BARELY-CONTAINED, INARTICULATE RAGE

I'm really sick of reading weak attacks against Trump. It's as if the left doesn't know how to get real down and dirty unless it's one of their own. The left can sure find the time and venom for Hillary but what's their best attack on Trump? Nothing.

Remember the nude statue of Trump? The portrait of him with a small wee-wee? The numerous hair jokes? Those didn't work during the campaign, so you figure now that he's President the left will get it together, right?

Wrong. Their strongest attack was hoping the electoral college would do something.

Pretty bad. Ranks up there with crying on Election Night as one of the gravest mistakes ever made. Never let them see you sweat. Or cry. Now you're just a whiny crybaby in the eyes of Trumpers.

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And speaking of whiny crybabies and Trumpers in the same sentence...

Look, saying "get over it" is useless. You won, so bear the weight of that. And there is a lot of weight to bear when your candidate is Trump. If you can't understand why people hate this man then you really have no business voting in the first place. But we know why you did. It's the same reason all conservatives vote for their candidates, no matter how much they dislike them: they want to be on the right side if and when a victory comes down the pike. I'm just glad John McCain and Mitt Romney didn't win, because the smug self-righteousness would be unending.

Instead, people who voted for Trump have to deal with the fact that he sucks as a human being. Being on the winning side can sometimes be a bitch. So deal with his stupidity, his inability to lead, his utterly charmless manner. You voted for him, so maybe YOU should get over it. As for the rest of us, we have every right to bash him for the rest of his term. I'll never get over it because frankly I don't think I'll ever get tired of pointing out what a dumbass Trump is, and if you don't like it well suck it up baby because this is what you're getting for the next four years.

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Funny how some of the people who were on Obama's ass for the NSA and spying on Americans are perfectly fine with Russia hacking their way through our election. That's because once again the heat was directed at Hillary and that gets so many alt-lefties off. They can enjoy their Hillary Hate Hot Tub Party with the alt-right for a little while longer, before the oil and water separate. I actually read something that someone wrote about the hacks that went like this: even if Russia did do the hacking, what's important is what the hacks revealed. Yep, you read that right. The ends justified the means. And to think, I used that line of reasoning to defend Obama and got pilloried for it.

Fuck the backpedaling, what matters is that we supported institutional misogyny in the name of fighting corruption. Never mind that it resulted in the election of perhaps the most corrupt leader we've had since Nixon.

*/*

As of this writing, the last update I've seen on the Pence emails was the middle of November. No one gives a shit because he's a man and he's already in the White House so now all the hippies and brown shirts can sleep at night knowing that at least a Clinton isn't in charge again. Way to go assholes. Keep it up, maybe we can get Satan himself on the ballot for 2020.

*/*

2016 sucked big time but that's old news. Will 2017 be any better? Only if you enjoy making fun of the new President... and I enjoy making fun of the new President.

Have a Happy New Year.

"THE FORCE IS WITH ME, I AM ONE WITH THE FORCE"

Yes, there are spoilers. MAJOR SPOILERS.

Just finished watching Rogue One with my son. I'm writing my thoughts on it as he plays with his Star Wars-themed LEGOs in the other room.

First, since this movie is technically a prequel to the original Star Wars (or as the nerds have termed it, Episode IV: A New Hope) I will give a preamble of sorts, detailing the lead-up to our viewing of the latest installment in this epic saga.

We went to Target last night, where I spent a gift certificate in JR's name on some early Christmas presents for him. He just started Winter Break and he has been a really good boy, and also I know he will get bored quickly; add to that the inclement weather as of late, and you've got two immature males walking the LEGO aisle looking for toys. 

I was a little surprised that JR chose LEGO sets related to the series, because he has never really shown much interest in anything Lucas-related. Even The Force Awakens, while it did excite him, fell away from his radar pretty quickly. Perhaps the kids at school were jawing it up; maybe the fact that I mentioned taking him the next day piqued his interest. At any rate, he made modest choices (two smaller sets and one mid-size set) and we took them home and assembled them... or to be accurate, I did most of the work and he played with them until very late into the evening.

Then we set up a nest in the living room so we could watch a movie before bedtime. I suggested one of the Star Wars movies but JR opted for Spaceballs. Neither of us had seen it in a while, and he was always more partial to Mel Brooks' parody than the films it was parodying. So to prep for Rogue One, we watched a movie that was probably better than the first three episode/prequels combined.

