Defying Gravity

 “Tell them how I am defying gravity

I'm flying high, defying gravity
And soon I'll match them in renown
And nobody in all of Oz
No wizard that there is or was
Is ever gonna bring me down!” (Defying Gravity/Stephen Schwartz)

 

Like millions, 74 plus to be exact, I can breathe again, I can inhale, exhale and make my next breath as invigorating and inviting as the capacity that my lungs can manage, because this time, my GUT is not inflamed and causing me to feel as if I am smothering! This will be notable as the first of many days in which the future actually seems to cause the ping of hope, the pang of promise, and the pitter-pat of change, for the better! 

 

Of course, we know that the disease of Trump, the stench of Trump, and the cult of Trump will remain, as does a virus if you do not take the prescribed dosage of antibiotics to eliminate the rot and ruin, and to be naïve is like most of the MAGA who think science/masks/social distancing are just a plot, and you end up shooting yourself in the foot or ending up in an ICU! But today, this most important day in OUR COLLECTIVE HISTORY, we have DEFIED GRAVITY, and have actually stopped the Black Hole (Orange in this case,) from consuming humanity!

 

And as I write THIS BLOG, on Saturday, November 7, 2020, I will set my wings in motion, I will look at the night sky, and I will BELIEVE, that evil, was not permitted to reign supreme, for now!

 

 

I Need A Hero

  

“HAVE YOU NO SENSE OF DECENCY, SIR? AT LONG LAST HAVE YOU NO SENSE OF DECENCY?” ("Until this moment, Senator, I think I never really gauged your cruelty or your recklessness"), Army counsel Joseph Welch during the Army-McCarthy hearings in 1954 

 

In the early 1950s, Senator Joseph McCarthy was famous for his aggressive anti-communist stance, and speeches in which he claimed to be in possession of long lists of names of communists in the State Department, the military, and elsewhere in government. He made full use of his position as chair of the Senate Committee on Government Operations and its Permanent Committee on Investigations. He destroyed the careers of many people by claiming that they had belonged to communist front organizations or associated with communists. His success at this owed a lot to the fact that he was able to play "judge, jury, prosecutor, castigator, and press agent, all in one."

 

“If you count the legal votes, I win,” he said, before ticking off a litany of baseless claims about ways his campaign had supposedly been cheated by his opponents, nonpartisan poll workers, and a vast conspiracy of technology companies and big business. Instead of letting the process play out, the president is calling on election officials to stop counting ballots, potentially disenfranchising hundreds of thousands of voters. (New York Times) Trump also called out cities like Philadelphia and Detroit as cesspools of anti-Americanism, and officials in Georgia and Pennsylvania as traitors, and conspirators!

 

So with a few exceptions, the Republicans have largely returned to the position they often adopt with the president: silence. But it may become increasingly difficult to stay quiet. Trump had, in the past declared war on democracy, and for me at his Propaganda, so-called Press Conference, held in the White House, was like The Battle of Fort Sumter (April 12–13, 1861) like the bombardment of Fort Sumter near Charleston, South Carolina by the South Carolina militia (the Confederate Army did not yet exist), 

 

It is no longer, just the responsibility of the Biden/Harris Team to try and soothe the frayed nerves and fear of America or promise things could be better, BUT NOW it is TIME for any REPUBLICAN with any prominence or prestige to SPEAK UP AND OUT AND AGAINST, a president who has declared a Civil War against America. (And YES, it is THAT serious, and no, fuck you if t=you think this is just HYPEROBLY OR HYPERBOLIC!

 

“I need a hero
I'm holdin' out for a hero 'til the end of the night
He's gotta be strong
And he's gotta be fast
And he's gotta be fresh from the fight
I need a hero
I'm holdin' out for a hero 'til the morning light
He's gotta be sure
And it's gotta be soon
And he's gotta be larger than life
Larger than life” (Holding Out For a Hero/Bonnie Tyler)

 

 

 

 

 

like sands

 “Like sands through the hourglass, so are the days of our lives.” Each day prior to and now each day since, ELECTION, we, as Americans seem to be living in a poorly written Soap Opera, all with the obvious characters, plots lines of hyperbole, and hyperbolic hysteria, protagonists, antagonists, snake oil, sold as perfume, unexpected twists and turns, and what seems an endless episode after another, as if instead of a Soap Opera, we are witnessing Groundhog Day, after day, after day!

 

The hourglass is such an effective symbol for the passing of time, isn’t it? We see the sands running through the glass without stopping, knowing that the end is increasingly near. Unlike the clock with its endless cycles, the hourglass has a definite limit. Time is running out! (The Word Is Life/Kevin Dowd) Endless, might be putting it mildly, mind-boggling eternity, overwhelming anxiety, mirages of hope, despair mangled into moments of sheer horror, instant terror, a sigh, a deep breath, running out of breath, and trying to pinpoint finality in the vastness of a universe, filled with at least three dozen alternate realities! 

