I have to tell y'all that I started this draft almost a year ago. I just didn't know how to talk about all the things I wanted to talk about in a way that made sense. Since then, a lot of shit has happened that I did not anticipate. And now, with the results in Nevada -- just the third state to vote, my you -- I fear that I may be too late in blogging about this topic, which has morphed into something else, and much more sinister. But I'll start from the beginning anyway, and I'll try to make some sense.
When all of ... "this" began, I wanted to think that the ultimate aim, to take down the Republicans and Donald Trump, was something everyone who is of decent character was focused on. There are a lot of candidates, and many (if not all) of them vowed when they got into the race that they would keep it clean, that they would remain civil towards their fellow party members and aim all their ire (and, hopefully, insults) at Trump.
The sentiment that everyone would be respectable towards each other seems like a pipe dream now. But, at least before all ... "this" started, I knew this was going to happen. And you know what? That's OK. Look, politics is never civil. These Democrats are fighting to be The Leader Of The Free World. Elbows are going to be thrown. And people need to distinguish between what was once 22 (?) candidates to find the person who is going to face Trump, Republicans, The Stupid People Among Us Who Want To Be Ruled By A Dictator, and the cheating (voter suppression and voter fraud as well as foreign influence and disinformation) that is going to be employed for the general election in November. Of course this is going to be dirty. This isn't a fucking tea party. This is, for all intents and purposes, war, moreso now because of the bullshit coming from Republicans.
With that being said, even I have had my limit of the Democratic primary already. What I did not take into account, or believe, is that the attacks would get so personal. And it's coming from the supporters of one candidate -- Bernie Sanders, who has just won Nevada and, although it should fly in the face of all common sense because there are 47 states who have yet to vote, seems like the presumptive Democratic nominee. Much of the toxicity comes from supporters on Twitter, but I have heard many anecdotes -- anecdotes, sure, but many of them -- about friends and strangers coming up to them and, after trying to discuss doubts and questions they have about Sanders, fly into a seething rage. I have heard friendships have broken up because of Sanders.
There could be a huge disinformation/disruption campaign going on. All these Bernie Bros. on Twitter could just be Russian bots. But the face-to-face in-your-faceness from Sanders supporters is harder to ignore or dismiss. This bullying is something I could not dream of from the left. And yet, here it is. Moreover, Sanders has had ample opportunities to stop it, and his efforts have not worked all that well. It may be because some of this toxicity has come from his surrogates -- more proof that these haters can't just be chalked up to trolls living in Moldova.
All of this leads me to a scary possibility: That Russia or other foreign entities are helping Sanders win much like how Russia helped Trump win. Two follow-up questions, in my opinion, are just as important: Does Sanders know this? And what is he going to do about it? I thought about these same questions for Trump, and, hopefully without being brainwashed by disinformation on the Internet, the answers to them are fuck yeah, and jack shit. But I'm not sure if Sanders's answers won't be the same.
Therefore, that leads me to fear the scariest worst-case scenario: That Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders are basically the same. There are already too many factual similarities that I find distasteful: They are self-styled populists; they make proclamations that they hate "the establishment"; and they have won the nomination of a party they are not technically a part of. There are other similarities which I do not totally believe, but scare me if they are indeed true: Their supporters are basically cult members who believe their "God" can do no wrong; they don't believe Russian interference exists, or at least it is not a big deal; and they have an authoritarian streak, that they want to get shit done, on their own, without some obstructive "checks and balances" that "centrists" have given as the reason to compromise, which is the reason our country is going to hell in a handbasket. In political science, there is a concept called the "horseshoe theory," whereby the extremes of the political spectrum aren't polar opposites but are instead analogous when it comes to both values and actions that achieve those values. It's as if both the extreme right and the extreme left are backing away from their moderate wings (hurling insults all the way) so much that they've butted asses with each other. Horseshoe theory isn't considered canon, but by God it makes so much fucking sense to me right now.
So I am left in a bind. I do not want to fall into giving every candidate a purity test. Fact is all of the candidates have some flaws; you go with the one whose flaws trouble you the least. However, on the opposite end of that is throwing up your hands and saying, "Both sides do it." There is a factual difference between what Republicans do and believe and what decent Americans who have brains do and believe, and not searching for that distinction shows one is too lazy to give a fuck about what's happening to our country. But I do not know how to feel about Bernie Sanders right now. His meteoric rise scares me. His about-face on not releasing his medical records and tax returns scare me. And the continuous insults and threats lobbied to non-acolytes in his name really scares me.
And the thing is, if you substituted Trump's name for Sanders's, those last three sentences in the paragraph above are exactly how I feel about Trump.
