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kimberlysteeleWhat Could Have Been: Carter 2.0
Sans "assistance" from Democratic Party operatives, Bernie Sanders arguably would have given Trump a hearty dose of competition had the Democrats let his campaign run its natural course instead of drowning it before the 2016 primaries. It is my opinion that Bernie would have been a second Jimmy Carter. Largely incompetent and inept, Sanders would have engaged in naive, Carter-esque brinksmanship in a way that Trump could only balk at. Americans would have gained free health care and college and at the price of a series of bank holidays. Economic collapse of some sort seems to have been written into the cards. This would have fomented a different sort of civil war than the one we are experiencing today. Bernie, like Jimmy, would have been a one-term president.
Despite his ineptitude, Bernie Sanders would have ended Pedogate in a way Trump with all his swamp-draining could never accomplish: by squashing Clinton like a bug at the first primaries, Pedogate would have gone mostly unexamined. Given their pound of flesh in the election arena, Pedogaters would have receded from the scene. Celebrities would have largely maintained their status as tastemakers and thought leaders. Most people do not want to live in a world where every celebrity and politician is suspected of depraved and horrible acts involving children. A Sanders presidency would have deflated Pedogate's bubble. Without an adversary to contrast themselves against, Republicans would have continued to be the party of rich Protestant property owners instead of lower middle class Deplorable property renters. Only Trump was able to thrust snooty Fox News Republicans onto the side of Larry the Cable Guy populists; the divide between the Middle and the Coasts was much less stark in 2013.
Trump's Unintentional Election Campaign
The Democrats, with their incessant Cruella De Vil toddler tantrums and ridiculous portrayals of Trump as the evil troll of the fairy story, made Trump possible and elected him in spite of themselves. I have often wondered if Democratic antics such as the choice of Hillary Clinton and then Joe Biden aren't a clever Republican psy-op meant to cement eternal rule by the Republican party. Everything Democrats do seems expressly designed to enhance Trump's appeal. If they actually didn't want Trump re-elected, the average Democrat would affect a bored, indifferent demeanor whenever Trump was mentioned. Furthermore, if they wanted to help their side get elected, they would be acting on a personal level in accordance with the values they preached. When they spoke of racial income disparity, it would be meaningful, because they would speak after they had given up their highly paid, benefits-included salary to free the job up for a "person of color". They would do this from a modest house or apartment in a poor, multi-racial neighborhood where whites, blacks, Latinos, and Asians lived cheek to jowl. There would be no empty Marxist words spilled by bourgeois mouths: Democrats of all colors who championed the poor blacks would live exactly like the poor blacks... as their next door neighbors.Instead, privileged Democrats cry, scream, hex, cheat, riot, vandalize, loot, curse and then virtue signal about how they're fighting against oppression. If they put their considerable energy into championing the equality they claim to care so much about, they could be a force for good, but alas. Instead, they are content to rest on their party's moth-eaten laurels. In the Democratic Party's heyday of the 1960s, they fought for peace and their record producers developed some groovy artists! The 1960s fetish is prevalent in Democratic Party messaging because it represents the last time the Democratic Party was relevant. To make matters worse, Candace Owens and her ilk have excoriated the Democratic Party for its white-hooded beginnings and its nasty habit of creating segregated brutalist ghettoes in big cities. Only black pro sports athletes and television/movie stars have truly benefitted from Democratic policy making over the last 60 years, it seems, and membership in that elite club comes at the price of one's human decency, according to Pedogate.
Democrats only hurt themselves when they sneer at the voting bloc they alienated. Instead of admitting that the lower classes saw benefits from Trump's policies (policies that were promised for decades and not delivered upon by Democrats) such as the end of the TPP and the reworking of NAFTA, the end of the Obamacare penalty, and increased tax breaks for families and businesses, Democrats doubled down on outrage culture, insisting that transexual males needed access to women's bathrooms while screaming Orange Man Bad.