 

And through all of this madness, a maniac roams the Twitter World, the imaginary land of WHERE, nothing is the truth, and rummages and pillages, even the most stable of sensitivities, hoping to wreck as much havoc, as possible; knowing a cult-like group of brain dead, but hate-filled zombies await to devour any crumb of democracy left undestroyed!

 

And OH BY THE WAY: We still have 545 caged kids of brown skin orphaned. Joe Biden has established a new record of voters, that of 71 million, and we still are arguing over something as inane as this man who already has received 50% of the American electorate’s choice, needing 270 Electoral College total to win. On this day, the 2^nd day after Election Day, the US witnessed the highest number of new positive cases, of the CORONAVIRUS, 102,831 in a day; that in addition to the already, 9.58 million cases, and the 234,000 Americans who have died of COVID-19. The estimated cost of the 2020 Election Campaign is close to 14 Billion dollars. All the while women earn a median income of $42, 238, and mean earn a median income of $52,004.

 

“Like sands through the hourglass, so are the days of our lives.” We wait, wish, wonder when anyone will be brave enough from within the Republican Party, to finally tell Trump, stop fucking with Democracy, and by the way, scientists estimate, there are seven quintillion, five hundred quadrillion grains of sand on Earth!

 

 

 

 

 

 

wtf, a lot!

 It is not over, so it seems, but the mere fact that IT IS NOT OVER, is, to me, a remarkable and miserable malady on America and Americans.  I am, NOW, in a multi-combinational mood, of what the fuck, how the fuck, why the fuck, and who the fuck are these people who embrace and engage EVIL! There IS a difference between good and bad, right and wrong, and yet in this nation, I call home, it seems there is nothing but shadows!

 

Caged Kids/Being a Foreign Asset/ Lying/ Stealing/Grifting/Acting as A Pre-meditated Murderer/Denying Democracy, Science, Medicine, Facts/Fraud/Crime/Grabbing Women By the Pussy/Lusting After Your Daughter/Herd Immunity Mentality/ Never Paying Domestic Taxes, but Paying Taxes to Foreign Enemy States/Pretending Your Love Jesus, While Enjoying Every Negative Moral Example…all of that is nothing, so it seems, because, as long as YOU MAKE SOMEONE THE OTHER/THE SCAPEGOAT/THE ENEMY, to soothe the insecure bigots, nothing but EVIL really matters!

 

So, they say the Venezuelan and Cuban Communities in Florida, voted in mass for Trump because he called Biden a Socialist, these immigrants, these refugees, who left their nation because of a tyrant, decide to vote for the wannabe tyrant of America, fuck all of you! For those who still stayed home, because you were either lazy or undecided because once again you figured all politicians are the same, how stupid you must really be! To the Americans who still think COVID is a plot a ploy a made-up thing and voted for Trump because he said it is over, just contract COVID already, and hopefully there is no room for you at your local ICU!

 

I DO NOT UNDERSTAND AMERICA, and no matter how much I SCREAM, there all I see is the simple fact, you either embrace EVIL or you don’t, and there IS no middle ground!

and now

 “Words can be like X-rays if you use them properly -- they’ll go through anything. You read and you’re pierced.”/ “O brave new world that has such people in it.”-Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

“Among other things, you'll find that you're not the first person who was ever confused and frightened and even sickened by human behavior. You're by no means alone on that score, you'll be excited and stimulated to know. Many, many men have been just as troubled morally and spiritually as you are right now. Happily, some of them kept records of their troubles. You'll learn from them—if you want to. Just as someday, if you have something to offer, someone will learn something from you. It's a beautiful reciprocal arrangement. And it isn't education. It's history. It's poetry.”/ “All morons hate it when you call them a moron.” -J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye

“Thus with continued concentration and the expenditure of enormous amounts of energy he tried to keep himself from slipping into the vast distances of his unhappiness. It was all around him. It was a darkness as impudently close as his brow. It choked him by its closeness. And what was most terrifying was its treachery. He would wake up in the morning and see the sun coming in the window and sit up in his bed and think it was gone, and then find it there after all, behind his ears or in his heart.”/ “I am often asked the question How can the masses permit themselves to be exploited by the few. The answer is By being persuaded to identify with them.” E.L. Doctorow, Ragtime

 

“Home, don't it seem so far away
Oh, we're traveling light today
In the eye of the storm
In the eye of the storm

Home, to a new and a shiny place
Make our bed, and we'll say our grace
Freedom's light burning warm
Freedom's light burning warm.” (America/Neil Diamond)

 

