On the Dark Side of the Force: Saturday Political Soap Box 232

I started out right.  I promise.  I woke up, put on my positive pajamas, wished everyone a Happy New Year, posted positive things, and was ready for the hope of a shiny new decade.  Maybe this year would be the conclusion of the Trump nightmare (resignation, conviction, 25th Amendment, defeat in November), and perhaps we would start grappling with the issues that dog us (climate change, universal health care, income inequality, racism, the cost of college, the influence of big money in politics - just to name a few).

But by the third day of the year, all my optimism had fled.

One of the biggest stories of recent years, the vast wildfires and heatwave engulfing an entire continent, Australia, is barely a blip on our American radar.  How many more warnings do we need before we wake up to the devastation that global warming will cause AND IS CAUSING NOW?

I just finished the book On Fire: The Case for the Green New Deal by Naomi Klein.  It makes it clear what needs to be done, and that the time for half measures is over.  It will require a lot of coordination between countries and a complete overhaul of our economic system.  It will change the way we live - but not for the worst unless you think happiness only comes from excess consumption and swimming in waste and pollution.

Is there a way out?  Yes, at least to make it considerably less worse than our current course.  Will we take that way out?  Sadly, no. No, we will not.  There are too many wealthy and selfish interests pushing us the other way.  We have an administration that is not only not working to fight against global warming, they are galloping steadily in the opposite direction - they are gleefully making it worse.  And the United States is not the only problem.  The Australian Prime Minister is a climate denier, blithely fiddling while his nation burns.  The fascist President of Brazil is accelerating the burning of the Amazon rain forest, destroying the lungs of the planet.  And it is hard to tell new developing nations to slow down and be cautious when major industrial nations refuse to do the same.


This was quickly followed by the initial steps towards, if not World War III, at a minimum a bloody regional conflict across the Mideast.  President Trump, without authorization or consultation with Congress (not even informing Democratic leadership, which he is obligated to do), unleashed this hell.  Was General Soleimani a bad guy?  From our perspective,  yes, he was.  Will this stop Iranian aggression?  No, of course not.  It will do the opposite.  It will spark and intensify the flames of hatred.  They will retaliate, and then what will we do?  We will respond, but most likely not in kind - we will disproportionally atttack, with ever moe intensified violence, creating an uncontrollable spiral that will lead us all into madness.

You think this was okay?  We've killed, in the last 18 years or so, hundreds of thousands of Middle Easterners, and not of all them have been hardened terrorists.  I daresay 90% or more have not been terrorists. How would you feel if they retaliated by a drone strike that took out our Vice President or the military head of the Joint Chief of Staffs?  You think we would go, "Oh, my!  We need to stop our military aggression and behave now!"  I DON"T THINK SO.

I doubt if Trump has thought through what this means.  He just followed a wag the dog instinct and thought this little incident would take impeachment off the front page, and give him a few days of positive headlines.  I'm not sure, as incredibly disgusting as Trump is, that he fully understands that this will lead to things he can't control.  Trump is disgusting and vile, but he also has the added bonus of being dangerously incompetent.


And then I see that Democratic moderates are trying to propel themselves forward by unfairly demonizing and savaging my SIGNATURE issue, true universal healthcare - Medicare For All.  I have to accept the reality that my favorite candidate, Elizabeth Warren, is fading in large part because of her stand on Medicare For All, a lot because she is being maligned by Mayor Pete Buttigieg, who is rising in the polls because he is willing to sacrifice decent health care on the mantle of fear-mongering and embrace the spirit and support of the wine cave (please understand if Mayor Pete becomes the nominee, I will support him enthusiastically - every Democratic contender is light years ahead of Trump and any Republican).

The one bright spot is the resurgence of Bernie Sanders. I would prefer a female nominee, but there is no denying the strength and consistency of Bernie.  He outraised all others, including Mayor Wine Cave, by almost TEN MILLION DOLLARS ($34.5 vs. the next closest's $24.7 million).  And he did it from small donors, more total donors than has ever contributed to a campaign.

Back on the dark side of the force, the establishments are aligning against him, and no matter how popular, they will not allow him to be the nominee.

So, we're back in the dark again.  I'm scared, and I don't know how we're getting out of it.

Sometimes, I think we're just marking time until AOC is eligible to be President.

If we can hang in that long.