The tongue becomes numb
to raw truth’s reality
in America.
Filed under POETRY
Duty.
Honor.
Country.
Fear.
Cowardice.
Submission.
The first three I claim
The last three I disdain.
No more need be said.
A national honor now dead.
Killed by those who fled
their duty to country,
a brilliant democracy.
I cannot shake the hand
of one unwilling to stand
by my side and claim
a nation fighting shame.
Pretense has no place
in a nation ruled by truth and grace.
Ignorance is no excuse for surprise
by those who choose to close their eyes
to crimes and fraud and hate
until it becomes too late
to grasp and seize and save
Duty,
Honor,
Country.
Parting ways.
Art seldom follows
where there is nothing new to see.
Art creates new eyes
new ears, new hearts to set us free.
Art imagines what minds can’t comprehend
forging new beginnings as old ways end.
Politics is an art form
tossing power to and fro
showing us what we really think
and where we might go.
Art is everywhere we look
showing us what we need to know.
Art has no end date;
its timeliness simply portends.
Vote! it is still not too late.
Art is our dearest friend.
I dream of Nazis…
men in blue jeans and camouflage
jackets with pockets
to hold weapons,
wearing red MAGA hats;
and bleached-hair women
in comfortable clothes
and comfortable shoes,
smiling at cameras
while they praise
a nobody who makes them feel
like somebody.
Like tools they line up
on his bleachers to be used
to disparage and demean
the others they call fiends.
These are not dreams.
These are nightmares come alive
and rending the seams of a nation’s fabric
with fascist schemes.
I can no longer sleep
in the silence
of so many who stay quiet.
Too ashamed to shout with that lout.
But willing to vote him in
to the place where our destruction begins.
I dream of Nazis,
the shouters
the doubters
the scoffers
the weak
the divided
the insiders
who refuse to give up
position and power,
while hour after hour
the fascist beast devours
airwaves and pews.
Let there not be too few
to block his way
on election day.
VOTE!
A nation of grifters.
That now seems right.
And the right has taken
grifting to a new level,
right in our sight.
Trump bibles, watches and hats
to grift cash for legal defense.
Elon Musk funds the cache
with his own which once
was our own, using what our
tax dollars created as his own.
Grifters come in all moneyed sizes.
But, the fine print on their offers
is too small to easily read,
hiding their grifting and greed.
Starlink for free to victims
of hurricanes Milton and Helene.
Except it is not free.
And if Musk and Trump succeed.
None of us will be free.
After one month, we will owe
Musk three-hundred forty-nine plus
dollars and service fees.
Backlash forced him to extend
the grift until the end
of the year 2024.
when victims will be left
holding the bag and more.
And so grifters appear to be
enlightened and generous and we
their sycophantic beneficiaries,
until it is too late
to shut the fascist gate
being constructed right under our nose.
Grifting away democracy is not new.
It has happened to others before,
but now, for us, it is way too close.
The grifters have united
and now so must we.
Vote!
A restless night wondering if the sign is still in place.
The sign I had to replace.
The young white man in the white SUV
loaded the Harris sign in his car’s rear
compartment, deportment of theft.
What cause does he serve?
My neighbor called to report, quite unnerved
as she saw him hurry my sign inside
then jump in the back seat of his ride.
I wondered at first to pause and consider
if the thief is motivated by hate,
or greed for a sign of his own.
Wishful thinking, I know.
Hate burns so fast,
Yet, we respond too slow
to catch the numbers on the license plate
of the vehicle likely stacked
with signs this crew used to show hate.
The sign has been replaced, another “on-order”
just in case the thief returns to take more plunder.
And, as I always have done, still I wonder
what motivates such sinful behavior.
Mild, stealing a campaign sign may be;
but, crossing hate’s boundaries,
moving over mine to steal my sign
shows hate’s design clearly, not merely
a sin old as time, and hard to contain
once such boundaries are crossed.
Such sins raise an alarm,
where and when would this thief
decide to cause even more harm?
Hate, once acted upon, fuels the fire;
and harming another grows in desire.
Words matter, you see.
they motivate young men such as he
to cross over boundaries once firmly in place.
Such is a nation’s disgrace
to act as if this campaign
is simply another political race.
Babysitters don’t come cheap.
They are hard to find sometimes.
One wants to be chosen
to guard the those you hold most dear;
to protect them so you need not fear.
Ignore that he is a convict,
convicted on 34 charges,
awaiting sentencing.
Your children will not know, nor mind.
And the criminal charge of rape
was never made.
The statute of limitations had passed.
The new babysitter-to-be did have to pay
the woman the civil jury found he raped.
He had to pay when he lied about her charge
and defamed her for telling us what he did to her.
You do not have any daughters, right?
Your sons may be okay unless
he teaches them his ideas of sex-play.
And do not leave your checkbook or credit card lying about.
He has a need to cheat, defraud and steal, the lout.
But you can lock them in the safe, right?
Of course your children cannot be locked away.
But, you think he is safe, you say?
Then by all means choose this babysitter on voting day.
Best to keep parched lips closed in the midst of drought.
When the rain comes, as it surely must, lips open wide,
with head tilted back, in a tumultuous shout.
Filling up with rain, one wet swallow can seem enough.
Memory quickly returns of a mouth full of dry dust,
reminding one a single swallow is not enough.
After thirsting so long words have grown tough
to swallow, feel bitter, feel wounded, feel flushed
where they would be drowned
if only rain would fall down.
Still, the short rain is enough to stir us to our feet,
on the forward march to greener pastures,
cool beneath our bare feet,
taking their fill of all the rains
that have gone before to make this place
one where one may stay to laugh and play.
