THE OLD ME (aka The Savage God)

Everybody is so political these days. 

It wasn't always like that, of course. Thanks to this new Information Age, anyone with an Internet connection and some free time can be an armchair pundit. I know how contemptuous I sound, but someone like myself cannot help but notice this paradigm shift. After years of hearing from people how they hate hearing me talk about politics, now all they want to do is bore me with their politics.

I realized that things reached a critical mass last year when my mother started posting political rants on Facebook. No offense to the woman who gave me life and raised me... but when even your own mom shows up at the party, it's safe to say the party is over.

Maybe it's my comeuppance for blasting my opinions so loudly. But then again, I don't know about that. Maybe it's the natural consequence of my opinion-blasting. Long before the concept of viral content became associated with the Worldwide Web, the notion that ideas were like viruses that can be spread and transmitted exponentially did exist. 

In the past I was definitely trying to get my ideas out there. Unfortunately, most of them were half-baked conspiracy screeds and juvenile attempts at shock and controversy... what we refer to these days as 'trolling'. Luckily, most of that happened when I was a teenager, so now I can look back at as adult and snicker at my sheer gall. 

Recently, however, I unearthed evidence of those ill-advised attempts. Back then, we didn't have no consarned Interwebs so we made Xerox copies of things and stapled them together and handed them out like flyers outside a nightclub. 

Yes, you guessed it: I found copies of the underground 'zine I made during high school.

There were cringe-worthy moments to be sure. Leafing through the pages, I found so many things to be embarrassed by: shock value for its own sake; pointless smut, particularly in the first issue; infantile attacks on other students, teachers, and administrators; and plenty of guileless profanity, none more pronounced than in the title of this angst-y wiseacre publication: "FUCK OFF!"

But I also laughed out loud, and I also realized that my friends and I (because there was no way I was going to do this alone) were smarter than I could ever give us credit for, and we were clearly having fun with it. It helps that, despite our willingness to be silly or vulgar or cynical, some of the articles had some depth. The opinions are dated and shrill, but you can see that we were willing to defend them to the death... of our social lives, which admittedly we neither possessed nor could afford.

However, it's not the articles and the rants that make me proud enough to take pictures of these pages with my phone and post them on a blog. It's the artwork.

I had just discovered Winston Smith, the man who designed many album covers and insert posters for the punk band Dead Kennedys. He specialized in topical montage art that had a style all its own. I co-opted that style for the look of FUCK OFF! and began to clip out magazine and newspaper photos, interesting tidbits of journalism, headlines in all sorts of fonts, and mounted them on notebook paper with a glue stick. Then I solicited a few friends for things to fill in the empty spaces: essays, articles, photos, cartoons, anything that would visually attract the attention of my peers.

To truly tell the tale of how I started doing this, I have to pick up where I left off in my last blog entry. In the wake of our confrontation with a Nazi skinhead crew on a city bus, I was suddenly infused with a self-righteous indignation that nobody could cool. Starting high school as a Sophomore, I was determined to strike out on my own and reinvent myself as some sort of journalistic provocateur, symbolized for me in my choice for a pseudonym: Hunter S. Thompson.

The two companions with whom I encountered the skinheads (whom I declined to name in the last post because I wasn't sure if they wanted me to) were very instrumental in turning me on to new ideas, both culturally and politically. My normal-looking friend who took an elbow to the face on the bus that day was, at the time, my best friend. He encouraged me to tell stories on the school bus every morning, and turned me on to music by bands like Led Zeppelin and the Stay Cats. He also had a liberal outlook on life, and it was at odds with my conservative-raised beliefs. We debated each other constantly, and after a while I began to see that his ideas actually did have more in common with how I really felt about things than anyone else in my life up to that point. I loved my family, but I also knew I was not the same as them; we did not see eye-to-eye on many issues. My best friend enabled me to find a way of expressing my concerns without being judged or ridiculed. 

