No Big Deal

 Holy Day

            In the Christian faith Epiphany is on January 6^th.

From Merriam-Webster

1 capitalized: January 6 observed as a church festival in commemoration of the coming of the Magi as the first manifestation of Christ to the Gentiles or in the Eastern Church in commemoration of the baptism of Christ

2: an appearance or manifestation especially of a divine being

3a(1): a usually sudden manifestation or perception of the essential nature or meaning of something

(2): an intuitive grasp of reality through something (such as an event) usually simple and striking

(3): an illuminating discovery, realization, or disclosure

b: a revealing scene or moment

            Epiphany is kind of a big deal in Christianity. We celebrate the 12 days of Christmas beginning December 25^th and finish up January 6^th of the New Year. Some of us start celebrating waaaay before that.

            From now on this will also be the day remembered that President Trump and a bunch of Republican Congressmen tried to overthrow our government on a Christian holy day.

And FAILED.

Orwell in charge

            When history books don’t mention the coup attempt that took place at our Capitol on < January 6, 2021 > it will mean that we have lost our Democracy and the fascist Republicans won. They will have successfully rewritten history. The perpetrators of the “Big Lie” that the election was stolen will be rewarded for their duplicity.

Traitors will be the victors.

 What’s the big deal?

            For the first time in the history of our country not only did a President not accept the results of a free and fair election he attempted a coup to overturn those results. The coup turned violent. There was no peaceful transfer of power. Members of the Republican Party went along with the coup. Lots of them, but they came up short of having enough traitors to overthrow our Republic.

            So far the leaders of the coup have gotten away with it without any repercussions. Only the Capitol terrorists have faced legal consequences so far. Their leaders have been rewarded for their seditious actions.

Business as usual.

Big surprise

            Republicans want people to forget about what they did. Understandable, but the sad reality is that the majority of Americans don’t spend a lot of time thinking about what might have happened or how close we came to losing it all. People are focused on living their daily lives. We’re easily distracted by thoughts of < Mayberry >. The < Average American > doesn’t appear to care that those who will lie about something so fundamental to our nation will obviously lie about anything.

            It shouldn’t be lost on the uber Christian Evangelical Party that Trump failed on a holy day. They will find ways to excuse their Caesar. It also shouldn’t be lost on MAGA Heads that while Trump pardoned criminal friends he didn’t bother pardoning all the Capitol-storming rabble that he encouraged.

            What about the rest of us? What history will we remember? What history will we pursue?

"You can't love your country only when you win."

President Joe Biden, 1/6/22

Poverty kills

 

Poverty

            Poverty has been on my mind a lot here lately because we have so many newly impoverished and poor. Their ranks have been swollen by millions. I reference some of the numbers here. (This is going to be boring because it has some of my history.) 

Korea and beyond

            Since its winter I’m going to start off with an experience that I had in South Korea during the time I was there before I backtrack in my life story.

            It was the dead of winter. I was riding shotgun in a deuce-and-a-half. (2 ½ ton truck) We were making a run to pick up some supplies In Yongsan. Our truck didn’t have a heater. We were freezing our asses off even though we had our winter gear on. We decided to take a back way in order to get there faster. We weren’t supposed to do that. We were supposed to stick to the main roads.

            We ended up going through some extremely poor neighborhoods. We drove past a group of screaming kids playing outside. I wish I was exaggerating about this next part but I’m not. They were all poorly dressed and some not at all. Playing. Outside. Bitter cold. Naked. To this day the image is still with me.

            That’s poverty.

Poverty kills.

 People adjust.

            One reason of many that I make being thankful for the day and the blessings that we have is that I remember not having much at different times in my life. I remember being financially poor. I remember my family living in a 3 room duplex.

            I remember times when I bought recap tires for the car. Do they even make those for cars anymore? IDK. A rebuilt battery was $10. In those days I could work on a car myself to put in a fuel pump, fan belt or starter. Now the fuel pumps are in the gas tank. Who came up with that idea?

            Cars today are engineering marvels. Nowadays when I pop the hood I don’t even know what I’m looking at. I come from a time of stick shifts, manual chokes and no air-conditioning. I still have Grandad’s fishing car, a “56 Chevy needing rebuilt. It’s possible to stand in the engine compartment.

            Let me see, in the summertime it was Keds or barefoot. I had a nice pair of shoes for regular wear and going to church. In the winter I had one of those blue gray parkas. Also had a jean jacket. BTW jeans were not expensive in those days.

            When I was eleven I got a job digging the foundations for an addition to their house that a neighbor was doing. The addition was almost as big as their house. Pick axe and shovel. He was pleased with my work ethic and in later years wanted me to go into business with him. But I had already moved on to other things. He was a good man even if he did hire an eleven year old. In later years I would work in a factory where underage kids were employed. The owners of the factory weren’t nice people.

            I was in the 6th grade when I got my first pair of glasses. Another hardship for my folks. And of course the nose bridge broke. That happened a lot in those days. So my glasses were taped together just like you see in the movies when a kid wearing taped up glasses is made fun of. Being poor is always funny to a certain group of people.

            If that wasn’t enough I also had a slight stutter. I talked so fast that I would trip over my words or get hung up. To this very day I give a little whistle at times when that happens in order to reset.

            When they started up a new high school in the area where we lived a dress code was implemented. We had to wear slacks! Buying slacks was a hardship for a lot of those living in working class neighborhoods. Nowadays we would say that the school board was tone deaf.

            I got my first pair of real dress shoes in high school. I spent my freshman year keeping my mouth closed because one of my front teeth had been knocked out prior to high school. There just wasn’t enough money to get it capped. Missing teeth was like carrying a sign that said poor.