Much Ado About Nothing
Meanwhile, Trump was doing so well in his management role, the Democratic party decided to roll out the Tantrum to End All Tantrums: COVID-19. Anyone who has done the slightest amount of research on the Black Death knows approximately how bad a plague can get: the Black Death killed 9 out of 10 people in London in 1349. The Black Death killed 25% of all people on planet Earth before it finished its rounds. Covid-19 has killed 155,000 in the US (155K is a ginned up, exaggerated number that includes cancer and gunshot victims) which gives it a mortality rate of 0.00047256097. In Sweden, a country that took minimal precautions where COVID was concerned, has suffered 5790 deaths in a population of 10.23 million. This translates to a 0.0005659824 mortality rate. Sweden, of course, did not shut down its economy, so it has not seen a rash of overdoses and suicides because of lockdown like we have in the US.Trump's administration differed in another key way from business as usual expectations: he and his team prosecuted human traffickers with a special focus on child traffickers. Ivanka Trump held a summit in early 2020 to combat human trafficking and Trump signed an Executive Order to the same effect. These concrete actions, along with tightened security at the US's southern border, showed that the Trumps were serious about attempting to punish traffickers despite the predictable pooh-poohing by leftist media pundits.
Tarnished Legacies
Forces conspired to trash the legacy of Bill Clinton's presidency and with it, the image of the Obama presidency. Clinton's proclivity for intercourse with girls, including those under the age of consent on Jeffrey Epstein's plane and island, along with his wife's complete failure to relate to anyone outside of her own class of One Percenters, was the seal of doom. Obama, with his smooth demeanor and his behind the scenes Chicago machine politician sociopathy, was implicated in Pedogate multiple times. Notably, a leaked email raises eyebrows over the Obamas order of 65,000 dollars worth of "hot dogs" to the White House during the Obama presidency. Outside food is not allowed at the White House for security reasons and hot dog is known pedophile code for little boys. The mainstream media has screamed "fake news" about any tidbit like this one that serves to tarnish the memory of the first half-black President, however, the email in question came from Wikileaks, which exposed the Podestas, the Clintons, and a crew of other players right before the 2016 election, so it's fairly clear from 2016's election results that the damage has been done. The Obamas and the Clintons lost their appeal. Trump, on the other hand, picked up the slack.The Democratic Party and the Left in the US, in my opinion, is a sinking Titanic. It is irreparably damaged and it will never achieve the kind of power and influence it had when I was growing up in the 70s and 80s. The capsizing of the ship cannot be avoided for leftists. The matter at hand is how leftists who don't want to go down with the ship will survive the coming wave of retribution.
What's A Leftist To Do?
Leftists can ameliorate what is coming their way by walking away from the Democratic Party, of course, but I'd like to talk about less dramatic and more personal ways to deflect what is coming if one is on the Left and planning to stay there.Number One: We Need To Talk
In a country founded on the ideal of freedom of speech, there is not a single person who has a right to censor, doxx, harass, or threaten someone based on speech alone. If you don't want to talk about Pedogate, fine, but stop expecting that others aren't going to want to talk about it more when you won't allow it in your presence. Don't shame someone for being a Pedogate/Pizzagate conspiracy freak unless you've done the homework. Admit there is something to it.
Stop the TDS
From the beginning, Trump's campaigns have only been strengthened by leftist hysteria. Trump succeeds in direct proportion to the amount of leftist cursing and frivolous aggravation he receives. Had the Left taken a neutral "meh" attitude towards him in 2014, he would not be President now. It's never too late to shrug and move on. Just as die hard Republicans survived Clinton and Obama, die hard Democrats will survive Trump. If you are tempted to go on at length about Trump being the epitome of evil, take a break, cool off, and do something constructive, preferably something that involves physical activity.
Leave the COVID Camp
Quietly refuse to take part in online shouting matches over mask mandates, distancing, and other social controls that are more symbolic than utilitarian. To the Deplorables, COVID controls are a ruse to oppress their class by killing their businesses and laying waste to small towns Trump managed to partially rebuild from 2016 - 2020. To Pedogaters, COVID lockdowns were an invention to help child traffickers fly under the radar. Allow people to go back to games, concerts, weddings, and funerals. If you see your neighbor having a party or people thronging at a re-opened business, shut up about it. Pedogate research gained massive popularity because people had the free time to do it at home. Take away that free time by replacing it with bread and circuses and Pedogate will become unappealing by way of distraction.
