who's who in America
"gangsters strut around like statesmen on the stage of history."- Brecht
"You can't help who you fall in love with."
- inbred redneck on the Jerry Springer show
Where does George W. Bush come from? He is the notion of power, and was created from its lack. His rise to prominence in the Republican-American imagination follows the curve of their powerlessness and desire for power. On the eleventh of September, 2001, it was utter helplessness that sent them diving into their mythology and heritage, to cash in their rugged cowboys and constitutional rights for a cheap thrill, for a chance to feel like they had balls again.
When a hairy little man drives by in a Ferrari, we leap at the chance to call it overcompensation. But when it's Sam down the street buying a giant flag and a Hummer with a Bush sticker, we tend not to air our doubts about his level of fear. Sure, he deals with his wounded masculinity each night by watching the USA gunfuck some brown people on the Fox news channel and he has no interest in advancing humanity unless it means getting a house closer to Wal-mart, but does that make him a bad person? I guess it depends on how you define "bad".
What's bad is that value itself is fleeing the planet faster than we can create it, and that this is happening with the approval of the intellectually laziest demographic in the history of civilization, the American middle class. Only occasionally is their complacency punctured, always for the temporary announcement of some newly discovered fact, "SOMETHING THAT WILL (eventually) FUCKING KILL YOU", like a diet high in bacon fat, or buying everything you own from China.
Insofar as it is too much trouble to even take a passing interest in the welfare of the world in general, yes, Sam down the street is bad person. Like every bumper sticker republican, Sam as an American should be required, before passing through our educational system, to justify his constitutional rights, so he can understand why they're there.
Instead there is the matter of getting busy stripping them off of himself and everyone else even faster than they came into being in the late 18th century, in the name of safety from the darkness. If this sacrifice is not too much, I wonder what is. It's transparent, stupid chickenshittery. Incidentally, this theme is the same as one a comedian sang about a mugging that occurred while he was out for a walk with his date. The chorus went: "Do whatever you want to the girl, just don't hurt me." He says he was thinking of breaking up with her anyway, and at one point even gives the mugger the PIN number to her bank card. It's hilarious when it's not the idiot horde calling for the head of what's valuable about our country.
"Ask yourself what terror is." I wish I could have these five words on a thousand billboards all around America.
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