Do Not Pass Go

The People are tired of the war. They're tired of being lied to, and led around by their short-hairs. They can accept a little bullshit from their elected representatives--most people see it as par for the course. But eventually the crap piles up too high to ignore the stench and all but the dumbest can see it for what it is.

The Republicans don't value families. They don't care if a father or mother has to work two jobs apiece to make ends meet because of their economic policies. They don't care if every kid in America is a latch-key kid. They don't care if there's anyone around to help them with their homework, or to play ball with them in the afternoons. As long as they grow up knowing how to spend themselves into debt and drive the economic machine with their production and consumption, they'll know enough to get by.

The Republicans don't care about winning the war. They just want to fight it, and hopefully manage to wrangle a deal to get their already filthy hands on all the oil they can suck out of the place. Thousands of dead American troops, hundreds of thousands of Iraqi men, women, and children are simply acceptable losses if the black gold flows into the waiting arms of those who have supported this administration all along.

The Republicans don't care about the environment. They don't even care about their own grandchildren and great-grandchildren, who will have to live in whatever fucked-up biosphere their permissive corporate policies and negligent regulation will leave to them. They'll be gone and who gives a fuck about kids they don't even know yet, right?

The Republicans don't give a damn about ordinary Americans. They don't care if Joe Sixpack DID vote Republican in the last election. If their cronies and buddies can make an extra buck by outsourcing Joe's job, all they have to do is tell Joe that the immigrants and gay marriage will make his life even worse, and Joe will vote Republican again, even if he has to crawl twenty miles to get there because he can't afford the gas anymore.

How in the hell has a bunch of rich motherfuckers who've never wanted for anything important, who've never had to wonder how they were going to feed their kids, never had to wonder how they'd pay their medical bills, never had to wonder how they'd be able to afford to fix their car, never had to wonder if they'd be able to find a job when the local factory shut down, EVER manage to convince a sizeable portion of the voting public that they'd EVER do anything to make their lives better?

Because they talk shit with the best of them. They make up phrases and words that sound important, that sound like something you should be paying attention to, but they're meaningless.

"Family values." Oh, please. Family values from people who don't value families?

"Compassionate conservativism." There's nothing and never has been anything compassionate about conservativism. It's all about "I've got mine and FUCK you."

Rich Republicans don't give a damn about the working class, the middle class, or anyone who isn't on the guest list for the next society wedding. They don't care if you have a job, a way to get to that job, food for your children, decent healthcare that doesn't put you in a pile of debt, a chance for a better life for your children, or whether the planet will even be inhabitable in 100 years. They won't be here, so what the hell does it matter to them?

They don't even give a shit about their own descendents. Does anyone honestly believe they give a damn about OURS?

It makes me want to vomit every time I hear some rich-ass pundit talking conservative trash. Rush Limbaugh? A fat rich guy who broke the law with complete impugnity and has the nerve to talk down to millions of people who work harder every day than he EVER will in his whole life. Bill O'Reilly? A rich puke who pretends to share the values of the ordinary American who couldn't find his own morals with a pack of bloodhounds and a GPS device. Ann Coulter? A scrawny rich woman who writes the same damn book over and over again saying the same thing: "liberals suck." Gee, Ann...if the devil had a daughter, would he name her after you? You claim to be a Christian, but if that's Christianity, you can have it.

I could spend ages talking about the creatures inhabiting this administration alone. George W., the scion of a wealthy oil family whose alleged service to this country goes back generations. A family that has certainly gained more out of the deal than the rest of America has. Dick Cheney? The man is padding his nest egg at Halliburton and just waiting to leave public life so he can live in the lap of luxury and spend ALL his time shooting caged birds and the occasional lawyer. I could go on, but why bother? These people have scammed all of us--cheated and (to quote John Mellencamp) "swindled" a bunch of honest decent folks into believing they gave a damn about them.

Now what are we looking at for the next Presidential race? From the Republican side--a bunch of insolent, rich motherfuckers with the morals of a pack of alley cats fighting over the last fishhead in a garbage can.

Fred Thompson played an asshole on Law and Order, a political hack who cared less for justice than political expediency. Why do I have the feeling that he wasn't doing a lot of acting in that part?

Rudy? "America's Mayor?" There's no doubt he used the hard work of the rescue workers to propel himself onto the national stage. He has about as much right to be President as would a rabid squirrel.

McCain? The Bush-Hugger? His "Straight Talk Express" derailed is is currently sunk in a fetid swamp with the conductor standing there scratching his head in bafflement.

