Ah, Politics…

—From CB—

Okay, so here are my political thoughts in one big blurt, whatever the consequence. Be warned: there are NO positions taken on any vital issues.

1. Bipartisanship doesn’t meet in the middle. It just means both sides listen, with real ears, to the other’s concerns. That’s near impossible, but sometimes it happens.
2. The Left, with whom I identify, doesn’t have any patent on logic: we can be just as crazy as them, and it behooves us to be very critical of our own rhetoric. Critics are seen as enemies. Some are; some are not.
3. Finding a new insulting phrase on Facebook isn’t activism, nor is taking to the streets. Activism is only something you try that makes a difference. If the only difference it makes is that it makes you feel active, it’s a tiny piddle.
4. A fundamental of strategy is “Know your opponent.” Ascribing horrific behavior to “white supremacy” or “toxic masculinity” is only useful insofar as it results in a strategy. If you can’t see the world from their perspective, you can’t remotely devise a strategy to oppose them.
5. Lots of rightwing crazies look to the main chance. Lots of leftwing dedicated souls look to the main chance. The main chance: to attain power within your subgroup, to achieve notice, to get laid. We must always distrust those we would elevate to stardom—not their motives but our own penchant for crowning heroes.
6. I hate CANNED CANT, whatever its source.
7. We’re right to question the mainstream media. We’re also right to question the alternative media. Major corporations aren’t the only players in the game of “Follow the money.” Distrust the alpha males, but also distrust those who model themselves counter to the alpha males. The Flat-Earth Society doesn’t necessarily gain more credence by being counter to accepted science.
8. There has always been a pro-fascist movement in the USA. It was very powerful until the Japanese did us the favor of attacking Pearl Harbor. We shouldn’t be surprised at its existence. And we shouldn’t give D. Trump the honor of producing it.
9. The greatness of America isn’t in its history. That’s shot full of holes in every century. It’s in its ideals, the aspirations of many of its people. Jefferson’s words stand beside Jefferson’s status as a slaveholder and mistress-fucker: which are more to honor? Does one discredit the other? How much courage did it take to write those words in the Declaration? Faced with the might of the British Empire, I couldn’t have done it.
10. There’s a strong “progressive” urge to discount all progress as being an excuse for laxity. I don’t think it works that way. I think we need, as one of our long-ago characters said, our tiny ecstasies.

 I don’t claim any more expertise than other bloviators. And someone who puts in hours with phone banks, writing postcards or daily blogs, should get more brownie points than I. I’ve spent my life writing and producing plays, now novels, that have tried, for the people who saw them or read them, to induce a way of seeing and feeling empathic. EMPATHIC. It’s been only a nudge in a direction, a breath in the biosphere. But I wouldn’t do otherwise.

###