Eschew Celebrity and Celebrity Culture
If you have any transparent ambitions to become extremely wealthy or famous, mask them now and for the foreseeable future. Celebrities are the new disgraced class. If they become Pedogate untouchables, their heads as well as the heads of any out and proud leftists will end up on pikes. Pedogaters literally think anyone of extreme wealth or fame is a Satanic pedophile. Keep that in mind if you're determined to chase stardom or high stakes investment banking.
End Class Warfare by Starting With Yourself
Much of class warfare is the irrational fear of other people that manifests as snobbishness, irritability, road rage, and online trolling. Rise above it. Other people are not out to get you -- they're far too busy worrying about themselves. Also, stop painting every other person that exists outside you and your bubble as stupid, unless you wish to be seen in the same harsh light. Give people the benefit of the doubt whenever it is possible. We are all going through rough times. During the times you must avoid people, be courteous about it. One must set firm limits in all areas of life in order to be happy, but we needn't be rude or melodramatic about it. Look people in the eye and don't pity them as lesser than you. Think good and hard about the bigotry of low expectations and the way you view other people. Root out the fear of others via deeply honest self-examination. Live cheaply and lightly and give the tiniest bit of excess away instead of putting it into displays of ostentation or vanity. You try to do this and I will do the same. Be blessed.
Re: Cuties
Date: 2020-08-23 06:56 pm (UTC)I think the absent religion of the local Catholic church is better than that! So the fact so many people come out of it as atheists surprises me not at all. I'm fairly confident that had I grown up in such a church I'd be one myself...
Re: Cuties
Date: 2020-08-23 10:59 pm (UTC)Re: Cuties
Date: 2020-08-28 09:25 pm (UTC)Re: Cuties
Date: 2020-08-29 03:20 am (UTC)Re: Cuties
Date: 2020-08-28 09:13 pm (UTC)In my experience, Orthodox are content to have you visit indefinitely without trying to convert you (I had to be quite pushy about it to join up).
Re: Cuties
Date: 2020-08-29 03:22 am (UTC)Re: Cuties
Date: 2020-08-29 04:14 pm (UTC)If you're only in it for the music, the Serbians have us all beat! I think they take all the men who would (in any other culture) become professional baritones, and ship them off to seminary instead.
I'd have to quibble just a wee bit with your take on the music, though. I might have seen it that way, once, but after spending some time as a chanter... no. in Orthodoxy, you can't look at the music as a way to attract people. That's not what it's *for* and as soon as you start looking at it as a marketing tool, you're doing it wrong.
OTOH, you're absolutely right, we *should* focus more on our musical tradition: it is a deep well of spiritual treasure. With the caveat that this is a rank beginner's take on it: different pieces of liturgical music/chant have different purposes. Your basic Apolytikia, Kontakia, and Kathismata are educational. They developed in a place and time where most churchgoers were illiterate. But even for me, a reading person, they are really quite useful. To an Orthodox person who attends Orthros (the early morning service before liturgy) every week, year in, year out, because these things are set to familiar and repeating tunes, you do end up with snippets of scripture and tidbits about the saints and the basic story of the resurrection absolutely embedded in your brain as a set of earworms. Other types, such as the chanting of Psalm 50 and the bit that comes after it during Lent-- "Open to me the gates of repentance"-- help the singer (and hopefully the listener!) to achieve a contrite state of mind/heart. Others, particularly the long ones, are meditative(?). It is hard to describe, and really just has to be experienced. You could read the Friday Lamentations for holy week ten million times, but you have not experienced them until you've chanted them by candlelight, in the church, after fasting all day. Together, we descend into the tomb with Christ. You'll never hear it sung liturgically, but singing the Agni Parthene (Rejoice, O Unwedded Bride!) is like... (and I sound like a crazy person whenever I attempt to describe it) it's like being tuned to resonate with heaven. Like the Theotokos reaches out and taps you on the head with her divine tuning fork until you're humming on the same note. It is a bizarre and wonderful experience.
Many of these things are beautiful even to outsiders, but... the purpose is not outreach. It's re-aligning the participant toward God. A tune-up ;)