[875] Oh Beautiful

“I feel sick.”

The votes aren't completely in, but as of this writing, 67 million Americans are proud to be Nazis. They're proud to be fascists. They are proud to be "white." They are proud of the story they have told themselves about why they are better or smarter than you.

You see people talking about how sick they feel that so many of their brethren could somehow justify this behavior. You see people literally getting sick and dying from covid. Still, after 4 years, we have not learned the mechanism for preventing someone like Trump like we could have prevented the worst from covid. Still, the story is at the mercy of all-out chaos and destruction, and we're waiting to be subsumed by a hail of bullets or alcohol when the misery won't put us quite over the edge.

For however many words this turns out to be, I'm again “at a loss.” There are no words, there is only death. There's been so much death for so long that it's now time to culturally celebrate it. That's what this “election” tells me. That's what years of campaigning tried to convince you to do. Celebrate the death of the middle class. Celebrate how much you hate yourself and how that hate comes out as racism. Celebrate you get to start “owning” people again for being dreamy or high-minded about what a proper piece of crusty shit you are.

I don't hear people “getting it” that the behavior exhibited from Trump isn't “the other side.” On a universal and indifferent scale, yes, any and all “merely changing” words or behaviors is going to build or destroy. Human, though? “Democracy?” It's not the held-harmless position of a functioning person. It's the stuff that would get you fired. It's the things they used to prosecute and jail for. It's too simple.

The psychology papers abound telling you about sunk-costs and cognitive dissonance. These people haven't lost anything nor wrestle with demons psychologically. They are proud. They want to die and they want to kill you and those feelings empower them further. These people are a collective lynch mob, wondering where the beer and barbecue are so they can top-off the carnage.

There was no rebuke. There was no persuading the country that Biden would be “easier” to convince and push in the direction of what we need. There was only the continued anger, hopelessness, and fear. There were only more lies. There were only whines and excuses and a moment arrested by how you think you might survive in spite of it all. We are not a country, we are a bubbling pit of blame and insecurity. We are a legacy of perpetuating around the world the rot we're suffering right now.

Obama touted “hope” as he deported families back to countries where gangs targeted them. He was the droner-in-cheif. Bill Clinton signed as much legislation as he could to bankrupt the working class. Jimmy Carter was shit on for his foresight and frankness about the forces taking over. The people in power now have spent their entire lives picking away at order and gaining power for its own sake. The real war has never been “close.” The underlying circumstances doomed you from birth.

I'm 32 years old and never had a person represent me in my “democratic republic.” My degree meant I could make less than minimum wage and feel better than most if I lived in a shed in a holler. I've never seen a democratic candidate even sniff at the shit hole county I live in. This country isn't for me. This country was a set of lies predicated on even worse actions to perpetuate the pretense.

The way I figure it, I have maybe 6 months to get my affairs in order and figure out how to buy a humble plot somewhere in the world that can at least pull off “boring” for a while. Until I die, I'll need something to look forward to and invest in. I need to stop believing I can make this country into something it's aggressively decided it is not.