Our mutual friend, the one in the Butthole Surfers T-shirt, was like no one I'd ever met: an accomplished artist even in grade school, with a mastery and skill I have rarely ever seen in my personal life; an avid punk rock fan who introduced me to bands like the aforementioned Dead Kennedys as well as The Vandals, The Descendents, The Germs, and X; also, he was a politically active member of a politically active family. Long before it became chic to buck the Establishment, the kid with the Butthole Surfers T-shirt and his parents and siblings were socially conscious and passionate about their commitment to the environment and to progressive causes.

And me? I was the writer, the storyteller. I had a way with words. I had the gift of gab. I also was shameless in my dealings with other people. I wasn't nervous in front of large crowds. I had balls. I think my friends thought I was a little crazy, but it only made them more curious as to how far I was willing to go.

In a way, you can say that these two associates of mine programmed me to be a political agitator. Certainly no one in my own family ever ingrained these ideas into my head. But they had to come from somewhere. And seeing as these guys were my best friends in the whole world during the elementary and middle school years, it makes sense (as I look back) to say that they poured their beliefs into me and I accepted it and ran with it.

What is sadly ironic is that it took the skinhead incident to catalyze this drive, this urge to make statements in a public/social arena. The irony stems from the fact that, as I noted in that blog entry, my friendship with these two friends deteriorated after we started attending high school. I felt like I had somehow outgrown them or that we didn't have the same level of commitment to things. Plainly speaking, I think they really did think I was completely nuts after almost getting us into a fight with some violent neo-Nazis. That summer before high school, I didn't really see or hear from them, which made the growing schism even wider. I had no classes with them, and I started to make other friends. These friends that I was making ended up being the people I recruited to help me with FUCK OFF!


I did the lion's share of the work but I handed the major writing assignments off to a person who chose the pseudonym "Fast" Eddie Peale. "Fast" Eddie had a style that took no punches: he went for the jugular, and I liked that. When he showed me his first articles, I declared them perfect. No need to edit, no need to tell him what or how to write... his contributions were ultimately what kept people's attention, after the visuals I cooked up lured them in. He targeted what he perceived as posturing and preening at our school: the little political groups devoted to ending South African apartheid that he (correctly) viewed as glamorized social clubs for those who weren't jocks or cheerleaders; the ways in which our musical choices determined cliques (perhaps the most controversial essay we ever published); and a list of reasons why killing a quarter of the world's population would be beneficial to society (an immature foray into satire via Jonathan Swift).

As sophomoric as this all was (and not because we were Sophomores, mind you) it also bears noting that this wasn't your average teenage whining. Far from it. FUCK OFF! was sort of mean-spirited and petty... and in comparison to what is going on right now as we speak online and in the world of politics, fairly prescient.

Many people assumed that I put "Fast" Eddie up to it when it came to things to write about, but the truth is that he was never told what to write or how to write it. Thus, when he targeted the kid in the Butthole Surfers T-shirt in an article about political consciousness in our school, many who knew me before high school assumed that I had commissioned a "hit piece" as retaliation for... for what, nobody ever explained. And it's just as well, because I suspect that if I had commissioned a hit piece (my God, just writing that sentence both makes me ill and makes me laugh) it would not have been as funny as what "Fast" Eddie turned in. 

Fortunately for everyone involved, I have not reprinted the articles for people to read. Some of the text can be seen in the pictures I have uploaded, but I made no effort to transcribe the content. Because frankly, it was high school writing at its best, and even if Mr. Peale were to sign off on it and agree to let me post his articles, I don't see how they would have any point other than to reflect upon ideas expressed over two decades ago, ideas that were funny back then but may have aged badly and might prove to be more embarrassing than we all would like to admit.

As it is, Peale doesn't even know I'm posting this. He's on my Facebook but I think he's too busy these days to log on. I might send this link to him to see if he might enjoy it, but I doubt he will. There's no bad blood between us-- I just have a feeling that (true to his ornery self) he would scoff at the notion that there's anything of value here.

As for me, I see the value (as I stated earlier) in the artwork. There are several elements that, even as they are of their time, are actually ahead of their time. For example, in the top left corner of the image above this paragraph, there is a picture of Donald Trumpp with a caption over his head reading "The Great Satan". I can't think of anything that encapsulates what a large number of people all over the world are feeling right now more than that. It has many layers to it, the biggest being the proposed anti-Muslim registry our new President wants to implement. "The Great Satan" of course is the nickname that Arab nations have given to the United States as the Western superpower it has been ever since the end of WWII. 