*/*

The terrible effect of this winter weather on traffic conditions meant that the theater where we went to see Rogue One was virtually empty. I shelled out close to $45 on tickets to the 3D version plus snacks and drinks. We missed all the previews that weren't in 3D, but I never cared for previews anyway; the trailer for the new Guardians Of The Galaxy was, of course, delightful. The credits for the new Pirates Of The Caribbean movie went by so fast, however, that I didn't get to see if Johnny Depp is actually going to be in it. (I checked later-- yes, he is... and so is Javier Bardem!)

The movie begins. Once again, the lack of a 20th Century Fox fanfare is jarring, but not as much as the absence of the main Star Wars theme and the iconic scroll-through-the-stars. This instantly (and more than anything else in relation to the promotion for this "one-off" experience) placed Rogue One outside of the accepted canon and into anything-goes territory... which is odd, considering how many references to the main saga this film makes.

As usual, JR's running-out-loud commentary is right on. He notices that the movie feels like a video game. His seeming disinterest in The Force Awakens turns out to be a ruse; he is able to recall entire events from that movie as we're watching. He marvels at both the special effects and the 3D format, although he does complain later that the glasses hurt his eyes. "Last time I take this kid to a 3D movie," I think to myself.

My first thoughts as we watch the movie are that it should've been titled The Rogue Warrior. The first half of the movie owes more to the style of the Mad Max movies than anything in the Star Wars universe. Forrest Whitaker ends up reminding me of Tracy Morgan's SNL character Woodrow. The actors and characters are cool and engaging but not too charismatic-- wouldn't want a repeat of what happened with the parent movies, where minor or supporting characters upstaged the leads and wound up with sub-sects of their own. Thematically, though, the comparison to The Road Warrior is mostly in the mythic plot: a mercenary with the skills to pay the bills is practically forced into taking on a suicide mission and ends up willfully sacrificing themselves for the greater good. It's like the Han Solo story arc, except Han ends up dying, as he was supposed to in Return Of The Jedi.

Knowing how the story ends kills none of the suspense; we still want to see how it was pulled off and what kind of significance it has to the saga as a whole, otherwise it would be useless to even make the movie in the first place. In this regard I think Rogue One is a stellar entry and makes the case for more one-off installments, if only to retroactively fix the gaping plot holes in the series that fans have noticed over the decades. I must say that the final ten minutes of Rogue One had me totally rapt. JR was kind of on-again off-again throughout the whole movie (which is nothing new-- even during the Marvel movies there comes a point where his attention temporarily wanes) but the third act had him so enthralled that he immediately began playing with his LEGO sets as soon as we got home. He was able to follow it almost all the way through but the one thing he always has trouble with is the timeline of these movies. Just like with the Terminator series, which deliberately messes with time in the story itself, the notion that Rogue One takes place before The Force Awakens was beguiling. I explained it as best as I could, and then it clicked with him, and he said, "Oh, it's like a flashback!"

I'm not even going to comment on Peter Cushing rising from the dead, because that is one of the few treats that every Star Wars movie has delivered on: something astonishing that reminds the audience of just how breathtaking these movies can be. For all of the wonders of the first Star Wars, there is always the sense that the creatures are men in costumes; only the space battle scenes had the sort of one-of-a-kind novelty that helped the original movie transcend its limitations and convince us that we'd never seen anything like this before. I'm not concerned with the repercussions or the predictions being made, because back when I was in high school (over two decades ago) John Wayne was doing Coke commercials from the grave, and that seemed either blasphemous or sacrilegious. That it was neither is irrelevant to those who want to naysay what is ultimately a rather impressive effect brought to us by the same people who made us (as kids) believe that Jabba the Hutt and Yoda were real. 

Finally, I think a sci-fi epic is only as good as its villain, but here I'm not talking about Darth Vader. We already know that Vader is a bad-ass, and even though he's not on screen for a long time his presence is definitely felt like a Jedi throat choke. (It bears noting that JR's boredom was done away with the minute Vader's breathing could be heard) But I really liked Ben Mendelsohn as Krennic, because he looks like a cross between Tom Bergeron and the late great Paul Gleason, both the type of actors who look like total A-holes and play it to the hilt. No scenery-chewing was needed; Krennic's line about the destruction of an entire city being "beautiful" was all it took for me to love hating him. And they gave him plenty of opportunities to project the managerial type of prick that audiences get off on despising in these types of films.

