Month: December 2024

A Parable of our time: “Our democratic house is on fire!”

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James Rowles, “A Parable of our time: ‘Our democratic house is on fire!”’, first published in The Trenchant Observer, September 23, 2021, reprinted in James P. Rowles, The Rape of American Democracy: Republican Actions and Democratic Failures, 2016-2021 (2024).

A Parable of our Time

See,

Robert Kagan, “Our constitutional crisis is already here,” Washington Post, September 23, 2021 (3:32 p.m. EDT).

There is a man running up and down the street, with his hair all frazzled and his eyes filled with terror, shouting, “The house is on fire! Our house is on fire! Our whole democratic city is on fire!”

Outside a cafe, on a bright sunny morning, a number of people sit calmly drinking their coffee. A few, but not as many as in the past, are reading their newspapers.

“Help! Help!” the screaming man implores. “Don’t you know, the whole city is on fire!”

The seated individuals proceed calmly to drink their coffee and chat among themselves.

“Don’t you know?” the wild man implores again, “The whole city is on fire!”

Different individuals respond variously.

“You exaggerate,” one says. “We don’t see any flames.”

“The houses in the next street are on fire,” the wild man rejoins.

“Don’t worry,” another replies. “Someone will take care of it.”

“Fake news!” another shouts out, aggressively.

“What about you newspapers readers?” the wild man screams, in exasperation.

“We know,” one of them replies. “But what do you expect us to do about it? Someone will take care oi it.”

Another newspaper reader says, “I haven’t read anything about it in my newspaper, or heard anything about it on my television stations.”

“Of course not, John,” another cajoles. “Look at the newspapers you read and the television stations you watch.”

Another man, a thoughtful-looking gentleman, declaims, “You’re right. Something is going on. We ought to launch an investigation to see who started the fire.”

A teenager, sitting with her parents at the cafe, leaps to her feet and shouts out, “We know who started the fire, and who the arsonists are who have been pouring gasoline on it!”

“In this town,” the wild man screams, “we have a volunteer fire department. You are all members of our volunteer fire department.”

“Don’t get so excited,”a senior member of the group rejoins. Someone will take care of it.”

“The alarm bell at the fire department hasn’t even rung,” says another.

“Who disarmed the bell?” the teenager shouts out, as she is ignored.

“The wild man, with growing terror in his eyes, screams, “Our democratic town will be destroyed if we don’t act to save it!”

“Go on, get out of here. You are disturbing our morning coffee,” one man yells back, as other coffee drinkers join in. “Yes, go on, get out of here. You’re disturbing out morning coffee.”

The screaming man yells, “The whole town is on fire, and half of its citizens are pouring gasoline on the fire!”

***

One might ask, “Does this parable have anything to do with current politics or democracy in America?”

One associates to Katherine Anne Porter’s brilliant novel, Ship of Fools (1962)–made into a movie of the same name in 1965. In the final scene of the movie, the protagonist, a dwarf, is watching the other passengers get off the ship, including those who had argued vociferously in the movie in defense of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis.

Looking directly into the camera, he says, “You are thinking,”What does Thia all have to do with us?”He then says, “Nothing” Puffing on his cigar,he turns and walks out of the station.
The movie ends.

The Trenchant Observer

Merry Christmas! The last Christmas before Crazy. The last Christmas without an apparent Russian Asset in the White House. The last Christmas before the billionaires’ unchecked rule. The last Christmas before the Unknown.

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“Merrily we roll along, We are safe now, safe in the hands of Donald Trump and the billionaires. Antitrust is out. Arbitrary rule is in.

We have a president, who surely briefed on the contents of the House Ethics Committee Report, proceeded to nominate Matt Gaetz to be Attorney General of the United States. With the full support of Elon Musk.

Merrily we roll along. But what can we expect?

We can expect a lot of controversies, a lot of distractions from the serious business of government and the proper management of international affairs.

What will happen in Ukraine? Who cares?