I created that small fraction of an image, one that was a small part of a larger tapestry, almost as na afterthought. The caption could've gone over the heads of any number of political figures of the time: Bush 41, Clinton, Yasser Arafat, Jerry Falwell, even someone like Luther Campbell from 2 Live Crew, who was embroiled in a First Amendment fight over his song lyrics. But it ended up on Trumpp, and seeing that small fragment as I rifled through these pages prompted me to get out the camera, take pics, upload them to the PC, and begin writing this out. 

In my mind, there is hope that some teenager out there is doing exactly what we did back then, but this time on their Tumblr, or on Twitter, or Snapchat or Instagram. 

After a few issues and a dwindling attention span for our brand of agitprop, "Fast" Eddie officially retired from FUCK OFF! My interest in the 'zine at this point was strictly editorial, which means nothing when you consider that I published nearly everything I was handed. More contributors began to submit artwork and articles, but as one friend of mine put it, the 'zine became more of a thing for the writers and artists than any readers. I think we even printed a contribution from someone's mom, under the name Suzy Creamcheese. As cool as it was for her to support our 'zine, remember what I wrote earlier about the party being over when the moms show up. 

We never got into any real trouble for our efforts, which disappointed me a bit. I totally imagined an entire scenario in my head whereupon the principal finds an issue of the 'zine and can barely contain his unfettered rage, his hands shaking the pages loose as he fumes with wrath. I could hear my name being growled as he pages his secretary, ordering her to "find out who is putting out this scandalous filth" and bring them to his office.

The fantasy falls apart when I recall that (1) our principal was a woman, and (2) there actually was an "official" underground newspaper called The Forum at our school. It started when a student created it, got in trouble, and some of the teachers defended the work and volunteered to supervise its publication so as not to stifle the creativity and expression at hand. This appalled me to no end, even though I submitted a piece or two that made it to publication. I had created FUCK OFF! as some sort of antidote to the notion of an official underground press, but when the most offensive piece we ever published was a Peale article that pigeonholed everyone in our class according to their taste in pop music, that should've been the sign that we weren't going to really get far with the whole -let's-piss-people-off thing.

I must say, my high school was extremely tolerant. Either that, or people today are just offended far easier than thy ever were.

There was one essay that I penned shortly before I stopped putting these things out for good. I was going to reprint it but decided against it, even though I am really proud of what it had to say.

I decided not to reprint it because I don't want to seem like I am living in the past. It's bad enough that I am celebrating something I did in high school. I feel justified in that only be cause it is the logical extension from my blog post about the skinhead incident, which was inspired by neo-Nazi Richard Spencer getting smacked upside his head.

But the other reason why  I didn't reprint that one article that made me proud is because, sadly, it is still relevant. When I wrote it in 1991, I was hoping for a better future. I was hoping that people would have evolved. In many ways, civilization has evolved since those days. But right now, we're seeing it devolve, going backwards. It is such a stark contrast to what I wrote back then.

My article's premise was that, if we wanted a better future for our kids, we had to start by reaching out to our peers before they go off to college, become cogs in the Establishment, and churn out babies, all the while passing on the bad habits and prejudices of the past. The future judges, leaders, police, and soldiers need to be programmed, like me, by people with optimism and love in their hearts before the world pummels them down and crushes their spirits. Only in this way, I surmised, can the human race rise above the muck and the mire.

Looking around these days, I don't see it happening any time soon. But at least I have a kid of my own, and I'm doing everything I can to make sure he gets it before he grows old. I'm doing my part, in other words.

Eventually, the demise of FUCK OFF! came right after Clinton became President. I can only imagine, had I failed to graduate in 1992 and didn't finally make it out until the end of his two-term presidency (or, in a less backwards manner, the underclassmen had taken up the mantle and continued publishing FUCK OFF! in my absence) what the 'zine would've done with material like the Monica Lewinsky scandal. By the time that thing hit the news, I was already busy being a cog in the machine after pursuing a record contract with a hip-hop group and then (when that failed) getting hired on at a radio network that eventually got bought out by Clear Channel.