When the movie ended, JR and I walked out and drove home, talking about all this Star Wars stuff. For the first time in his short life, he really seemed interested in it. I've never been one to push it on him, because I knew that it would have to grow on him in its own way for him to care about it, but he's going to be 8 in a month and I remember that I was his age when I really started to dig these flicks. In fact, when I was 8 I was immersed in The Empire Strikes Back. I think Rogue One is probably the best Star Wars movie since Empire, because it is a little darker and has less cute moments and the humor is more subtle and less broad. I think that if George Lucas had never made his deal-with-the-devil with Jim Henson then maybe the entire series would have been a tad edgier, more of a hard PG-13 (which is Rogue One's rating) rather than a soft PG. I don't think the intention to incorporate Muppets ruined the Star Wars franchise (it was mostly done in order to realize more complex creatures that didn't look like "men in costumes") but it did make Lucas think twice about decisions like, oh, I don't know, saving Han Solo at the end of Jedi or having Greedo shoot first or using Ewoks or Jar Jar Binks... the list is as long as those scrolls in the beginning of each of the major movies.

That residual darkness is a good thing in terms of storytelling, and even JR noticed it. He pointed out the sadness and pathos of scenes such as Jyn Erso as a child watching her parents being accosted by the Empire, or when she speaks with her father after 15 years of separation only to be separated once more, or the bittersweet final image of Jyn and Cassian embracing in the face of destruction. Those moments were not lost on the little boy upon whom this grand spectacle makes an indelible impression. In fact, it makes him care just a little more than he did before. If he becomes a full-on Star Wars maniac after this, it's because this movie came at the right time, for him and for the series. It's ultimately not a great work on its own merits, but as an auxiliary to the world that Lucas created, it shows so much promise, potential... and hope.

Because rebellions are not the only things that are built on hope. There's dreams too.

MIRROR MIRROR ON THE WALL

I can't help but notice how much the extreme political Left and extreme political Right have in common.

Right now, they both are of the mind that Russia didn't help Trump get elected. Conservatives and Trump supporters see this as a way to undermine his presidency, while liberals and Third Party supporters see this as a weak apology and blind rationale for Hillary losing.

See the common thread? "HILLARY BAD". Then one of the sides invariably posts that stupid meme of the clueless dog sitting in a burning house. But what's notably missing from the meme is a mirror on the wall.

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Living in Indianapolis, where the Colts logo is everywhere, it's funny how I haven't thought of Horseshoe Theory as a way to explain this bizarre phenomenon until now.

Horseshoe Theory basically states that, rather than a linear spectrum with Left and Right stretching away from each other in opposite directions, a more accurate representation of modern political thought would be a horseshoe: both ends in close proximity to each other, while the middle is the spot furthest removed.

At the ends of the 2016 horseshoe model is hatred for Hillary, as well as a willingness to embrace phony-baloney conspiracy sites and anti-corporate nonsense.

The main flaw with Horseshoe Theory is that it fails to include complex belief compatibility. Indeed, I'm a good example of that complexity: I'm a left-wing liberal who distrusts the state and stresses individuality; a religious skeptic who goes to church and believes in God; an anarchist who has faith in local government. Most people would just call me a hypocrite, and they do. It doesn't bother me, but it sure as hell bothers them when I do the same to them.

Having friends and family on  both ends of the linear political spectrum (a construct that is difficult to leave behind, even if the horseshoe model seems attractive) leaves me in an odd position at all times. I receive criticism and flak from both sides because I am not toeing their line, so to speak. Usually, this is a sign that I am doing things right, but lately the proliferation of this horseshoe logic on social media has been exhausting. I don't have the energy or time to blast my so-called leftie friends who are this close to becoming Hitler Youth whenever Hillary is mentioned, nor do I have the masochistic tendencies to listen to racist, elitist claptrap disguised as Libertarianism, and I've never found it harder to tolerate GOP propaganda and bald Trumpism (for there is no other word to describe it, is there?) than now.

No one will honestly reflect upon their biases and personal cognitive dissonances. My only haven of hope is in the political beasts whose lifelong consistency to issues that matter to them (namely, the environment and the economy) makes for rational, idea-driven discourse. No name-calling or paranoid ranting here-- it's pure policy, solutions only. I've know these people since grade school, and what is remarkable is how they evolve and adapt without turning their coats or abandoning their principles. My hats off to them, for they are keeping me sane.