In my 7 decades, born during the McCarthy Era! Raised in the “I Like Ike,” Dogma of black or white, draw only between the lines, my teenage years, waiting for the atomic bomb to drop as Walter Cronkite spoke to us about the Cuban Missel Crisis, witnessing JKF, and my dreams of Camelot die. Having RFK and Martin Luther King assassinated, and finally reding MKL Jr’s I Have a Dream, wishing I had taken the time earlier to grasp the concept of equality. Waiting in the closet as Anita Bryant, bullied the Homosexual, or Phyliss Schlafly conveniently blame the downfall of heterosexuality on Women’s Rights and Gay Rights. Waiting for the day the moment, the empathy of Reagan to say the words HIV/AIDS. Aghast and astounded that someone of my exact age was murdered on the campus of Kent State, by orders of Nixon, and to finally see him resign in disgrace for the criminal he always was.  Treacherous times, then, moments in history, I was never certain could just be called history, but perhaps remain only as the PRESENT! Now at 71, seven decades and a year, feeling a déjà vu of 2016, I aimless meander and murmur words of hope, and praise, a prayer, perhaps, a desire that good CAN and WILL triumph over bad. Of all I have lived through and have recovered from, on this day November 3, 2020, I feel as if all of that was for not if in fact, we watch a madman, begin again to dismantle, (and this time forever,) DEMOCRACY. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

one person, one

 The One-Person One-Vote Rule refers to the rule that one person’s voting power ought to be roughly equivalent to another person’s within the same state. “Let each citizen remember at the moment he is offering his vote that he is not making a present or a compliment to please an individual - or at least that he ought not so to do; but that he is executing one of the most solemn trusts in human society for which he is accountable to God and his country.”/Samuel Adams

 

Republican activist Judges appointed by Trump and McConnell, and hurriedly rushed to confirmation, Republican, mostly gerrymandered State Legislators, intimidated by the mere idea of democracy, Onward Christian Soldiers, pretending that the USA IS and was INTENTIONALLY formed as a Christian nation, bigots, racists, ignorant, fearful, uneducated, and a plethora of VERY WEALTHY CONSERVATIVES known as the Federalist Society, have highjacked, for quite a while the entire notion of One-Person One-Vote, and if they are successful during this election to complete their kidnapping and terroristic ploys, plots and plans, none of us will ever see the brightness and beauty of a country craving equality and freedom, a nation nurtured by civic and civil rights, laws that protect the most vulnerable, and a potential that a SOCIETY can indeed rid itself of the vulnerable.

 

I speak for myself, but I watch the impotent, men in trucks, with weapons of war dangling down their legs as if they were images of their male genitalia, chasing, or parading in State Houses or threatening to kidnap or murder public officials. I am horrified as females regale as the rights for their own reproductive freedoms seem lesser and lesser. I am stupefied as some police have decided to be derelict in their duty to honor and serve, as they suddenly insist peaceful protests is a slight against their profession, when in fact their profession used to insist that law and order were a priority. And I cringe with rage, and fear, and loathing as all I read about is will the transfer of power be peaceful. Will a man who lost the election by at least a million votes (if not more) has declared himself KING! An emotionally ill, criminally-minded sociopath, corrupt having been impeached for fraud, is given the pleasure to determine the fate of this nation. 

 

One more day, until, WHO KNOWS WHAT…and I wait, my heart palpitates, my gut aches, my mind is in a fog, and all I can think of is that THIS WHAT AMERICA HAS BECOME!

 

 

I am I said

 "I am"... I said

To no one there
And no one heard at all
Not even the chair

"I am"... I cried
"I am"... said I
And I am lost and I can't
Even say why
Leavin' me lonely still” (I Am…I Said/Neil Diamond)

 

Each new day, another reason for angst and worry becomes apparent, and as that new day transitions into the afternoon, the worries of the morning, are just smothered by newer revelations of even more insidious insults, which by the evening hours when the sun has set, are stuffed under another blanket of bull shit and buffoonery, crimes and chaos, selective hypocrisy, and horrific foreshadow of a faithless figurehead, floundering, and failing, but oh so happy to take hostage, any and all of America! I read too many articles from print or the internet, I listen to way too many pundits, Talking Heads, political performers, and my obsession, my compulsive personality enables all of this, THIS I KNOW, but yet my greatest fear is that not understanding all of the possibilities of a future of less freedom/rights/equality and democracy, is even MORE frightful!

 

Trump-appointed judges encouraged by Republican State Legislators, to void valid voter ballots, truckloads of Trump supporters harassing and attempting to injure anyone Biden, self-appointed Trump Brown Shirts, using their weapons of war as both a replacement for their own male genitalia, and as a threat to democratic principles, intimidating and in sighting violence, as police either look the other way or, law enforcement, themselves decide that protests are no longer an American right. Trump and his spawn pretending that the only reason anyone is talking about COVID, is to attack the president, and to consider over 200,000 deaths a talking point for Biden and that doctors love to see people die because they can make a few more bucks, and to STILL have some Governors pretend death, dying, and doom are imaginary, and to have them IGNORE the plight of their own citizenry. To worry that INDEED, civil unrest will follow any results of the election, and wonder, what if this race IS too close to call on Election Eve, what becomes of us, of this nation, of democracy!

 

I am, like millions afraid, scared, unsure, worried, and I like millions have to wonder, how could this kind of history be taking place in MY lifetime, was there more I could have done, is there still things I CAN do. I am, among the millions, OVERWHELMED, and the countdown is LOOMING LARGE"I am"... I cried
"I am"... said I
And I am lost and I can't
Even say why.