Vicious Little Liars

I turned on the news last night.  There was Karoline Leavitt saying that there is no place in America for violence in politics.  Then Kash Patel.  Then Todd Blanche.  

Really?  WTF!  Is everybody stupid???  

Maybe.  If they keep saying that January 6 never happened, people will believe it.  The president surrounds himself with violence and spews violent rhetoric, and he counted on the manosphere to get him where he is, Dana White, and all his push up/pull up cabinet members. . . . 

It is totally unbelievable to me that every news outlet has not pointed out this hypocrisy.  Maybe there is a reason Trump is so often a target. 

I am truly flabbergasted.  I am living in a country I never imagined.  So much for American Exceptionalism.  I realize that I have always unconsciously believed in the machine it had built.  

However. . . look at the sign in that photo I took on Sunday.  There is part of the political problem.  "Abolish Billionaires" is tied to "No ICE."  But it is not.  Those are two separate questions.  You reduce the market when you put them together.  They will throw in a few other causes, too.  You are either on the bus or off the bus.  

I haven't said that right, haven't really made my argument.  I am trying to say you can agree with one thing and not the other.  I've been part of this stuff all my life, but my relationship has often been strained.  Bumper stickers and clever bromides breed shallow thinking. . . I think.  Terrible writing there.  

Rather, I saw a poster announcing the celebration of Buddha's birthday on May 3 at one of the Buddhist Temples in town, but I don't know which one or where.  I think I want to go to a festival, though, and even take my camera.  I am still drawn to what I consider exotica, the "other," etc.  Old throwback man.  The sort of guy who didn't know he held to the idea of American Exceptionalism.  Not just America.  I believed in the whole Western World/Civilization.  

Oh, you know, I was steeped in the anti-colonial rhetoric of my time.  Africa was only violent because Europeans had colonized it.  India would have been better if England had never given birth to Rudyard Kipling.  All that.  And of course, Said and "Orientalism." He deconstructed western thought and privileged the East.  Trouble was, deconstruction isn't supposed to work that way.  You are never supposed to stop reversing hierarchies, so someone else deconstructed the Eastern idea of the West.  Yea.  Turns out they weren't so kind, either.  It seems you can't live without privileging something.  

Mom, dad, the gods. . . whatever.  

One of "the gals" at the gym yesterday had a young girl woman with her.  Turned out to be her granddaughter.  Some of the boys men were gawking talking about her.  As I was finishing my workout, grandma introduced me.  

"I hear you're a good photographer," said the granddaughter.  

"I am," I said with faux-confidence.  

This led to a little discussion about artistic tastes.  The granddaughter had just graduated with a degree in philosophy/political science and was headed to law school in the fall.  We talked for a very long time.  

"Look out for him," the shock jock said in passing.  Alain seconded the notion.  I looked at the girl woman and grandmother and said, "I'm the only one who has worked around college kids his whole life. That's all I know."

I had just about finished up and said, "I think it's time for me to skip abs."

"Stay.  I can teach you yoga."  

I sat on a bench where I usually skip abs (ha) and she and her grandmother lay their mats on the floor beside me.  We talked for a very long time.  It was fun.  

"Since I've retired, I've lost my connection to language evolution.  I don't know how kids talk anymore."

"You've lost the lingo?"

"Yea."

"I can teach you some stuff."

"Like what.  Give me an example."

"Gooner."

"What's a gooner."

Turns out, that is what we used to call a "wanker." 

"Most of the guys in my philosophy classes were gooners."

"Probably.  But that's pretty much the norm now, isn't it?  I live by Country Club College, and I can't help notice that you hardly ever see couples walking together.  There are groups of girls and there are groups of boys, but hardly ever a couple.  Covid and online everything kind of messed them up, I think."

Grandma was perplexed.  

"This generation doesn't have a lot of interpersonal interaction.  They have much less sex than your generation did."

Grandma looked at her grandchild.

"There is a lot of insecurity, that's for sure.  We weren't meant to look at ourselves so much, but that is all we do.  We see ourselves on our phones and compare ourselves to everything we see on social media."

"Do you have insecurities?  Intelligence, looks, spiritual?"

"I think I'm insecure about my intelligence sometimes." 

"Really?  Don't you know how dumb everyone else is?  You don't think you can kick there asses?"

Insecure smile.  

As I say, this was really fun for me, but I was falling in too deep.  I excused myself with a "really nice to meet you--this was fun" and headed for the car.  

I miss that so very much.  I want to understand the vicious little progressives and how they think.  I don't get that anymore.  It was what kept me "young."

Yes, yes. . . I've always been a youth vampire.  Part of my whole "Pepsi Generation" upbringing and having never left the college campus, I guess.  

But now my mother is rising and I have a call to duty.  It's just another day in Trump World.