It should come as no surprise that a nation of cast-offs and rejects from Europe of the 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th and 20th centuries — 400 years worth of religious extremists, prisoners turned indentured servants, disowned second and third sons, treasure hunters, pirates, brigands, thieves, sons of impoverished pastors, corporate murderers–and the kidnapped and dispossessed of various continents plus the survivors of the genocide of its original inhabitants has elected a charlatan, showman, rake and felon as their President for a second, non-consecutive time. The problem is that many have an illusion of this political subdivision of the North American continent being fundamentally Exceptional, and they are now shocked to find that the script has deviated from their vision, while others are absolutely certain it is their way that is Exceptional and that Exceptionality also requires exclusion of everyone that doesn’t look, think, worship, or fuck like they do.

The axis of American political direction has always been wobbly, the result of idealism built on a foundation made from the opression and enslavement of others whom the founders could not be bothered to admit were also people worthy of rights. “We the White Male Landowners” would have made for a very uninspiring Constitutional preamble opening, but it would have certainly been more accurate–and as it turns out, that’s how certain “originalists” on the Supreme Court interpret it anyway. Fear of a lessening of American Whiteness has long been a driving force behind national policy, from the three fifths compromise, to Irish, Eastern European, and Italian restrictions in 19th century immigration acts, to the Chinese Exclusion Act, to children in cages on the southern border. Only those who can assimilate into what remains of Protestant White culture are truly welcome everywhere in America, and even then those of a slightly darker shade will be eyed suspiciously.

So shock! An appeal to the basest of those long-held prejudices along with a promise of doing a different (but not necessarily better) job with the economy and shutting the doors for the corruptive forces of global trade in goods and ideas has won the majority of a vote by a minority of Americans who are eligible to participate in this system we call Democracy, with all its handicapping for underpopulated and exceedingly White provinces that in many cases are still fighting the war they lost in 1864 in another form. We are stunned that our hopes for a somewhat slightly better direction embodied in a daughter of immigrants was thwarted by the grandson of a bordello owner who emigrated illegally and was stripped of citizenship in his old country for not paying his taxes. (The apple does not fall far from the tree, even over two generations.)

Which story is more American? The child of immigrants who rose to be a top cop and instrumental in maintaining a status quo that put innocents in jail and slapped the wrists of corporations abusing the less wealthy, and generally making California slightly less fascist? Or the convicted felon escaping sentencing whose life story has been about the power of both real and fictional wealth, the power of coarseness and lies, and reaching out and grabbing whoever he wanted by the p*ssy?

Both are on script, but cop shows are tired and everybody loves a circus.

Footnote: My accompanying rant from Bluesky

A little food for thought having nothing to do with Veterans Day, but everything to do with it, if you get my drift.

We were taught certain things that made us want to serve. That Democracy was to be defended. That America was the land of the free and the home of the brave and fair to everyone, right? And that we were making the world safe and supporting a Western World of truth, fairness and Big Macs for everyone

Or we were inspired to defend our country by the evil acts of evil people from lands far away where they wanted women to be covered up and flagellated themselves and were cruel to animals and shit. Plus 9/11.

But what we keep finding is places where you’re putting a boot on the neck of people who are more like us than the people who are cheering for us, victims of every fucking circumstance who if they had been born in the US would probably drive pickup trucks with Trump flags to NFL tailgate parties.

And we lost friends. We lost shipmates and fellow grunts and squadmates and battle buddies and often the people from those places we went who helped us the most. Sometimes in combat, often in stupid, stupid circumstances created by a flag officer trying to get another star’s wet dream of an idea.

But if we opened our mouths about how stupid those ideas were we’d get busted or worse, get sent off to some rubber-room assignment waiting for our obligated service to run out or some brig or disciplinary barracks. So we either stealth resisted or just said yessir and waited for the worst to come.

47 shipmates in one take, and I was elsewhere because I pissed off the wrong person and was in Panama making sure classified data wasn’t in fucking plain sight through the window to Russian binoculars on the other side of the canal and the names were rolling up the screen and I was screaming.

And that’s just how it fucking was. And how it is. And how it evermore shall probably fucking be. Because a handful of people end up taking the brunt of the mistakes of someone a handful of people voted for in the right states, and afterward they get a “thank you for your service.”

Happy Veterans Day.