Tuesday, March 29, 2005
Digging Out of the Hole
If I have any regular readers, you must have noticed that I’ve been somewhat absent for the past few days; at least since Friday. I could offer a few excuses – life has been hectic, one of our pets damaged his eye, I’ve been busy with other projects – and all of those would be true, but those aren’t the real reasons I’ve been remiss in posting. The real reason is that I’ve hit a bit of a stumbling block, or a turning point, depending on how you look at it. The Schiavo case, while the media sells it as a human interest story, has revealed a lot to me about the truth of the American media, government, and people. If the election was a punch in the gut, this one….well, I don’t exactly know what you’d call it. I lost my moral compass for awhile, wandered in the wilderness; okay, not really. I resumed work on my novel and started a Nationals Blog (plug plug) while taking a few days off from politics to get my head straight and gather the wool.The following are the items that have jumped out at me since I’ve gained some perspective:
- Never has it been clearer to me that George W. Bush is a political opportunist who lacks the courage of his convictions, as evidenced by his signing the bill and then vanishing.
- Tom DeLay…well, you know the story. By his own standards for Michael Schiavo, he’s a murderer.
- The “Religious Right” are a motley crew, composed of strange folks with strange backstories and strange agendas. See the story of Bill Tierney (http://billmon.org/archives/001784.html) and Scott Heldredth, the two-time rapist for Jesus.
- We are all in great peril because these lunatics have any sort of sway over politics and policy.
- I realize now why Bush was re-elected; people refuse to hear or recognize the truth.
- I now understand the rise of opposition to "science-based" teaching.
- Never has it been clearer to me how the conspicuous display of morality leads to its opposite.
- The American people, on the whole, are good people who have been misled by the media. I’ve always suspected this, but this case has really brought it to light. What we need to do is educate people not to trust anything they see or read without proof. Unfortunately, that’s not going to happen with the modern education system.
Cable news channels don't deliver news, they broadcast sensationalist propaganda. It's all about the ratings. There is no journalistic integrity left in the TV news media, and there's certainly no incentive to search for the facts as long as no one touches that dial. - This hurts the hardest: The Democrats in charge are also little more than political opportunists. Witness this attempt to pander.
So all this leads one to wonder, what the hell can you do? The truth is being buried by the news media, spun by the pundits, twisted and broken by politicians for their own gain, outright ignored by those that think their faith can overrule reality, and
The answer? Just try to annoy the fuck out of them. That’s my new goal. I’m going to keep on screaming the truth, louder and more strident than ever. The chances are nil that I’ll break through, but maybe with thousands of us trying, we can get through. It’s the only option we have left.
Consider Matthew 6:5, you attention whoring lunatics:
And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.
Seriously, even the Bible wants you to shut the fuck up.
Finally, a little moment of Zen, if you wonder why I feel so ambivalent about this country these days.
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