As for the rest of you, do yourselves a favor and look up Horseshoe Theory. I promise you, it will either amuse you or disturb you. But it will go a long way to explaining why you are no different than your supposed "enemy" on the other side of the fence.

RUSSIAN ROULETTE, ELECTION STYLE

Before I begin my latest screed, I want to share my observations about my decision to post political content on my blog instead of social media.

Before I made the switch, I saw my political posting increasing in the wake of the election. Even after I had made several attempts before the election to curb my transmissions, I still found myself wanting to comment, re-post links, share memes, and 'like' news feed items at an accelerated clip.

But after I posted the first of what I hope to be many blog entries in re: current events, I suddenly saw my anxiety over posting political content drop dramatically. By moving the forum over to my blog instead of Facebook, my posting decreased.

I can only attribute this to the format of blogging compared to the format of social media: sites like Twitter and Facebook are all about re-posting information created by others; there is nothing inherently original-- and therefore ultimately satisfying --about sharing something that someone else created. Blogs, however, are more likely to encourage original thought nowadays, especially if (like I did) one eschews linking to external sources and concentrates instead on composing a unique (if eventually shared) perspective.

Another plus is that there is less emphasis on trying to draw 'likes' or comments. After nearly a decade of Facebooking, it was a small relief to post something and not care if anyone read it or not. Thanks to Blogger's dashboard, I can check those stats without having to engage further. My last two posts garnered no comments but I averaged the same amount of visits as if I'd posted it on my News Feed.

There is one thing, of course, that makes this enterprise worthwhile: the freedom to write whatever the hell I want to write without fear of immediate and ignorant reprisal based on an uneducated lack of reading comprehension; no semi-clever attempts at defusing the importance of my dispatch via trolling. Sure, it's a blog-- eventually I will get into it with someone as time goes on... but the likelihood has diminished thanks to the march of time and the advent of faster tech. In other words, the time it takes a troll to click onto my blog page, read everything I've written, then comment derisively could be better spent flaming several Tweets in a row. It's simply not an efficient expenditure of time for the average cyber-dunce these days.

That means I get less interference and more expression out of this blog than I ever have. There was a time when I felt how about this blog as I do about Facebook but now that seemingly everyone is on social media, blogs are where people go to re-post to social media. But the majority of people are not actually visiting the sites unless they see them on social media first.

Now, if I were concerned with my online presence, then it might hurt my feelings to know that no one is sharing my work. But I have no advertisers and no personal stake in my blog being seen by the masses. It's merely here for me to get things off my chest. And it has succeeded wildly in that regard. I feel more fulfilled; I am able to vent (more truthfully, if less succinctly) with less consequence, and it has encouraged me to continue without dread or anxiety over who said what and where I am in all of this.

I'm doing this for me. That's all that matters right now. It's good for me. It's healthy... or at least, healthier.

Now, onto the political caca.

I'll make it brief: I see the irony in President-elect Trump and the CIA going at it in the media ring. Only a few short months ago everyone was going on about the lesser of two evils. Apparently unconcerned that at least one of the candidates (Mike Pence anyone?) was pure evil and therefore rendering the notion of the lesser evil moot, potential voters hemmed and hawed for days on end about the ethical complications of voting for any one of the two major nominees for leadership of the free Western world.

And now, post-election, we have ourselves another ethical dilemma, a political Sophie's Choice if you will: who do we want to put our trust in? The organization that has historically lied about all its intelligence while funding backdoor coups and engaging in disinformation globally? Or the dishonest car salesman/casino magnate who actually supported at one time the intelligence of the organization in question and now has the BALLS to denounce same organization for it?

America, you brought this on yourselves. This all could've been avoided had you not been afraid of the corrupt candidate who has a vagina; the same candidate who went on TV and told millions of viewers/voters during a presidential debate that Russia was trying to get Trump elected; the same candidate whose popularity in the polls was greatly negated by a ponderous last-minute news bombshell... from an intelligence organization... a bombshell, mind you, that was later recanted somewhat after the damage was done.

And now the Swamp Drainer has filled it back up again, and all I can think about is the last line of Pete Townshend's immortal "Wont Get Fooled Again"... which I will not link nor explicitly cite because (1) you should already know it by now, and (2) I'm pretty serious about keeping the links to the barest minimum. As my mantra goes: You'll Just Have To Do It Yourself.

