A Nation Going Nowhere

Good Day, Waferinos-

We watch the progs jumping up and down with joy over Biden, while we know that none of the changes he is proposing are structural ones. And unlike the progs, we understand that only major structural changes can save us, and that these will not come to pass. Of course it is good that he is fighting covid (unlike Trump), and all of us want to see this scourge defeated (although I predict that viruses and lockdowns and masks will be with us for a long time to come, especially as mutant viruses emerge). But as I said at the end of the last thread, Biden is no FDR, and even Roosevelt's structural realignments were fairly mild, all things considered. I keep coming back to that line from W.H. Auden, "We would rather be ruined than changed." Well, amigos, we are going to be ruined; we will be the cause of our own destruction; and the possibility of reversing this downward trajectory is nonexistent.

Pain is a great teacher, said a Buddhist monk to me years ago. For a very few Americans, our disintegration will be a significant learning experience. For 99% or more of the population, it will be no learning experience at all, just rage and hurt and violence--the tantrum of a spoiled child, although so many are taking the route of drugs (coke, cell fones) and suicide. At every stage of our ongoing defeat--Vietnam, (the mess we made in) Iraq, 9/11, 2008--we could have learned something and failed to do so. There is no motivation for us to do anything different, and we lack the intelligence to do so in any case, so our national suicide will continue on its sad and perilous journey. I can only echo what I imagine Native Americans have said for so many years: "I told you so, but you just wouldn't listen." (Sitting Bull: "Possessions are a disease with them.")

"Have a nice decade"--mb