The 24-Karat Turd

Totally bonkers, barking mad, deranged, off their rocker, screwy, batty, nuts, daft, cracked, crazy, unhinged--whatever term you care to use for insanity, it's the new conservative. Or maybe it's just Trumpism, which has redefined madness.

A booth at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Orlando is featuring a larger-than-life gold statue of Donald Trump. 

It's not gold, of course. Like all things Trump, including his presidency, it's a cheap and tawdry simulacrum of the real thing. The material is fiberglass covered in gold-tinted chrome. It is dressed in a suit coat, tie, shorts, and flip-flops, and carries a "fairy princess" magic wand. Were it not for the fact that the artist seems to be a Trump fan, it could taken as contemptuous.

Media platforms have been full of the thing and not a few people have cited biblical passages. The Second Commandment has been popular, but I think Exodus 32:20 is more fitting. After talking God out of destroying the Israelites for disobedience, Moses descends from Mount Sinai. Seeing the people worshiping and cavorting around a golden calf, " . . . he took the calf which they had made, and burnt it with fire, and ground it to powder, and scattered it upon the water, and made the people of Israel drink it." 

The point of making the Israelites consume the ground calf was to convert it into human excrement, demonstrating the nature and ultimate fate of false gods. I've been having dreams of all the Republican movers and shakers eating ground up chrome-plated fiberglass and shitting out little Trump-shaped turds.

I apologize for the grossness, but their behavior has gone so far beyond reason that I'm sometimes at a loss how to deal with it civilly.

Is there anyone, finally, who can't see the phenomenon for what it is? Trump is a cult leader and his followers are cultists. Not "cult-like" or "quasi-cult" or "resembling a cult," as some apologists have tried to make it. The Trump movement is a full-blown, active cult that is inimical to America's democratic values. The violence of January 6 should be seen as just a precursor for probable future uprisings. 

Major Republican donors are sucking up to Trump this weekend, and they have a lot, make that a LOT, of money. And regardless of where his personal future is headed, he has supporters who will fight for him. We've seen it. Does anyone think January 6 was all they had? A one-shot, flash-in-the-pan kind of misfire? Not at all. Quite a few right-wing militant groups wisely stayed on the sidelines on 6 January. When they decide which battles to fight it will be a new ball game.

And let's not forget the numerous Trump supporters on active military duty. Whether they rise up during or after their service, they will be formidable.

We are still in danger and there does remain the possibility that the Trump faction could capture Congress and even the White House in two or four brief years. We have to remain solid, vigilant, active, and perhaps armed. 

The threat has abated, but it has not been defused.

Wachet auf!

 

--- Diogenes, 2/27/21

 

Cities Of The Dead

Consider three North American cities: Atlanta, Georgia; Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, and Matamoros, Mexico. I invite you to look up one or more of them on Google Earth or whatever viewing or mapping program you use. Study the demographics, take a virtual tour, find out how many museums each has, how many churches, how many restaurants, how many theatres--whatever attracts you to cities, and visualize the local population carrying out their lives.

Then imagine them empty: devoid of life and motion, no sound of traffic or bells or whistles or sirens, no children playing, no concerts, no couples laughing, no sports events, no people. Visualize each as a ghost town.

Each of these cities has a population of approximately 500,000--the number of Americans who have now died of COVID-19. That's what we as a nation have lost: the population of a good-sized city. 

As pure numbers go, 500,000 isn't particularly huge, compared, e.g., to astronomical distances. We read about 500,000 widgets being shipped somewhere and don't bat an eye. But the 500,000 we're talking about here aren't widgets, and the distance they're traveling isn't finite. 

These are American lives lost, their souls released. Early in the pandemic the American death toll was compared to 9/11. Now our scope has to expand to the point that the number of American COVID-19 deaths approximately equals the number of Americans killed in both world wars, combined.

Out of respect for those deaths President Biden has ordered flags flown at half-staff on federal buildings. Here in my part of Virginia many private organizations, companies, clubs, and individuals have followed suit. 

The stark exception is the group who consider themselves citizens of Trumptopia. They fly the Trump flag high, and like their leader believe the pandemic to be a hoax and President Biden to be a pretender. They may not be traitors, but they are definitely deserters.

Die Fahne hoch . . . ?

Hell, no!

--- Diogenes, 2/26/2021