            My brothers and I all had paper routes. We would get up at 4 in the morning and throw our papers before we went to school. I lied about my age to work in a grocery store in town. Dad had already had heart attacks by that time. Right after high school I got a job at a defense plant. Also started college.

            Viet Nam was in full swing but I had a college deferment. They upped the requirement for the number of hours needed and there just wasn’t any way that I could afford more college hours and was not about to let my folks try to come up with the money and help so I enlisted in the Army instead for a 4 year hitch. At that time in my age group you either went to college, enlisted or you got drafted unless you had a medical deferment or were a…

“Fortunate Son”.

Life happens.

            That’s kind of a long route to get to the point but if you’re reading this you’ve got time on your hands anyway. I try and make it a point to remember every day that there are an incredible number of people struggling right now. People that were and are far worse off than I ever was. People, entire families, homeless. People living out of their cars. People dying because they have no health insurance. Kids hungry.

            In every age group there are those that aren’t as fortunate through absolutely no fault of their own. They are good decent hard working people that life happened to in a different way. They needed help before the pandemic. They and the ranks of the newly poor need help. The same thing happened during the financial collapse of 2008. People that never dreamed such financial hardships could happen to them found themselves struggling to hang onto their homes and lifestyle.

            We have people in this country living in poverty.

Poverty kills.

Mayberry

 

Is nothing sacred?

            Well, it’s 2022 and I’ve come full circle. I’m talking about Andy Griffith again. Back in 2015 I wrote a piece about "LonesomeTrump". The title being a take on a movie that Griffith starred in.

            I watched this video from CBS Sunday morning where Ted Koppel went with a film crew to Mount Airy, North Carolina that is a tourist attraction based upon the fictitious town of the Andy Griffith Show’s (AGS) Mayberry of the 60s. The video is well worth watching. It’s a powerful segment. The Washington Post did an article based upon the video but it might be behind a paywall.

            Remember the 60s? In case you’re too young, Mayberry was NOT an accurate reflection of the times. These were times of segregation and the Civil Rights struggle. In the entire run of the AGS there was only one black actor that had a speaking role. A black woman that was interviewed by Ted Koppel mentioned that Mount Airy still had segregated eating in restaurants in 1973.

            In 1970 I was discharged from the Army after a 4 year hitch and immediately ceased getting haircuts. I wanted to see the country so we took a car trip and headed south touring the coastline all the way to Florida. The racism of the south was blatant then and even visible from the road.

            It was also hard to get a job then. They were few and far between. One of the many places that I applied to was for the job of being the guy that rode on the back of the trash truck that jumped off and emptied the trash cans. I was turned down because I was a veteran. Yes, you read that right. The “conservative” patriot guy that owned the business wouldn’t hire veterans because well, we all had a bad reputation. Get this. He was a WWII Marine veteran.

Go figure.

Trippin’

            There are just some priceless unscripted man-on-the-street moments in the video segment. The “moral values” expressed in the AGS came up early in the production. Followed shortly by a gentleman talking about the“…the Godless society that we see today…” in comparison to the goodness of fictitious Mayberry. He was talking about a Christian God. Just like when conservatives talk about bringing prayer back in school they aren’t talking about bringing back Jewish or Muslim prayer.

            The Airy trolley car tour is when things really got interesting. The word that best describes it comes from the 60s. Trippin’. Koppel asked people what they thought about the election and why they thought what they did. The riders managed to cover a good portion of the debunked conspiracies about the election and slip in a little racism within the span of a couple of minutes. Except for a couple of people on the trolley, they LOVE Trump. They avoid the truth…

Like they avoid the plague.

Militant ignorance

            A great descriptor. I didn’t come up with the term though. Credit goes to Senator Moynihan.

“Sen. Moynihan became indignant. "In my office, we do not criticize ignorance," he said. "Most people who are ignorant can't help it. They had no opportunity to learn." The senator then paused for thought and added: "Militant ignorance is different. Ignorance that is proud of itself, that holds knowledge in contempt - that must be condemned."

            I believe that militant ignorance best describes what we are currently witnessing in America. Almost half of Republicans in addition to not believing in science they don’t believe that we had a fair election and that President Biden is the for real honest to God duly elected President. Nothing will convince them otherwise.

PERIOD.

Branches

            To not believe that President Biden was elected in a free and fair election at this juncture is to not believe in our form of government.

            The Executive Branch headed by Trump validated that the election was legitimate. The DOJ, the FBI and Homeland Security all found the election to be on the up and up and claims otherwise to be bogus. These were people appointed by Trump. (Remember when he said that he was only going to appoint the best people?)

            The judicial branch of government ruled against challenges to the election 61 times. This doesn’t include all the court challenges that have taken place and failed since Biden took office. The Supreme Court sustained the election process. These judges included judges appointed by Trump.

            The Legislative Branch, albeit grudgingly, upheld the election attributed at least in part to the attempted coup that took place. Enough Republicans remained that were willing to uphold the truth and voted to certify the election.

            MAGA Heads don’t believe the Republicans that were in charge of the elections at state and local levels of government either. They don’t believe all of the subsequent recounts even those conducted by hyper partisan groups that have held that there was no widespread voter fraud. They don’t believe all of the legitimate media that has reported on all of these activities. Anyone that doesn’t believe what they believe is suspect to them.

Willful Militant ignorance.

White time.

            They long for the Mayberry that never existed. They long for the old south where people of color knew their place. No BLM for them! And just like in the Civil War they want all of America to go along with them. They want guns! Lots and lots of guns! Guns everywhere! They threaten violence. They want an America where everyone gets along with them. They don’t want more people of color, immigrants. They don’t want more Muslims. They want a mostly white America in charge with their supposed Christian values of intolerance.

And they don’t care how they get there.