My one real regret while working for Clear Channel was that I never took over the streaming satellite feed during a Rush Limbaugh show to broadcast Bill Hicks' stand-up bit about Bush, Reagan, and Rush doing nasty things with Barbara Bush in a bathtub. I had the idea, and I know how I would've carried it out. Sure, I would've been fired, fined by the FCC, and received death threats from Dittoheads the world over... but the Old Me would've done it with no compunction.

Eventually, they laid me off after almost eight years of service. How appropriate. 

I discovered the virtues of blogging and trolling in late 2002, around the same time I got the boot from Clear Channel. I began to follow current events again, and at one point I had as many as five blogs (one being expressly political) as well as being as contributor to a few college websites that did the underground press thing much better than I ever did in high school. I battled with Internet trolls and argued profusely with complete strangers, some of whom I might have been friends with had I met them in person IRL.

And now, here we are, in the Trumpp Age. The New Dark Ages. The Era Of The Great Satan. And here I am, wallowing in past pseudo-victories, laughing to myself as people debate concepts such as "alternative facts" and "fake news", marveling at how many people I used to know who hated it when I talked about politics now think they have an opinion just because they own a smart phone.

I'm over it. And yet, I'm not. Because it's all coming full circle. Like I said, somewhere out there, a bunch of smart-ass kids are getting their crazy anything-for-a-laugh friend to do something wild and nutty. And then that kid is going to have an epiphany one day, and he (or she... gotta be gender neutral) is going to go out and make bold, grand declarations. 

And I hope they get further with it then I ever did.

One last thing:

The poet W.B. Yeats attended Alfred Jarry's debut performance of his play Ubu Roi back in 1896. The character of Pere Ubu is a buffoonish, vulgar caricature who somehow becomes the ruler of the nation and proceeds to "dis-embrain" his political foes before he and his manipulative wife are driven out of Poland and into exile. The play ended when the lead actor playing Pere Ubu uttered the play's first word, "Merdre," and caused an infamous riot.

Later on, Yeats was quoted as saying, in response to both the play and the riot, "After our own verse, after all our subtle colour and nervous rhythm... what more is possible? After us the Savage God."  

NAZI PUNKS F--- OFF

Normally I'm one of those guys who says that violence isn't the answer and that we need to be able to talk things out rationally and peacefully.

But there are some things that need to be handled with fisticuffs. Neo-Nazis like Richard Spencer, for example, who got knocked the fuck out by some anonymous guy at the women's rally in D.C. following Trumpp's inauguration.

Okay, so he didn't get knocked out cold... and I would love to share the link to many many MANY videos that riff on this incident captured on video with all sorts of music (my faves are M.O.P. and LL Cool J, with New Order as an honorable mention) but that violates my no-link policy on this blog. You're a big boy/girl, you can find it yourself. And you'll enjoy it just as much as I have.

But I'm not blogging about it to state the obvious, that sometimes neo-Nazis need to get punched in the fucking face. No, I'm blogging today to share my own personal story about the time some friends and I dealt with racist skinheads on a bus in the Valley when I was about 15.

It was the summer before our Sophomore year of high school. The junior high we attended went up to 9th grade, so we were going to enter high school without having been Freshmen. Our 9th grade year was spent getting ready to make this transition, and as a result we started taking days off. On this particular day we went to the beach and goofed off. Later we even scored a ride from my mom's co-worker, but he only got us over the hill and dropped us off in Sherman Oaks. One of us invited the other two back to his place, so we got on the RTD (back before it was known as the MTA) and took Sepulveda Blvd straight to his house.

The bus was kind of crowded, so we had to stand. I was wearing camouflage pants, a sleeveless shirt and sandals; one of my friends was wearing normal shorts and shirt, and the other was wearing a shirt that had "Butthole Surfers" emblazoned on it. He also had a punk haircut, while my hair was long and our other friend had a normal haircut. The description of how we looked is crucial to understanding how all of what I'm about to tell went down.

