the self-serving foolishness of American unilateralism;
  • the kowtowing to religious fundamentalists;
  • the age-old campaign against the rights of women;
  • the rampant “all-american” xenophobia;
  • the fubar demise of our so-called free market economy;
  • and, our idiot inaction in the face of urgent environmental concerns….

— isn’t it great that our presidential hopefuls are devoting their campaigns to media-manufactured hullaballoos over which advisor said what offensive-to-somebody-somewhere-thing or which old friend is not a media-approved perfect American citizen?

As Kurt Vonnegut once remarked: “There is a tragic flaw in our precious Constitution, and I don’t know what can be done to fix it. This is it: Only nut cases want to be president.”

When they write the history of the fall of the American empire, they will point to this time and note how in one election after another we managed to avoid all of the critical issues of the day. Or at best dealt with monumentally complex problems with farce debates and sound-bite electioneering.

Actual candidates who have clue are quickly branded as unelectable. Which leaves, inevitably, politicians, not leaders. Which means that the actual governance of a great nation is all about the political game, rather than the issues of the day.

Maybe Obama’s just playing the game to win, and once in office will dazzle us all with sweeping progressivism. You gotta hope!

Or maybe Vonnegut’s right and we should be concerned about the mental health of anybody who wants the job of cleaning up George W Bush’s mess.

Michael Sky

2 thoughts on “All Fall Down”

  1. Vonnegut was right. “Only nut cases want to be president.” But, that is true in every political system. Only the control freak nut jobs want to invest all of their lives in pursuit of that much control.
    But, there is another flaw that is present in all political and governmental systems, and that flaw is that no system has proven effective at eliminating corruption. All of the ‘signs of a nation unraveling [sic]’ are signs that the corrupt have gained almost absolute power in this country. And they are playing us like fools.
    Clinton and the media are attempting to split the Democratic Party along race lines, not to win an election, but to prevent us from believing that we have the power to win. And, she and the media wish us to believe Geraldine Ferraro’s claim that Barack Obama would not be front-runner “if he was a white man.”
    The reason for this is simple: Barack Obama, whether he is ‘playing the game to win’ or not, is making commitments to the American people that are helping to unite us.
    Yes, black people are supporting Barack Obama. The point is that Barack Obama would be nothing without the support of so many white people and those of other races who have not so much chosen to put race aside, but who have determined that race is not a legitimate issue in determining who is leader.
    Hillary is banking on Super Delegates, and intends to maintain power for a specific set of people, not all of whom are Democrats. She and McCain represent the same constituency that Bush does. This can be established by listening to their rhetoric.
    Obama may not be for everything we hope he is for, but he is not chosen by the same constituency as the others. He is supported mostly by the people, and because of that, he is answerable to us in a way the others are not.
    This election is important, but we must begin to work toward replacing the corporate candidates for House and Senate in 2012 as well. Obama will be able to do little until we do, even if he is sincere.

    And, we must become even more assertive in pushing the issues. We have a media to take back. We have a constitution to restore. And, we have a nation to rebuild.

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