The Revolution Will Be Televised: Saturday Political Soap Box 248

It's difficult.

As a middle-class white person, one steeped in respect for property and possessions, as someone who cringes at vandalism both big and small, watching the destruction of buildings, and the looting of stores, bothers me.

And yet...

These people are angry, and we're not listening to anything they're trying to tell us.

When they protest peacefully, we ignore them.  Some of us (not me) pretend to tolerate peaceful acts of civil disobedience, but then find something to object to in the mildest of protests.

Colin Kaepernick was vilified and ostracized, and his career derailed because he took a knee during the national anthem.  And why did he do that?  To bring attention to the very thing that's happening now.  Over and over and over again.

Ahmed Aubrey - killed while jogging.  Breona Taylor - riddled with bullets in her own home.  George Floyd - murdered by police who have this cuffed man down and wouldn't get off his neck for almost nine minutes.

And those are just a few of the recent incidents.

We only know of many of these because we live in an age of cellphone videos.  It seems like more because more is filmed.  And unless it's filmed, we don't believe it exists.

Protesters block streets, and some conservative-dominated state legislators pass bills saying it's okay to run over protestors if they get in your way.

We say we want the protests to be peaceful, and I agree.  But the reality is that they are much easier for the vast majority of white people to just ignore them when they are.

Things are not good in America. The grievances felt by people of color are real. Our safety net is being shredded.  Millions are unemployed, and the biggest thing you hear on the right is whining that some on unemployment may be getting an extra dollop of money so they can be secure as we try to handle a necessary shutdown to help us get through a deadly pandemic.  Low paid workers are deemed essential and are forced to into work environments that are not safe - and the Republican answer is to attempt to pass legislation that will make sure employers cannot be sued for the lack of providing proper protection.  Our employer-based health insurance system is crumbling, and even many centrist Democrats refuse to address the single-payer system that is vitally needed to replace it.

Meanwhile, as everyone else sinks, our tiny but dominating billionaire class is getting richer and richer.

Some of the corporate entities, like Target, that were looted and burned, is disturbing to watch, but I understand the message being sent.  This is also true of the burning of Minneapolis Precinct 3, which was the precinct that was home base for the police who participated in the murder of George Floyd.  I have less understanding of the mom and pop businesses that may have been looted and burned as whole blocks went up in flames.

President Franklin Roosevelt, faced with digging us out of our depressionary hole in the 1930s, saw that no response would lead to the greatest dangers, and could see the extremes of fascism and communism tearing up the world.  So, he buckled up and put in place The New Deal that benefited so many working citizens, defying the squallering of the wealthy and large corporations.

We no longer have that kind of leadership.  We have a racist president whose primary reaction is to quote a racist saying from the 60s - when the looting starts, the shooting starts.  Many of our politicians, on both sides of the aisle, have sold their soul to special interests that choose their good over the public good.

I do not want to see buildings burned.  I do not want to see stores looted.

But I do know why it is happening.  And I do know that crimes against people are more important than crimes against property.

The revolution will be televised.  And the scariest part?  We have no FDR.  We have George Wallace Jr.

The election cannot come soon enough.