Maybe it's not just Democrats who don't want Sanders are in disarray. And maybe it's not just all Democrats who are in disarray. Maybe all of us who seek the facts are in disarray.
So, maybe we're all fucked.
When all of ... "this" began, I wanted to think that the ultimate aim, to take down the Republicans and Donald Trump, was something everyone who is of decent character was focused on. There are a lot of candidates, and many (if not all) of them vowed when they got into the race that they would keep it clean, that they would remain civil towards their fellow party members and aim all their ire (and, hopefully, insults) at Trump.
The sentiment that everyone would be respectable towards each other seems like a pipe dream now. But, at least before all ... "this" started, I knew this was going to happen. And you know what? That's OK. Look, politics is never civil. These Democrats are fighting to be The Leader Of The Free World. Elbows are going to be thrown. And people need to distinguish between what was once 22 (?) candidates to find the person who is going to face Trump, Republicans, The Stupid People Among Us Who Want To Be Ruled By A Dictator, and the cheating (voter suppression and voter fraud as well as foreign influence and disinformation) that is going to be employed for the general election in November. Of course this is going to be dirty. This isn't a fucking tea party. This is, for all intents and purposes, war, moreso now because of the bullshit coming from Republicans.
With that being said, even I have had my limit of the Democratic primary already. What I did not take into account, or believe, is that the attacks would get so personal. And it's coming from the supporters of one candidate -- Bernie Sanders, who has just won Nevada and, although it should fly in the face of all common sense because there are 47 states who have yet to vote, seems like the presumptive Democratic nominee. Much of the toxicity comes from supporters on Twitter, but I have heard many anecdotes -- anecdotes, sure, but many of them -- about friends and strangers coming up to them and, after trying to discuss doubts and questions they have about Sanders, fly into a seething rage. I have heard friendships have broken up because of Sanders.
There could be a huge disinformation/disruption campaign going on. All these Bernie Bros. on Twitter could just be Russian bots. But the face-to-face in-your-faceness from Sanders supporters is harder to ignore or dismiss. This bullying is something I could not dream of from the left. And yet, here it is. Moreover, Sanders has had ample opportunities to stop it, and his efforts have not worked all that well. It may be because some of this toxicity has come from his surrogates -- more proof that these haters can't just be chalked up to trolls living in Moldova.
All of this leads me to a scary possibility: That Russia or other foreign entities are helping Sanders win much like how Russia helped Trump win. Two follow-up questions, in my opinion, are just as important: Does Sanders know this? And what is he going to do about it? I thought about these same questions for Trump, and, hopefully without being brainwashed by disinformation on the Internet, the answers to them are fuck yeah, and jack shit. But I'm not sure if Sanders's answers won't be the same.
Therefore, that leads me to fear the scariest worst-case scenario: That Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders are basically the same. There are already too many factual similarities that I find distasteful: They are self-styled populists; they make proclamations that they hate "the establishment"; and they have won the nomination of a party they are not technically a part of. There are other similarities which I do not totally believe, but scare me if they are indeed true: Their supporters are basically cult members who believe their "God" can do no wrong; they don't believe Russian interference exists, or at least it is not a big deal; and they have an authoritarian streak, that they want to get shit done, on their own, without some obstructive "checks and balances" that "centrists" have given as the reason to compromise, which is the reason our country is going to hell in a handbasket. In political science, there is a concept called the "horseshoe theory," whereby the extremes of the political spectrum aren't polar opposites but are instead analogous when it comes to both values and actions that achieve those values. It's as if both the extreme right and the extreme left are backing away from their moderate wings (hurling insults all the way) so much that they've butted asses with each other. Horseshoe theory isn't considered canon, but by God it makes so much fucking sense to me right now.
So I am left in a bind. I do not want to fall into giving every candidate a purity test. Fact is all of the candidates have some flaws; you go with the one whose flaws trouble you the least. However, on the opposite end of that is throwing up your hands and saying, "Both sides do it." There is a factual difference between what Republicans do and believe and what decent Americans who have brains do and believe, and not searching for that distinction shows one is too lazy to give a fuck about what's happening to our country. But I do not know how to feel about Bernie Sanders right now. His meteoric rise scares me. His about-face on not releasing his medical records and tax returns scare me. And the continuous insults and threats lobbied to non-acolytes in his name really scares me.
And the thing is, if you substituted Trump's name for Sanders's, those last three sentences in the paragraph above are exactly how I feel about Trump.
Maybe it's not just Democrats who don't want Sanders are in disarray. And maybe it's not just all Democrats who are in disarray. Maybe all of us who seek the facts are in disarray.
So, maybe we're all fucked.
No comments:
Post a Comment