In the back of the bus where we were standing sat quite an array of types: Mexican day laborers, senior citizens, middle-aged shoppers coming back from the mall... and sprawled out in the very back of the bus, sneering and sniggering at everyone around them, were three white kids, probably a little older than us.

One of the white kids had a normal haircut and clothes, except he was a redhead with freckles. The second one was a full-on Nazi skinhead, probably from Sylmar or Van Nuys. He was all decked out in total Nazi skinhead regalia: bomber jacket, Doc Martens, shaved head, tattoos with swastikas and various other symbols, and suspenders (or "braces", as they were much thicker than normal suspenders). The third kid was definitely a punker, but his mohawk was combed to one side, which looked unusual and stood out like a green hat with an orange bill.

They were talking among themselves and so, as uncomfortable as we all felt around them, we also didn't really think much of it. As long as they were not addressing us I think we could've made the trip without incident. But it didn't take long for me to realize they were making in-jokes between themselves about all of us on the bus, aware of the sway they were holding us hostage with by their mere presence.

I guess they just couldn't help themselves. I guess they just weren't able to leave well enough alone, because Mr. Sideways Mohawk suddenly said something to my friend with the Butthole Surfers T-shirt.

"Hey man," he said in a dopey drawl, "there's a spot on your shirt."

Of course there was a spot on his shirt. It was a punk rock T-shirt of an infamous punk band, and the punk style of the shirt was riddled with spots and smudges and smears and anything to make it look worn and ratty. In fact I think my friend may have also added a touch of his own to it, seeing as he was (and still is) a talented artist.

But in relation to what this neo-Nazi was saying to my friend, there was no spot worth pointing out. In my opinion it was a ploy to intimidate us, to make us feel even more uncomfortable than we already felt. It also felt like he was setting us up for something.

Well, I couldn't help myself either. I replied to Mr. Sideways Mohawk... or rather, I addressed my friend in response to the mohawk kid.

"Dude, there's no spot on your shirt."

Soon the three white supremacists were trying to get something started. They recoiled at the bold assertion I'd made; they felt I was calling them liars or something like that. They were acting like their feelings were hurt. They feigned disgust at my insistence that there was no spot on the shirt.

Finally the full-on Nazi skin said, "This kid must think he's Rambo, with those camo pants on. Is that it? You think you're Rambo or something?"

I was scared, but I also wasn't going to back down. "I'm not the one wearing military boots."

If there is one thing I am really, really good at, it's saying the one thing that gets someone's attention. I suppose you can say I have a way with words, because the conversation definitely shifted gears. They were now standing in front of us, threatening to hurt us, but also chickening out because they suddenly sensed that everyone else around us would probably join in and help take out the trash with glee.

I will always remember the skinhead's words to me as their stop came up and they turned to leave. It was like a melodramatic scene in some action movie. I almost laughed in his face but thought better of it-- after all, he stood a full foot above me.

"If I ever see you in a dark alley or anywhere on the street, I swear I will kill you with my bare hands."

I don't remember what my response was to that. All I remember is that I was shaking... but I also wasn't going to back down. Even if he hit me right then and there, I wasn't going to back down.

Well, he didn't hit me right then and there. Instead, as the rear doors opened, the redhead kid (who had been silent the whole time) snuck in a quick slap in the face to my friend in the normal clothes, who also had been silent the whole time. It was like they were somehow perfectly matched up against each other. Then the three white boys jumped off the bus... but not before the Mexican laborers literally got up, held onto the top of the rear door, swung out of the bus behind them and kicked one of them in the head.

As the bus rode off, I could see out the window that there was a melee going on between the Mexicans and the skinheads. I turned to my friend who got slapped-- he did not look very happy, but it was a baby slap at best and probably just startled my friend more than anything. My other friend in the Butthole Surfers T-shirt was speechless.

I was pretty speechless too. What in the living fuck just happened?

Suddenly, one of the senior citizens spoke to me.

"You were right to stand up to them."

