I Do Not Feel Appreciably "Better" This 4th Than I Did Last Year At This Time

Not "better" about the direction in which the country seems to be heading in relation to our over-seas militaristic adventurism. I heard this week that Marines had swept into another valley somewhere in Asia. They were setting up "combat outposts" as they went, near "peaceful" villages. I was transported back 40 years, when "combat outposts" were called "fire bases." And the friendly villages were "pacified hamlets." The countries began with different letters--"A" vs "V"--but other than that the song hadn't changed. By even the current regime's rationality, if it worked, even torture would be alright.

I don't feel "better" about the Constitution. It still seems to lie, in tatters, under the shit-encrusted loafers of the new administration as it was under the shit-encrusted boots of the previous one. "We" are still torturing 'detainees,' despite the lies. Preventative detention is official policy. More and more electronic surveillance is being authorized in the name of combating "terrorism," but even with new powers, the authorities have been powerless to prevent the recent outbreaks of right-wing/eliminationist domestic terrorism.

Obviously, I do not feel "better" about the economy. I am retired, on a fixed income, and i saw my tiny retirement nest-egg, acquired only after the last 15 or so years of my many and varied careers, eaten away to less than HALF it's value even a year ago.

I don't feel any better about the steps being undertaken to meet the challenge of global climate change. I am beginning to think nobody will have to political will to do anything to reduce the hazards that our gobal 'life-style' generates in such profusion. It's been well-established for almost half-a-century that these conditions were going to ensue, that there had by then already been enough carbon released to raise the global temperature significantly. I am, if anything, more content than ever that I never reproduced, so that none of my get will be facing these impending disasters of food, water, energy, migration, drought and inevitable warfare.

I do not feel "better" about the prospect that something meaningful will ever b done to resolve the nests of corruption, villainy, greed, mal- and misfeasance that is the zso-called US Health System. The vested interests have far too much power/money/influence. They have the whip-hand, and the smiling, compromising, community organizer doesn't have either the personal stones or the electoral mandate to actually stand up to 'em. Obama beat a remarkably weak GOP ticket, by far too small a margin.

I have more or less by now formalized the notion that has been kicking around in my head for this last year, since it became likely that Obama would be #44:

Obama's main job as President is to make people forget the disasters the last 40 years of proto- and crypto-Fascism have inflicted upon the country, and prepare the way for the next Bush.

Obama beat an incredibly weak GOP ticket by WAY TOO SMALL a margin.

McCain: 70-year-old, demented, tainted, ptsd denier/survivor (a lot like the dry drunk recently departed), morally smudged, ethically challenged, congenital liar,

Paired with the most incredibly inept, indisputably ill-prepared, vapidly vainglorious, unknown parvenu from the boondocks of Alaska, whose own sordid connections discredited even her prior position;

on the heels of EIGHT years of the most obvious, most blatantly partisan manipulation and exploitation, war, terror, and economic collapse...

STILL GOT FORTY SIX PERCENT OF THE FUCKING VOTE?

What is WRONG with this picture?

ANNOUNCEMENT:
Woody's Bloggy Enterprises are going on a short hiatus after tonight.Well, actually, the blogs will stay here whilst Woody and friends embark on a manic, musical, odyssey which might see us dangling a digit or two in the Great Gi-chi-goomi, who knows. I'm leaving Budreau, my sweet but territorial 80-lb pit-bull home, with instructions to keep an eye on things while I'm gone. A week? 10 Days? Two Weeks? Gonna sleep out under some stars. Eat camp food. Drive A LOT of miles. Can you say "ROAD TRIP!!!!!"