And in these days of fake news reports and dubious counter-claims made by various political groups, you may indeed have to start doing it ALL by yourself.

GHOST STORIES OF THE FOURTH REICH

I'm reading about Pizzagate and the only thing going through my head is: Why are suddenly people acting upon the impulse to "investigate" these things now? Sure, the Pizzgate rumors are relatively recent, but figures like Hillary Clinton and the Bushes have been linked to salacious conspiracy theories for decades. And throughout all those years, I must admit it crossed my mind every now and then that someone will take these stories too far and go Travis Bickle on some unsuspecting person or persons some day.

The only answer I can conceive is that this Trump presidency is bringing out the worst in people on all sides of the political spectrum.

As I noted in the previous post, I stopped communicating with a friend over politics. That person died recently. I'll refer to him as Droogie, as we had a shared appreciation of the movie A Clockwork Orange.

When I first met Droogie, it was a pre-9/11 world*. We worked late nights in the Network Operation Center of a massive radio conglomerate. We made sure the radio programs were broadcasting properly, and so we listened to a lot of talk radio as a result. After all, it was our job.

Droogie was a former engineer for a prominent recording studio during the 1980s. He grew up in the wake of the Free Love '60's and came of age during the late '70s' and mid-'80s glam metal movements. He was a long-ginger-haired, chain-smoking, leather-clad free spirit and a rebel at heart but he didn't have any particular preoccupation with politics. He was also handicapped-- he was the unlikely survivor of a car crash that should've killed him. He walked with a cane and was in constant pain but refused to take painkillers because he didn't want to become addicted to opiates.

Most of the radio content was right-wing claptrap, but a few programs focused on strange happenings and conspiratorial windage. This was long before people like Alex Jones and other Internet personalities began hawking their Illuminati-coated wares. Droogie had never heard any of these conspiracy theories; I, on the other hand, was well-versed in many of them.

In those days you had to go to weird bookstores or place orders by mail to get your hands on truly bizarre conspiracy theories. Not every Waldenbooks or B. Dalton's carried books by Jim Marrs or William Cooper. You couldn't get magazines and weeklies like Steamshovel Press at news stands. The collected works of Robert Anton Wilson were hard to come by through regular commercial avenues. The most mainstream types of media devoted to such material were the tabloids, but not necessarily The Enquirer-- more like the Weekly World News, which took Elvis sightings and UFO abduction tales to their absurd conclusions.

Nowadays, you can click on almost any link and find strange, bogus, and too-incredible-to-believe articles of the tinfoil-hat-wearing variety. But back in the pre-9/11 world, before the Internet gained critical mass, before Pynchon-esque paranoia gripped our country and refused to let go, you had to work and dig a little in order to get your bemused, half-joking fix of bona fide conspiracy lore.

While listening to shows like Dreamland and hosts like Art Bell, I regaled Droogie with some of the more fantastic stories I'd read and heard, everything from the myriad of possible suspects involved in the JFK assassination to MK-ULTRA/Project Monarch conjecture to the coming New World Order. And I have to say right now, this is a huge regret on my part.

I gravitated to conspiracy lore because it was a way of freaking people out. Most normal people would listen to me talk at length but the looks on their faces said it all: they thought I was nuts. And I liked that. I wanted people to think I was nuts. It was funny. It fit my persona to a tee. But deep down inside it was the same as talking about album liner notes or any other random, useless trivia that I had stored in my memory: just a lot of hot air designed to kill time. It made for great conversation. It also made for great storytelling-- this is also before The Da Vinci Code and an entire cottage industry devoted to the notion that Things Are Not As They Seem.

But the one theory I was not familiar with was the Bigger Nut Theory, which stated that there is always someone freakier than you just waiting to absorb your nuttiness and run with it. In Droogie, I'd met my glorious, freak-flag-flying match.

Droogie was skeptical at first, and I respected that. But over time it began to wear him down a bit, I suppose, because he started to confide in me some of his personal conspiracy theories, like how apricots cure cancer but the "healthcare industrial complex" kept it a secret. Once again, I thought nothing of it-- just late-night ramblings from two unusual freaks.