And then I returned to my senses, realizing how close I got to getting my ass kicked on the bus. That skinhead was really tall and mean-looking. I wasn't known for my fighting prowess, and I might have been able to get a lick in or two... but I'm sure that I would've gotten schooled had chingasos been thrown. As for my friends, I can't say if they would've had my back or not. My one friend who got slapped was quiet and looked like he was getting ready for a throwdown, but that sneaky slap took him by surprise. Butthole Surfers shirt was definitely not the type to fight, at least not back then.

In fact, I was sure they were mad at me as we got off at our stop and went back to Butthole Surfer's house. I kept nervously talking about the whole thing, letting off some steam, but they were very, very quiet. I think they were mad because I almost got us into a situation that we had no control over, but I was just adrenalized and relieved and exhilarated by the entire ordeal.

I did say one thing at the time, however, that has turned out to be prescient and true:

"When I look back on this, I want to be able to know that I didn't back down just because I was afraid."

Perhaps my friends' anger stemmed from a feeling that maybe I overreacted, and that by getting defensive from the start I may have misinterpreted or misunderstood what was going on and thereby almost causing a scene that may not have had a good outcome for us. But as the obvious minority out of the three of us-- my normal-dressed friend is Persian but his skin is light; Butthole Surfer is Israeli but definitely Caucasian-looking --I was vibeing on something else entirely. I was feeling the hate, the superiority, the smugness. It was coming out of them, pouring out, oozing out if you will. Like I stated earlier, they couldn't help themselves. Their racist ways made it impossible for them to just leave us alone. I was wearing my Coke-bottle eyeglasses, we were all wearing sandals from being at the beach, and we were all noticeably younger than them... we were vulnerable. And they knew it, because they were bullies, and they were bullying everyone on the bus subtly before we even got on, and they would've kept subtly bullying and intimidating everyone had I not spoken up.

So when I look back on this incident, my only regret is that I didn't throw a punch. Sure, the Mexicans got their licks in when they all got off at the stop in front of Sepulveda Junior High, but I really wish I had thrown a punch. It would be a sweeter story to tell, wouldn't it?

Maybe not. Because people know I'm more of a peaceful kind of guy who abhors violence. And everyone knows that my fists are not my greatest weapon: it's my tongue. The retorts I had for them were more devastating than anything, because it made them realize who they were fucking dealing with: an intelligent Latino/Japanese soon-to-be-sophomore with an intellectual chip on his shoulder and words that can wind up even the most detached observer. In the many years since that day I have only had to physically fight a handful of times, but I've gotten in countless verbal arguments and debates. That is my forte, that is my strength. That's what I'm good at.

Afterwards, the three of us went to the same high school but I kind of drifted apart from them. That day on the bus, I think I realized that I was on a different sort of path than they were. I'm still friends with them, and we reminisce about the good old days and keep in touch online, but that day left an indelible mark on me, and it made me realize that I wasn't cut from the same cloth as them. Of course, they are successful now and I'm living in the Midwest working retail and raising a kid as a divorcee... but then again, back then I didn't think I'd make it to 25. And yesterday I turned 43, so I guess I'm doing something right.

The bottom line is this: with all that's going on right now, we need to be brave now more than ever. We will face bullies and Nazis and fascists and people who want to take away our freedoms or worse. It hasn't gotten better; it looks bleak, in fact. But if a geeky junior high school kid can tell a bunch of racists to back off, then we all can.

And if they get punched in the face on the Internet, I can laugh at it and not feel any regrets about it. Because those assholes deserve everything they get.

CORPORATE PRESIDENTS STILL SUCK... or do they?

As the Inauguration of Trumpp (spelled with an extra P for a double dose of that pee-pee) looms on the horizon, I have started un-following people on Facebook again. Not un-friending, mind you-- un-following, because some of their fucking posts are intolerable to read day in and day out.

