Seen in NYC

 

My Country 'Tis of Thee...

It is a remarkable phenomenon: a people who claim, on the one hand, to be free and, on the other, to having no real say in the most crucial matters affecting their lives or the lives of others around the world. 

Under such conditions, you end up with what we have in the United States in 2025: Trumpism, which is a desperate flailing about, trying to effect change by turning back the clock--impossible even if it were desirable, which it is not. With Trumpism comes an idiocracy capable only of delivering harm and chaos. The alternative is authoritarian Liberal self-delusion that this is the best of all possible worlds (cf. Voltaire's Dr. Pangloss) so stop complaining and get with the program which also delivers various forms of harm and chaos around the world. 

If we have no political agency, if we cannot escape the choice of Trumpism or Liberal self-delusion, then political discussion is pointless. 

Those who find this choice intolerable will need to abandon such cherished notions as: (1) the two-party system (nowhere mentioned in the Constitution) is an effective form of self-governance and (2) the U.S. Constitution itself is the greatest instrument of freedom ever conceived by human beings and, therefore, we can do no better for ourselves.

Around 1995, I became convinced that the two-party system was a disaster. I then began to advocate that we call a Constitutional convention in order to ask ourselves how to go forward as a (self-described) free people as we approached the 21st century. 

For thirty years I have argued these two points (i.e., the dysfunctional nature of the duopoly and the inadequacy of an 18th century Constitution) with pretty much anyone who would listen.

For thirty years, my arguments have been met with silence or with the highly contestable assertion that we cannot do better than the system we currently have. 

Some of those who asserted the latter are now suddenly gripped with panic by the prospect that we are on the verge of a Constitutional crisis. 

I don't know whether to laugh or cry. 

In any event, if we abandon those two cherished notions (which are faith claims, not facts) and insist upon our own political agency, then perhaps it's time to start talking to our friends and neighbors about where we go from here. 

I have never advocated a quick fix or a violent revolution. 

I have no illusions that the road to a multiparty parliamentary democracy worthy of a free people would be easily effected in these United States. 

In my view, however, this is the kind of political conversation Americans should be having.

It's not a particularly "meme-friendly" conversation and the hour is very late. 

But better late than never. 

The failure to engage with radical ideas of political change (radical in the sense of "going to the roots" of the problems we face) is cowardly capitulation. 

That is something I do not wish to be found guilty of.

Fire Sale

 

Anyone who still believes that the Democratic Party is a true opposition party with the best interests of the American people at heart: I have decided to part with my most valuable possession (pictured above). If you are interested, send me a message. I'll make you a really good deal. I promise.

Resist the Zeitgeist: All of It.

 The Zeitgeist, which is currently dominated by the MAGA crowd's conflict with authoritarian Liberalism (the unquestioned political common sense of the well-intentioned), feels very tangible to me these days. The noise-to-signal ratio is almost overwhelming. No one on either side is capable of critically examining their own presumptions, much less tactics or motives. We have descended into an abyss of moral certainties. I find it curious and troubling in the extreme that a horror of wars of attrition and genocide does not necessarily figure among those moral certainties.

LESSON 1: Do Not Obey In Advance

The Streets of New York

 

Tax the Churches

 

Dumbold Trump

These are available for $2 a piece (minimum order of 3) at the U.S. government bookstore. I would send one to DJT, but I am confident he wouldn't bother to read it. He's determined to learn the hard way about the separation of powers, judicial review, the fact that it is Congress (through legislation) and not the President (through Executive Orders) that makes the laws, etc. He's old enough to have been required to take high school civics, but maybe he was absent those days.

The Coming Crisis

I recognize, of course, the resilience of self-delusion--religious, political, and otherwise. Christian Zionists will be "searching the Scriptures" for answers as to what they might have "misinterpreted" or "overlooked" to explain the Messiah's continued "delay." Will it ever occur to them that their messianic self-delusion helped to underwrite a genocide?