What a world we live in. No doubt, at other, if not all, times in human history, people have justifiably made similar claims delivered with (or, perhaps without) heavy doses of sarcasm. Perhaps another way of describing our present predicament here in the U.S. would be to observe that, as per the ancient and marvelously veiled Chinese curse, we live in interesting times. And speaking of interesting, China, as fate would have it, is now America's greatest economic rival. I'm not sure who, if anyone, constitutes the United States' greatest military rival. I suspect no one does, though, equally, I'm reasonably sure that in some regions of the world asymetric warfare, or, if you prefer, fourth generation warfare, is practiced with great skill against the U.S. military juggernaut. But that's another subject for another time.
What may be the most interesting thing about living in the U.S. presently, at least from this citizen's perspective, is the overwhelmingly Orwellian disconnect between the behavior of officialdom, their preferred organs of misinformation dissemination, and the state of the rest of the union. With that in mind, I think it's worth noting that during President Obama's State of The Union address last night, one of officialdom's highest ranking members, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, fell fast asleep. I suppose Justice Ginsburg's deep dozing could be attributed to her advanced age, or, even, perhaps, the relative lateness of the hour, but I prefer to entertain the idea, however fanciful, that the Universe, through the unwitting medium of Justice Ginsburg was, instead, offering a meaningful, succinct, proper, and profound judgment on the content and quality of our President's oratory- if not his entire Presidency- as one best slept through. To bowdlerize the pop outfit, Green Day, "Wake me up when Obama ends."
I personally applaud Justice Ginsburg's response, however unintended it may have been, to the President's State of The Union address. After all, his was a communication with only slightly more merit than an awkwardly constructed, sophomoric love ditty scrawled on public restroom toilet paper. Had I watched the speech in real time it would have unquestionably left me in a state of agitation entirely incompatible with sleep, but one well aligned with nightmarish fantasies of the sort that would likely still be bothering me. Sometimes, when the times get too interesting, the best thing to do is to turn off the set. And while Poor Justice Ginsburg couldn't afford that luxury, being duty bound to actually attend the event, the results were, nevertheless, at least where her presence was concerned, entirely fitting.
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3 comments:
I hadn't heard that.
But why not doze off - she already knew every lie he was going to tell and every crime he was going to proclaim. They're her lies and crimes too.
And he sure is annoying and boring.
A year ago I wrote a post shredding the stupid speech. This year I didn't watch or read it, though I've picked up details on the fly, like this one.
One sick ( and I suppose blackly funny) thing is how the behavior of the media is exactly like the coordinated media of any historical totalitarian regime.
Goebbels informs the editors and television producers that Obama's going to stress "competitiveness", and that's the word we want to get out there. You already have your orders on "civility".
And everyone stumbles out into the sun as if dazzled by the light, talking like Moonies about "competitiveness" and "civility" as if these were brand new and yet the most profound concepts/words ever elucidated.
And meanwhile every lie is simply moved along along the propaganda conveyor belt. That's the way the court flack combo of Big Lies and hagiography proceeds. That's how Stalin became a great linguist - the media acclaimed him as such.
And so that's how "competitiveness" is alleged to have any meaning at all, let alone be possible, desirable, and sought by these criminal policies.
It's really just an Orwellian euphemism for slow mass murder by starvation, disease, and despair.
Thanks for dropping by, Russ, and well done on the Tuniisia post. I visited Tunis briefly in the early eighties, and my most lasting memory from that time was not the ruins, but the hordes of impoverished children following we tourists around trying to get whatever they could, mostly by begging. I'm glad to hear that the people there have taken a powerful stand against their horrid overlords.
Thanks, Edwardo.
It's great what they're doing. I hope they can keep it up. So far they've just driven out one guy and compelled some promises of political reform, but basically the regime is still in place.
But that's still a great start, far more than almost anyone else has done.
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