But the people I've been un-following are NOT Trump supporters. In fact, ever since Bladdergate (as my Facebook cohort BJ Fornicatti so eloquently labeled the Moscow dossier pseudo-scandal) it seems likes all the MAGATS (acronym for Make America Great Again Trumpp Supporters) have been laying low. I don't have a lot of MAGATS on my Facebook account anyway, but the ones whom I know for a fact did vote for Trumpp have been relatively silent as of late. Good for them.

No, it's the loudmouth Obama Haters on the Left that I've had to un-follow. I now understand how people who were once radical and liberal turn conservative over the years; all they have to do is watch their peers become intolerant assholes. Then they figure that they'd rather embrace the Grand Old Party than have to be lumped in with the kind of people who have the balls to praise President Obama for commuting Chelsea Manning's sentence but then turn around and say "It's not enough" or "How many kids did you bomb today?"

Luckily, I will never turn into a GOP stooge, no matter how many of my so-called liberal friends unwittingly subscribe to the Horseshoe Theory (see earlier posts). The rest of my so-called liberal friends only voted for Hillary out of sheer terror: they saw the Trumpp monster rearing its ugly head and held their noses to vote for Hillary. I commend them for at least trying but I remember how much shade they threw at her at the beginning of the primaries.

Then there is a small minority, perhaps less than 1%, of my liberal friends who know the score, who talk the talk and walk the walk with amazing conviction and consistency. They are not the types who talk shit about CNN but praise Buzzfeed; they are not the kind that would say something stupid like "Bernie would've beaten Trumpp" when Bernie's ACA bill got shot down by even the likes of Corey Booker. These relatively few bastions of liberal light wouldn't even think of considering Corey Booker as a Democratic candidate for 2020 in the first place, because they don't buy into any narratives.

Instead, they create their own narratives, and they are usually based on actual information instead of links to dubious websites and reposts. Here's an example of one, posted by a Facebook friend whose initials are KS.

This comment was in response to someone who stated that, just like Trump, Hillary would've stacked her Cabinet with Goldman Sachs people as well.

Not all corporatists agree with each other. Many are in direct competition with each other and have opposing goals. Like many major corporations want universal healthcare for Americans because the cost of insurance is a significant burden to their company. Then there are the corporatists who see raping the American public on healthcare costs as a viable profit center. Which corporatists do you want running healthcare? Same with things like regulating Wall Street. Some are raiders out to scam as much money as they can. Others see that instability as a huge risk to their businesses that will crash the economy and destroy their business when there is no one to buy their products. One brand of corporation depends on a healthy vibrant economy and consumers with disposable income to power their profits. The other type of corporation makes money by crashing other people's dreams. I know who's side I'm voting for in that scenario. I know which one works out better for most people. I'm not fooled by the argument that both sides represent major business interests. That isn't a monolithic block with uniform policies.

I like this comment very much because KS did not buy into that whole 'Shillary' narrative, and retorted by (gasp!) coming up with an informed opinion of his own, one that is no doubt echoed by many (such as myself) and yet still original because it wasn't spoonfed to him by the types of people who want to take credit for all of Obama's successes and none of his failures.

I mean, let's face it: Obama was a corporate President. He ran the country like a corporation. That is the new trend for the 21st Century. Why do you think the Powers That Be (and in this case, those powers may be Russian!) wanted a businessman to run the country for the next 4 to 8 years? But corporations are not what they used to be. For example: it's corporate lawyers and lobbyists who are advancing the marijuana legalization movement in Colorado. Not hippies. Not NORML, although they are still a valid organization for information on the subject. These people have wrested control of the market from cartels and hippie mafias, and now people in Denver can smoke weed without fear of reprisal. California never got that far with their agenda-- yeah, you can get a Rx but no one remembers that it was the Emerald Triangle on the West Coast that lobbied to have Proposition 19 shot down. Prop 19 would've allowed people to grow up to five plants in their home. Big Pharma didn't kill that measure, hippies in Oregon did. Shit, even Gov. Schwarzenegger did more for pot decriminalization than the Humboldt pot posse.