But when 9/11 happened, it changed the game. Now paranoia was de rigeur. Suddenly all those crazy plots about shape-shifting reptilians ruling the world and Reichstag-like false flags were probable. If I could watch the Twin Towers crumble on TV before my very eyes, then isn't everything possible now? The effect on Droogie was instantaneous: he began to get even more argumentative and started berating me for "sitting on the truth" and crowing about how he would do something about it if he were physically able. Finally I felt like he had pushed me away and gotten lost in a rabbit hole of his own design, but one that I also felt guilty about having a hand in. I didn't want to plant suggestions in his brain, but at the same time I think he was searching for something like that, just as I was. Only for me, the search was fueled by a morbid curiosity, whereas with Droogie it was a way of managing and having control over a life that didn't seem to make much sense. A fall from grace like his was spectacular, going from rock-and-roll excess and pre-AIDS sexual freedom to sullen, decrepit, sterile physical entropy in front of a computer screen because your legs can't support your weight for longer than an hour.

Immediately after 9/11 my paranoia kicked into overdrive, but that's a post for another day. In the meantime, it drove someone like Droogie to embrace the lore he had merely been flirting with. Eventually I burned out over it all somewhere around the end of the second Bush 43 term, but Droogie was just getting started. And he continued in that vein until he died last Halloween.

Incidentally, after a few days of processing his passing, my paranoia returned subtly, wondering if perhaps Droogie had stumbled across "the truth" and had been summarily dispatched by the Illuminati. I think he would've loved that train of thought and he would've laughed with me and said something like, "If they ever find me dead under suspicious circumstances, you know what happened!"

As for me, my fascination with the idea of secret governments and covert operations is still there, but muted and weighed against the march of time. None of the conspiracy theories have come true or have been exposed. The New World Order, if it really exists, is very unorganized. I believe in the Second Law of Thermodynamics more than I do the idea that somehow this planet will be united under a one-world government that can keep tabs on everyone.

But more importantly, the secret is out. It's no longer fun to whisper to others in the know about the Franklin Cover-up, or the Iran-Contra-crack connection, because now (as the late, beautiful Leonard Cohen once sang) everybody knows... or rather, everyone can know if they just turn on their phone. New York Magazine did an article on the greatest conspiracy theories of all time. Presidential candidates are crowing about the rigging of elections that they end up winning. Even my soon-to-be-8-year-old son pointed out the Eye In The Pyramid on the dollar and said, "That's Illuminati!" How the hell does he know about it? He certainly didn't get it from me... which is how he should've been exposed to it!

Let's face it: Conspiracy Lore is In, and I can't wait for it to be Out.

So, in the spirit of these times, here are my top 5 circumstantial clues that expose how the Trump win was a foregone conclusion by The Powers That Be.

1. Trevor Noah replacing Jon Stewart on The Daily Show: Jon didn't want to keep doing it anymore, not with a man like Trump being groomed for the position as leader of the free world.

2. Glenn Beck becomes liberal: Having branched out into many different forms of commercial media, Mr. Beck was looking for the next gravy train. By endorsing Hillary and opposing Trump, he now has a meal ticket for the next 4 to 8 years.

3. Lorne Michaels uses Alec Baldwin to play Trump on SNL: He has Darrell Hammond as an announcer, who does a great impersonation of The Donald. And he even had Taran Killam try his hand at it before he let go of the cast member inexplicably last season. But Lorne needed a ringer for the next 4 years, and Baldwin was his go-to man.

4. All the celebrities dying in 2016: That one needs no explanation. They're not dead, they're all on a rocket ship headed for Mars where they can jam with Kurt Cobain and Tupac.

5. Castro checking out: He was in power longer than 10 U.S. Presidents combined, on his deathbed for almost the entire Obama administration... but somehow finally cashes in just before Trump takes power? Not buying it.

I'd like to add Droogie's death to the list, but it would violate The Law of Fives**, and plus he wasn't as well known as everybody else on the list. But I hope wherever he is, he appreciates the gesture. Even if we couldn't see eye-to-eye towards the end, I still had respect for him.

*= Some events have been fictionalized due to poor memory and artistic license.
**= I'm not gonna link it... you'll just have to look for it yourself.

TWO MEN ENTER, ONE MAN LEAVES

If you haven't been to my blog before, WELCOME!

If you have, you'll no doubt notice that not only are previous entries few and far between, but they are also not very political. I suppose there is a good reason for that, but I cannot think of it right now.