Huckabee? I shudder to even think of it. If we thought Bush was bad with his religious crap, President Huckabee would be a freakin' nightmare.

And don't even get me started on Ron Paul.

I can't even bear to consider any of the other Republican candidates. Rich, selfish, and indolent, they have nothing to offer any of us except utter destruction of everything America is supposed to represent. More lying, more corruption, more reverse Robin Hood policies that steal from hard working Americans to line the pockets of corporate fat-cats.

These rich Republicans are a festing boil on the ass of America. They all might say they want to deport the illegal immigrants, but there's just one burning irony in that...the illegal immigrants couldn't help but be better for America in the long run than any one of those Republican pricks who'd like to be rid of them.

If any of our prospective candidates can't beat any one of theirs hands down, this country is in even worse shape than we think it is. All it takes is a willingness to tell the truth and stop feeding us with more bullshit from the political crapeteria.

I've said it before and I'll say it again. There's no point to playing nice with these people. If you're going to fight, fight to win.

Or Do Not Pass Go.

"the invasion" and "the occupation" of another country!

It´s the attitude of Republicans and Democrats alike, this "if you´re going to fight, fight to win" which has led this country to the state which it is in today.

WHEN WILL WE, THE PEOPLE, fully comprehend that we have to stop the killing in order to make progress.


You want universal health care?

Stop invading other countries first.

Stop killing innocent men, women and children in the name of democracy.

Support a candidate who is HUMAN enough to say that behaving in the interest of GLOBAL HUMAN RIGHTS is more important than the price of oil, health care, or education.

Uneducated, frightened, and hungry people can't be convinced to look beyond themselves. They don't have the luxury.

... bashing the AWARENESS of uneducated, frightened and hungry people.

Telling yourself that because you have a computer and something to eat this evening, that you have more interest in what´s happening in the world today.

NOT TRUE!

Every human can look beyond themselves, unless they are brainwashed to think ME, ME, ME!

A person who is fighting to feed him or her self and his or her family is going to do that FIRST. I've BEEN hungry. Not just a little hungry, but for-REAL hungry. I've lived on the street. I know a little about it.

People WILL take care of their own first. It's as much instinct as a conscious decision. Some say that all altruism is ultimately self-serving. It's an arguable point because it goes directly to how a person thinks about him or her self.

Fighting for one's own survival tends to render one's priorities to the barest essentials. Humans can look beyond that, at times, but it's not easy. Nor is it always desirable.

I agree with you that a person will think of himself when he´s hungry.

BUT, when a person has enough to eat, a place to live, and time on his/her hands to sit at a computer and take part in a discussion, then he/she should be able to stop thinking about himself/herself, at least while he/she is writing in a forum.

The problem is, that people have been BRAINWASHED by American self-help success rhetoric to concentrate more on themselves than on basic human rights.

If you can BRAINWASH someone to only think of himself, then you have complete control of him.

This is true. And it's one of the major problems we have trying to reach people in this country about the plight of those less fortunate than themselves. If they themselves haven't experienced it, it doesn't exist.

The teachings of Kung-Fu-Tse, known as Confucious to the West, argue that a man should put himself in order first, then his house, then his community, and then his country. That all attempts to better one's world must first start with the self.

Taoism teaches one to live willfully, to consider ones actions as part of a greater whole, to consider the effect they have beyond themselves and in the world at large. Most people live in the world as if dreaming, only marginally aware of cause and effect, and then generally only with regards to their immediate environment. If one acts towards one's neighbor with kindness, compassion, and decency, it can stimulate them to act in a similar way to those with whom THEY come in contact with, but most people seem blind to this fact. They visit upon their neighbors the repercussions of their bitterness, anger, fear, and frustration and then wonder why their environment is so negative.

We can CARE about those who are not our immediate neighbors, but we have the greatest effect on those in the closest proximity. We can exert an effort to make the lives of those around us a little better through our actions and attitudes, and thus influence the lives of others in a widening circle.

It can sound like mysticism, and, in fact, is the basis for many different schools of mysticism, but there's nothing mystical about it. It's pragmatism at its base. People mirror their environment. An environment full of negativity simply breeds more negativity.

People need to stop sleep-walking and understand that there's a reason nearly every major religion on Earth has, at its base, something like the Golden Rule. Because there's a deep and abiding validity to the sentiment. One person can choose to be a force for peace, justice, and harmony, or a force for fear, anger, and hatred. And the people in the world around him or her will reflect back what they receive.

I wax philosophical this morning, it seems.

We all do what we can.