I VOTE YES ON CALEXIT!

[Eric the Green]

(03-10-2017, 02:10 PM)TeacherinExile Wrote:

(03-10-2017, 12:52 PM)SomeGuy Wrote: You misunderstand.  I am not offended, nor am I apologizing for my vote, I just don't think what you linked to counted as satire, nor was it particularly witty.  Had Eric or PBrower or Alphabet or any of the other emotionally-crippled old men who post routinely here linked to it, I probably would have passed without comment.  It was the fact that you are usually more open-minded that made me cringe when you posted something so narrowly partisan, that amounted to little more than a "blue" venting his spleen at the "reds".

I mean, to whom do you think that article was actually addressed?  What was the message that the article was trying to get across?  How effective do you think the rhetorical strategy chosen was in conveying said message to said audience?  What elements do you feel identified the article as being satiric in intent?

It simply made me laugh.  Was it satire?  Only in the sense that the writer was being deliberately impractical, though not completely so.   Much as Jonathan Swift sounded wildly impractical and immoral, intentionally so, as a counterpoint to the British response to the poor, starving Irish.  Personally, I don't think "virtual secession" is that all that farfetched, though a lot would have to go wrong in America for that to come about in any meaningful way.  Like Kinser, I wouldn't rule out dissolution, Soviet-style.  And that wouldn't take a civil war, necessarily, to accomplish.  

If you could see the extreme legislation that the GOP-controlled statehouse is trying pass here in my adopted state, and the 2016 voter-approved initiative (minimum wage hike) that the Arizona Chamber of Commerce is trying to overturn by way of judicial review, contrary to popular will, you would understand my initial impulse to move to a state (or country) more in accord with my values.  I'm not partisan in the least, though I admit I do fall--for now--on one side of the political spectrum, and only then as a countervailing force in a country that has swung too far in one direction.  Truly, I am a radical pragmatist, oxymoron that that may seem.  Where is the political party for that "ideology," pray tell?  Do I have to move to a country like Singapore to find a government ruled by some semblance of common sense? (Authoritarian as that country may be.)  You know the old saying, "If it ain't broke (Glass-Steagall), don't fix it?" and if it is broke (healthcare), we best fix it, and now. 

In my lifetime, both parties have pressed their so-called "mandate" and electoral advantage too far.  Forced busing?  Bad idea--hello, "white flight."  Hate crimes?  Didn't sentencing guidelines already give judges the leeway to incorporate such aggravating factors into the sentences they impose?  Isn't it obvious to the jury--and to the public--that, when a man goes into sports bar and yells "Go back to your country!" and then kills an Indian-American (not a "Middle Easterner") that racial animus probably motivated the crime?  "Free-speech zones"?  Don't get me started. 

It is as one man has said, "There's a common lack of common sense in America."  My girlfriend and I agree that the evidence of that is all around us, and not just in the political arena.  Just where is the leadership that's going to reverse that trend so that we can get down to the serious business of fixing what ails our country?  Having taught young people, who I always thought were entitled to wild-eyed optimism, I generally disdain cynicism, defeatism, much less despair.  Millennials, including my two grown sons, deserve so much better.  But when I survey the politicians on offer, I'm hard-pressed to find a Washington, Lincoln, or FDR in the bunch.  Perhaps, Trump in some weird, inimical way will assume--and justify--the mantle of Gray Champion.  We better all hope so.  Because if he fails, and spectacularly so, I fear someone--or something--much worse will come in his place.  I will hold that thought in abeyance for now..

As of now, I doubt there is anyone who could be worse than Trump. He has devolved to the far right in every sense. The best we can hope for is that his extreme retrograde policies and narcissist behavior generates the regeneracy on the Left that we need. That's how we get someone better instead of worse. As of now, it would have to be a Democrat, but in a 4T things can change quickly and an independent or third party candidate of the center-left or left could appear to save the day.

I don't see anything wrong with hate crimes laws, but many years ago I'd agree that sometimes criminals were let off too easy. That has now gone to the other extreme, and people on both right and left agree that innocent people have been punished and that prosecution and sentencing needs to be more fair, especially to the disadvantaged.

I'm afraid disunion and exits are very serious now, and it can only be avoided if the right-wing is defeated, and enough people on the right begin to change and open their minds. In any case, I have always agreed that a break-up need not necessitate or cause a civil war this time. It may be that, this time, like people on opposite sides here, we can allow each other to go our separate ways. 

But it will be complicated. It would be better if the right-wing vote-rigging and fanaticism that currently predominates can be overcome. The 4T must go to the Left, if our country is to come out ahead as it has in other 4Ts. That is always the side of progress, even if there's also some stubbornness or wrong-headedness on the Left that must be overcome as well.