So you see, as distasteful as the notion of a corporate USA is, the sad fact is: it's here. It's been here, for a while. If you are still violently anti-everything corporate then you are living in a past that you never experienced. The question now is: do I support good corporations or bad corporations? Or rather, do I support good ideas or bad ideas? Because I can hate Monsanto and still think GMO foods have a useful application. I can hate Apple products and decry their labor practices abroad but also know that they are trying harder than most companies to make progress. I can loathe Wal-Mart and at the same time know that, because of pressure from protest groups, they occasionally kowtow to the needs and demands of the people. I can admire Al Gore for being environmentally conscious even though his wife wanted to censor rock albums in the '80's.

Hell, even Pearl Jam and Prince did business with Target after they changed some major policies.

It's not hypocrisy anymore. It's awareness that things are complex, shaded, not black and white. And that's the danger of Trumpp: he's fooling his supporters into thinking those black and white days are here again. They're not. Even he knows it, but he used that illusion to get his way. And it worked.

It's only hypocrisy if you fight against your own best interests... no, scratch that. It's stupidity that makes us fight against our own best interests... stupidity that I can fortunately block out by un-following unreasonable people online, which makes my head feel better and my days nicer.

Ants Playing Chess, Grasshoppers Playing Checkers

Let's move away from the Russian hack thing, since it will be proven to be a fact in less than two years and yet it won't stop Trump from being re-elected because the masses are stupid and his opponents are feeble.

Let's look at strategies.

I've said many times over the past 8 years that Obama played a mean long game. I believe the phrase I invoked the most was that time-honored and tired old cliche, "It's chess, not checkers." I even had to employ it recently, when the Obama Administration's Army Corps Engineers had to step in and take measures against the Dakota Pipeline.

A few curious things happened. The first: All the left-wing Obama haters were suddenly so quick to praise him. Even though he literally did nothing. It was his Army Corps that made the call, not him. And even then, it's more of a stall, a way to buy time.

The second: even though the Left gave him the credit, it was merely to take it away by saying "He should've done it sooner."

To which I say: it's chess, not checkers. Time and time again, the instant gratification that left-wing Obama haters seek is not only unrealistic but makes future progress down the line nearly impossible. You can't make the grab for the Queen piece right off the bat; Pawns must be sacrificed, Knights must be positioned, Bishops must be at the ready.

But Obama won't be President much longer. Now we have Trump, and Trump is definitely a man for whom the phrase "chess not checkers" does not apply. In fact, it may very well be that the opposite is true for Trump: it's checkers, not chess. Never have we seen a leader so impatient, so living-in-the-present-time-only... not even George W. Bush was like this.

It's as if every moment of a Trump presidency will be a push to be Kinged. His every diplomatic and political move from Day One has always been to bulldoze across the board and get to the other side, demanding "KING ME" and then repeating this until he is satisfied, which he will be never.

I wonder if the anti-Obama Lefties are secretly happy that Trump, the God of Instant Gratification, is now President, since he matches their penchant for NOW NOW NOW more than their preferred candidate, Bernie Sanders. It gives them a cause for the next four years, that's for sure.

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Another good analogy is the Aesop's Fable about The Ant & The Grasshopper. Guess which one is which.

And this makes me wonder: even if you aren't a big conspiracy theorist, you have to admit there are certain groups that have the President's ear, who have some sway over matters of the Oval Office. And it's my opinion that these special interests anoint our leaders by gauging what the global economic and political needs must be.

Much like the fable, there is a time to be idle and there is a time to put the nose to the grindstone. We had 8 years of Ant leadership; looks like the wind has changed direction and it's time for some Grasshopper trickle-down policies. And I'm sure that, more than any other reason, is why Hillary is not President.

It's also the reason why Bernie will NEVER be President, so stop all the bullshit about "Gee, I wonder what it would've been like if he'd been elected." Please wipe your ass with that already. I will agree with Trump supporters on one thing and only one thing: the Left needs to stop writing thinkpieces analyzing their losses and start doing shit. REAL shit. Even Bernie is actually doing something. But coming up with apps that lobby Congress for you? That's just fuckin' lazy.

Get over it. The next four years are going to be a razor fight in a dive bar. Get yours sharpened as soon as possible.

Because this is how the Grasshoppers play, LIKE IT OR NOT.