We will not go back.
Tears of joy rain down now.
We swallow them whole,
filled with power so bold
we believe we control
the weather.
We don’t, we know.
But, we can vote.
And our vote grows in volume
as word drops form streams
and create new rivers of dreams
that flow within oceans so strong
their freedom carries us along
to new and better shores
where right overcomes wrongs.
Words fall like rain, again and again.
Dance in the rain and play
on the way to election day.
RE-POSTING: PAST IS PROLOGUE
Recently, readers outside the United States seem to have discovered posts I wrote on my other, earlier blog “Worthington for Obama 2012”. This prompted me to re-read them myself. They explain why I am not keen to listen to the shock and surprise at the current political climate. Anyone could have seen it coming, even I.
Since long before 2012 it was clear that a long-term strategy to destroy what the Republican Party could not compete with, what white supremacists (who started a civil war) and Christian nationalists who stole Native American lands and formed the KKK) have long abhorred, was thoughtfully and carefully organized through groups such as ALEC ( American Legislative Exchange Council formed in 1973 to create model bills across state legislatures),Tea Party (movement within the Republican Party to oppose Policies of President Barack Obama formed in 2009), The Heritage Foundation (Conservative Republican think tank formed in 1973 to popularize and enable President Reagan’s policies, and which developed and now leads Project 2025).
These groups were welcomed and happily utilized by the Republican Party. The changing demographics of the United States (think immigration no longer western-Europe dominant), enforcement of civil rights through the court decisions upholding constitutional rights following the Civil Rights Movement. The Republican Party either had to embrace diversity (accept the equality of people color, women and LGBQTQIA+ individuals) or change the rules by undermining the courts, gerrymandering districts, and suppressing the vote. They are nothing if not thorough. Over the past 30 years they stoped sneaking in the dark and spoke out loud as they convinced Americans that Democrats were the corruptors via their disinformation campaigns. Were you not paying attention? How could you when they kept you so entertained. Now their head honcho is an ex-“reality” TV star. Entertainment has been used as a distraction for those worn out by laboring long hours and just needing a break from reality. It is time to get off the couch and start paying attention.
Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (2010) was filed by a conservative non-profit the FEC had stopped from promoting and airing a film unjustly criticizing (disinformation- at- the- ready) presidential candidate Hilary Clinton; and, McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission(2014) weakened regulations reversing centuries of campaign finance regulations meant to eliminate/reduce corruption. We all know “money talks.” Citizens United and other groups are now free to use any amount by any person of wealth to influence an election during a time when 99% of the country’s wealth is held by 1% of the population. The result is inevitable. A very small minority controls the election through its unlimited political contributions. Super Pacs can include “dark money groups” who may act un-named “in the dark” so we never know about their direct coordination with candidates. McCutcheon v. FEC eliminated aggregate contributions limits. The sky is now the limit.
Corruption has never been easier. No wonder Americans have lost faith in elections and campaigns. No wonder they mistrust courts and politicians. And no, they are not “all the same.” These changes were fought by Democrats who opened what had been a Dixiecrat party to a tent large enough to embrace diverse populations, who advanced women’s rights, who worked to assure voting rights and Equal Opportunity using affirmative action to redress the denial of rights and opportunities for over a century, and restore the rights of labor unions and workers. Diversity and Inclusion (DEI) is not evil because of the good it does for all Americans. It is lambasted by Republicans because they want to keep the tent closed to all but white men and those willing to submit to white male dominance (which, unfortunately, includes too many white women).
Which brings us to today, not to what I wrote in 2012. Those who say they are “trying to understand how Vice-President Kamala lost have been ignoring the reality for decades. Those who are shocked by the outcome of the last election have not been paying attention. Donald trump is not the leader of a party. He is only the cheerleader for a corruption of the political process put in place by the Republican Party long ago. From the Reagan era on, Republicans have embraced these corrupt practices and strategies to secure their election and re-election despite the demographic changes and heightened awareness of constitutional rights. They have created a disinformation system bar none, even aligned themselves with Russian disinformation campaigns, feeding information to Russian operatives (remember Paul Manafort and Trump’s first campaign?).
But, now, the Republican Party which was a respected competitor, is dead. A fascist government will replace our democratic republic. Our constitution is up-ended by a corrupted Supreme Court put in place by the Heritage Foundation. Project 2025 is in process, replacing the transition process which we have long relied upon. National security secrets are at risk. Those securing our national security still in the field will soon be at risk of disclosure (Trump owes our enemies big time). Yet, we continue to ignore the reality set in place 30+ years ago and pretend this is a normal transition. We discuss the relative qualifications of unqualified sycophants (“Good “Nazis”). We elected a fascist whom we would not hire to babysit our children, entrusting our national survival to his care. We are the fools. we are getting what we deserve, for failing to pay attention and give a damn about our country. We have for too long put self-interest above national interest.
I have seen this day coming for a very long time. And here is what I know to be true:
No one can steal your joy.
No one can convince you to submit.
No one place you in fear.
No one can destroy your faith in freedom.
No one can compromise your hopes and dreams.
No one can take way your power.
No one can force you to give up.
No one can disinform a truth-seeker.
Keep fighting, friends of democracy.
Keep registering voters.
Keep educating our young people.
Keep cleaning the air, water and soil.
Keep reducing green-house emissions.
Keep supporting your community.
Keep telling the truth.
Good always overcomes evil.
Joy always overcomes grief.
Love always overcomes hate.
We are not done. Not by a long-shot!
Perhaps I am the greatest fool. I still believe in Americans. I still believe in you. Do not make me regret it.
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