Suffice it to say, I used to blog quite frequently in the past. I had at least four or five blogs going on about 15 years ago. One was very political and critical of George W. Nixon (as I used to call him) and the rest had the occasional news-related item.

Then I discovered social media. First it was Friendster; then My Space, which was mostly about posting music on my page; and then I came across Facebook, and kinda stayed there. I have a Twitter account but I never use it, and the reason is evident when you read how long my old blog posts can get.

So Facebook has been where I posted EVERYTHING for the past decade or so. No need for extraneous blogs-- or, more importantly, no time for them. Marriage and raising a son and moving to the Midwest really took up all my free moments. I could link you to those but they have been neglected and many of the links are long gone and the relevancy has passed. Better to just start a whole new thing.

This new political climate is also a factor. President Trump is something completely new, and yet we've seen him before. I'm not gonna go the Hitler route; I'm thinking more like Alfred Jarry's Ubu Roi. I won't link to that; you're just gonna have to do the leg work yourself. But most likely I will end up writing about Jarry in the near future anyway, so just be patient and I will eventually get to it.

At this moment I feel the need to explain why I have returned to the haven of the political blog. It's because of what I call 'cultural gaslighting'. I define that as the process of being talked down to or lectured by political and religious neophytes and poseurs, to varying degrees.

I resist the urge to call the religious zealots poseurs because some of them have really turned their lives around thanks to religion; it just annoys me that I've been going to church and reading the Bible since I was a kid but now all of a sudden someone who prefers Christ to jail now has the cojones to tell me that I'm living foul.

With the political zealots, however, I have less pity. I have no tolerance for people whom I clearly remember complaining about people like me who talk political shop, who are now spouting endless ill-informed bullshit about current events and wagging their finger at me with NO AWARENESS of their own complicity in this stinky cluster of fuck we call the news.

It's not all bullshit, though. Some of it is common sense, whether it be liberal or conservative in its viewpoint. But the sancti-fucking-nomious way in which it is expressed riles me to no end. I know, I know... I wrote the book on sanctimony in political discourse... which is why it gets me upset: I've been doing it for years. How dare some newbie upstart tell me how to blather on pointlessly about political minutiae!

I guess I feel guilty because in at least one instance my political boorishness actually converted someone over to my way of thinking... and then I changed my way of thinking! Which is ironic, given that I am railing against people who change horses midstream... but in this case, I stopped entertaining certain conspiracy theories while inadvertently turning a friend onto them. This resulted in many painful exchanges where we butted heads and I ultimately had to block him from my Facebook page because he was annoying the shit out of me by posting onto my Timeline after I told him not to do that.

I would check up on his page from time to time; by then he'd become a full-on Ron Paul Libertarian... a "Paulbot", if you will. I guess there are worse things... no, wait, there aren't! At least not many. But at any rate, we didn't ever talk again. And it's too bad because he passed away on Halloween night of this year, a week before an election that may have conceivably killed him anyway had he somehow survived the heart attack he suffered.

I vowed I wouldn't let politics ruin a friendship again, but in the wake of Trump's victory this seems almost impossible. So I am taking extra measures to keep my social media life and my Political-with-a-capital-P side apart. Sort of like the separation of church and state. Or like the McDLT. Anyone remember the McDLT? I won't link it; you're just going to have to find out on your own.

I will end this blog entry with a newfound reason for why my previous posts on this blog were not political: I was actually trying to do the opposite of what I'm doing now. This blog was going to be the respite from current news, and my Facebook page was going to be where I was going to wage the wars and debate the critics. But a funny thing has happened: I no longer have the stomach for it. I now get sick when I think of having to bicker online with people. I don't like that feeling; I used to live for it, but now I detest it. And yet a part of me still has the jones to argue with people over issues that, truthfully, might not directly affect me or anyone I know that much. So how to reconcile that? I guess moving the political BS over to the blog is a better tactic. It keeps my social media friendly and it takes the war somewhere off the beaten track. Blogs have less currency these days (at least that's how it seems to me) so it's sort of a No Man's Land for battling among opinions.

So anyway, this is the place. This is the Terrordome. This is where you can find me if you want to talk about the President or world leaders or inane domestic policies or ISIS. This is where we can freely bash Mike Pence or discuss why Bernie Sanders is theoretically a good politician. As for my Facebook page, that's gonna be devoted to pics of my son, You Tube shares, and movie reviews. That's how I like it, and that's how I'm gonna keep it.