US Air Force joint terminal attack controllers and US Army forward observers direct air assets during a close air support training in Djibouti, December 13, 2015. (Photo: Senior Airman Cory D. Payne / US Air Force)
Holy great galloping Jesus on a turkey track, but man, am I exhausted. I mean exhausted down to a core place within I never even knew existed. Tired to the sub-atomic level. My damn toenails are tired. My earlobes are wiped out. The hairs on the nape of my neck need a nap. My eyeballs are about to go on strike, and my pillow haz a sad from the lack of attention it has received.
Why? Well, let’s see …
The so-called Tea Party took control of Congress three days into the year, giving the rest of us 72 hours to breathe normally before the crap hit the fan and sprayed. Every Republican on the planet is running for president. Another Planned Parenthood clinic got shot up, and then a pair of scumbags riddled San Bernardino with death. An amazing number of Americans got angry at the simple argument that Black lives do, in fact, matter, even as hundreds of Black people got shot by cops up and down the calendar year. The seas rose higher, the glaciers retreated at speed, and they talked about it in Paris, because talk is cheaper than the water that is coming for us all.
Pretty standard stuff, really.
Such is the way of things as 2015 – the year that saw Donald Trump go from TV clown to GOP frontrunner – staggers to its inevitable death. I say good riddance to bad rubbish. The words “fascism” and “fashionable” rhyme too closely for comfort, and “The Donald “is making them sing. It’s an old story, too often repeated.
Oh, P.S., it was warmer at the North Pole than it was in Southern California on Wednesday. Read that twice. Learn to swim. “Waterworld” was a terrible movie, but prophecy has a way of getting dismissed as foolishness before the metal meets the meat. The gills will come in due course. If you don’t believe me, ask Missouri.
For the sheer barking hell of it, and because it’s what you do this time of year, let’s talk resolutions. If you want to lose 10 pounds, or quit smoking cigars in the bathroom, or finally get that hair transplant you’ve been talking about for so long, go to it with my blessings and best of luck. There are 364 days lined up in front of you for all that. What I’m talking about is us, we the people, all of us, everywhere.
Two ideas:
Let’s find a way to make war something other than a for-profit industry. Something, say, that no longer exists. You can’t improve war; you can only abolish it, and one way to do that is to make it cost more than it earns. Call me goofy, but I’d like to see a world where bullet manufacturers, drone crafters and bomb builders don’t get paid for every round fired or explosion delivered, but instead have to pay for them. Kaboom, that’ll be 10 million bucks. They’d either go bankrupt overnight, or everyone would calm the hell down and ease that finger off the trigger. This would do wonders for the bloodbath happening in the United States, as well. If killing cost money, it would go out of style faster than leg-warmers, pet rocks and Vanilla Ice.
Let’s not die as a species. There are millions of acres of space along all the highways in the US, thousands of miles lying fallow. Let’s rack in solar panels there, from sea to shining sea and from the Twin Cities to Corpus Christi. The Germans are doing it right now, and it’s working for them beyond their wildest dreams. Every township along the road can have its share of that energy and someday, maybe, when the grandchild on your knee looks up at you and asks, “What’s oil, Grandma?,” you can enjoy a quiet smile at the fact that she has no idea what oil is.
These are two solutions that will spare millions of lives. Preposterous? Perhaps, but at least I’m trying. We’re running out of moves in this little chess game called Earth. Nothing is too stupid to propose, because checkmate is too gruesome to contemplate, much less confront. No more complacency or despair. Forget all these presidential candidates, yes, even the worthy ones. You are the one you’ve been waiting for. You’ve been here all along.
Have a better year. Earn it.
Truthout Is Preparing to Meet Trump’s Agenda With Resistance at Every Turn
Dear Truthout Community,
If you feel rage, despondency, confusion and deep fear today, you are not alone. We’re feeling it too. We are heartsick. Facing down Trump’s fascist agenda, we are desperately worried about the most vulnerable people among us, including our loved ones and everyone in the Truthout community, and our minds are racing a million miles a minute to try to map out all that needs to be done.
We must give ourselves space to grieve and feel our fear, feel our rage, and keep in the forefront of our mind the stark truth that millions of real human lives are on the line. And simultaneously, we’ve got to get to work, take stock of our resources, and prepare to throw ourselves full force into the movement.
Journalism is a linchpin of that movement. Even as we are reeling, we’re summoning up all the energy we can to face down what’s coming, because we know that one of the sharpest weapons against fascism is publishing the truth.
There are many terrifying planks to the Trump agenda, and we plan to devote ourselves to reporting thoroughly on each one and, crucially, covering the movements resisting them. We also recognize that Trump is a dire threat to journalism itself, and that we must take this seriously from the outset.
Last week, the four of us sat down to have some hard but necessary conversations about Truthout under a Trump presidency. How would we defend our publication from an avalanche of far right lawsuits that seek to bankrupt us? How would we keep our reporters safe if they need to cover outbreaks of political violence, or if they are targeted by authorities? How will we urgently produce the practical analysis, tools and movement coverage that you need right now — breaking through our normal routines to meet a terrifying moment in ways that best serve you?
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We promise we will kick into an even higher gear to give you truthful news that cuts against the disinformation and vitriol and hate and violence. We promise to publish analyses that will serve the needs of the movements we all rely on to survive the next four years, and even build for the future. We promise to be responsive, to recognize you as members of our community with a vital stake and voice in this work.
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With love, rage, and solidarity,
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