Well, fear is already creeping up my spine. There's a certain sense of social victory that will be touted around as if we as a nation have accomplished great strides of progress that will lead to limitless bounds of success. It was Hesse (who I will paraphrase liberally) who quoted the fear of people's willingness to be drunk on collective pride, success, and anguish. I'm very much with him, when I see this presidency. I see division. I see pandering to extremes. I see years of hardship and reactionary follies.
So, I do not discredit Obama in the slightest. I just have a good read on the younger generation in particular. They bought into the slogans, but they do not realize the severity of what could start to unfold in the next 4 years. This bothers me to no end. I could feel a sense of entitlement due to victory in the air today. And so, the "you're either for us or against us" mentality begins.
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"There's a certain sense of social victory that will be touted around as if we as a nation have accomplished great strides of progress that will lead to limitless bounds of success."
ReplyDeletethere's two ways this could be interpreted. racially, it's an obvious symbolic victory. but until minorites, and all people in general, have no impediments to equal quality of life and health i don't think it's true progress. this is a really sticky situation to discuss with anyone, but what i mean to say is that all of society's ills may not be solved but could certainly be effectively targeted than they are now. why does the richest nation still have poor people?
"This bothers me to no end. I could feel a sense of entitlement due to victory in the air today. And so, the "you're either for us or against us" mentality begins."
is it not correct for progressives to want to undo the last 8 years? bush came into office, at least his second term, with "mandate." he didn't get very far by any normal person's standards. obama and every president hereafter has not just a mandate but an obligation to fix what's gone wrong in every sense of the word, wether its foreign policy, the environment, schools, social security, pay equity, job loss, regressive tax codes, whatever. no matter how great the majority in both houses is, there still has to be cooperation. but it's certainly nice to have a president that values science and is somewhat--gasp-- intellectual back in office.
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ReplyDeleteAlso, the Hesse quote I was referencing is this
ReplyDelete"My instinct as an individualist and artist has always warned me most urgently against this capacity of men for becoming drunk on collective suffering, collective pride, collective hatred, and collective honor. When this morbid exaltation becomes perceptible in a room, a hall, a village, a city, or a country, I grow cold and distrustful; a shudder comes over me, for already, while most of my fellow men are still weeping with rapture and enthusiasm, still cheering and venting protestations of brotherhood, I see blood flowing and cities going up in flames."
That's what I see coming
My point is that there should be NO PLACE for sectarian politics in the United States. It makes things a joke. People are aligning themselves with the polar extremes because it's convenient and because brutish, narcissistic behavior is ultimately what wins out. I see a general downgrade of society coming out of THIS election because there will be a huge group of people that are going to be hypercritical of this presidency whether because of racial motivations or because of his generally broad campaign stance, there will be fair-weather "voters" who will turn their back on him because the general situation is worse, and lastly, there has been a gigantic ECONOMIC downswing that we're finally having to deal with (you can blame this on Republican ideology and greed, but it's simple economics. At some point, we had to choose between high wages vs. low cost. We went with low cost at sacrifice of a gigantic portion of our manufacturing. Short of being able to compete with China and other Asian countries, the rebound will never truly be there).
ReplyDeleteMy point of all of this, even though it was/is childishly written, poorly worded, and thought out erratically, is that I have faith in Obama because he IS a brilliant politician. I do NOT have faith in the American people, Congress, big business, etc. etc. to do THEIR part. I see discontent rising.
Bush, himself, was not "THE PROBLEM." He was a great scapegoat, a meager symptom, and a general patsy. The erred logic in thinking things are just going to change because one man is gone bothers me to no end. Things will slowly evolve, but everything we're in right now could take, literally, a hundred years to "correct". So, this is all my dismay at society at large who still wants to sue you for not rubberizing your playground when their child falls and breaks their arm because it was your fault you weren't watching their children, who refuses to GENUINELY stand up and fight for what they believe in, a society that would rather divert and coin new terminology in the name of being "politically correct" just to avoid the situation while claiming to have fixed it etc. etc.
Now that was my intent of all of this, but the richest nation still having poor people? Communism failed, remember? Why? People always inherently want more and are will to do this at the expense of others always. Feeding, clothing, and providing good paying jobs for the poor and homeless is a novel goal, but it still lends itself to the idea that if you pay a ditchdigger the same amount you'd pay a doctor, why would anyone want to be a doctor? People claim the common good of the people. This goes against every fiber in our bodies no matter how much we want to believe we've truly risen above it.
Apologize the terrible grammar. Tired+ computer keeps freezing, etc. etc. etc.
ReplyDeletein that last paragraph, "are will" = "our will"
* I apologize FOR THE
ReplyDelete