Merrily we roll along.

Netanyahu and Israel, if they agree to a ceasefire in Gaza, won’t do so until after Trump takes office on January 20, 2025. In the meantime, for Israel Gaza will remain pretty much a free-fire zone, as it occupies Syrian territory in open defiance of international law.

Who cares.

What will the Russians exact from Trump? Will Elon Musk, deeply enmeshed in business in China, moderate Trump’s policies toward that country?

How long will the two biggest alpha males on the planet continue to work harmoniously with each other?

How does Trump like people calling Elon President Musk?

Both men strive to always be the center of attention. How will that work out?

The president-elect, knowing the contents of ahe House Ethics Committee Report on Matt Gaetz, nominated Gaetz to be Attorney General of the United States.

Think about that for a minute.

Then we can all join the dance and song, as “Merrily we roll along”.

What could possibly go wrong?

Democracy v. the billionaires, tyrants, and time

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With their Trumpist conquest of the government and the political and information systems, they will be hard to dislodge,

It’s really a race against time. Will the people reassert their power before the institutions of democracy and their means of doing so peacefully are dismantled?

It is a worldwide struggle. America is the stronghold of the billionaires and the wealthy, of those with the money to buy the technology that can help defend their positions and to advance toward their goal of tyrannical or oligarchical control?

Dec. 10, 2024

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The Gleichschaltung of Big Tech in Trump’s America

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BACKGROUND

1) Keren Lentschner et Lucas Mediavilla, “De Bezos à Zuckerberg, l’allégeance très calculée des grands patrons de la tech envers Donald Trump; RÉCIT – Les dirigeants des Gafam montrent patte blanche au président élu. Une illustration de l’espoir dans la vague de dérégulation promise par Donald Trump, tout autant que la crainte de représailles de la part du président ou de son vice-président officieux, Elon Musk,” Le Figaro, le 14 décembre 2024 (18h00);

2) Keren Lentschner and Lucas Mediavilla,”From Bezos to Zuckerberg, the highly calculated allegiance of the big tech bosses towards Donald Trump; The leaders of the Gafam show a white paw to the president-elect. An illustration of hope in the wave of deregulation promised by Donald Trump, as well as the fear of reprisals from the president or his unofficial vice-president, Elon Musk,” Le Figaro, December 14, 2024 (6:00 pm);

SATIRE Trump traces ancestry back to Neanderthal ancestor

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BACKGROUND

1) Carolyn Y. Johnson,”Scientists pinpoint when humans had babies with Neanderthals; Neanderthals interbred with modern humans 47,000 years ago, passing down DNA that still exists in many modern-day people, according to two new studies,” Washington Post, December 12, 2024

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Scientists have identified the point in time 47,000 years ago when Neanderthals first had babies wit humans.

These Neanderthal ancestors passed down DNA tgat still exists in many modern-day people.

Donald Trump learned through a DNA test that his DNA is 98% Neanderthal in origin Curious, he enlisted the assistance of Elon Musk and his vast financial resources to investigate his ancestry further.

What the investigators found was that Trump is a direct descendant of the Lesder of the dominant Neanderthal tribe 47,000 years ago, and that Trump has an amazingly high percentage of DNA that an be traced to that particular Leader.

Democrats have signed the leading authorities on Neanderthals and Neanderthan behavior to help them devise a strategy for navigating through the next four years of Trump’s second presidency.

Neanderthal experts, speaking anonymously because they are afraidthey might lose there jobs, are of the unanimous view that Trump is determined intge coming years to recreate the Neanderthal social order. They add that his recent nominations of cabinet other other high officials point unmistakably to the conclusion that that is indeed Trump’s intention.

Researchers not affiliated with Trump and Musk are no investigating whether MAGA and other Trump supporters have some kind of genetic defect that makes them particularly susceptible to Neanderthal appeals, or at least appeals by a direct descendant of the great Neanderthal Leader 47,000 years ago represented by Donald Trump today.