Like most things in the Idiocracy, this election has devolved into a game, a farce, full of buffoonish gesturing, but entirely devoid of substance and content. Even at this juncture, neither party has explained how they will balance the budget or create a sustainable economy that generates new decent-paying jobs. So instead, they focus on all of the side issues that are meant to distract us from these larger vitally important issues. The fact that a tax cut is still on the table for both parties, despite a $1 trillion ongoing deficit, is the most asinine concept of all. Thirty years of tax cuts has lowered tax rates to the lowest level of any developed nation and buried this country in debt and ongoing massive deficits.
Foreign Policy - A Conspiracy of Dunces
Foreign Policy - A Conspiracy of Dunces
The other egregious form of bullshit surrounds the hubris over foreign policy. Power is a drug, an addictive narcotic. And unfortunately, the U.S. is addicted to that drug and isn't about to let go. Ironically, the Baby Boomers were the generation that wanted to avoid war at all costs during Vietnam. Now apparently, many Baby Boomers are willing to go to war for any reason whatsoever. It's amazing how that changes when someone else is doing the fighting and war becomes just another line of business. For the U.S. to return to its true libertarian, isolationist roots which was its native state during most of its economic ascendancy, then the current crop of Neocons will first have to be weaned off of their reckless and delusional power trip. Let's face it, America's foreign policy this past decade has been about as coherent as a frathouse game of Risk on a Friday night - invading countries on false pretense, camping out for years at a time with no exit strategy, bankrupting the U.S. Treasury, buying trillions in oil from terror sponsoring countries, alienating local populations w/exported junk food and junk culture, outsourcing the economy to potential future adversaries (aka. China), maintaining a hypocritical double standard on economic policy - austerity/reform for them, unlimited stimulus for us. The Taliban are not stupid, they know that time is on their side and that the Military Industrial Complex is bankrupting the U.S. So, the Taliban just bide their time in a low grade guerilla war of attrition, exactly as Mao would prescribe. Ironically, it's a similar strategy the U.S. used against the Soviets during the '80s Cold War arms build-up, to enfeeble the Soviet economy. Even more ironic, it's the exact same strategy the North Vietnamese used to force the U.S. out of Vietnam after 10 years of gain-less attrition. Imagine the four star generals inside the Pentagon having to eventually realize that they were the insider stooges manipulated to the demise of their own country. To that point, the U.S. defense budget almost doubled (and remains doubled) during Bush's futile "war on terra", so it's only the childlike dunces running the U.S. who don't understand that they are playing checkers against an opponent who is playing chess.
The 10,000 Day Class War Is Over; Operation and Extend and Pretend Now Underway
The 30 year guerilla war against the middle class is now essentially over. Most people who think they are still in the Middle Class, are really only one paycheck away from bankruptcy. This next major "battle" will be between generations. The aging of the Baby Boomers has been a key factor in the overwhelming inertia behind the ongoing set of ludicrous and totally unsustainable policies. The Baby Boomers, being the largest voting bloc and also at or near retirement, have one overriding goal, which is to maintain the status quo at all costs. Don't reform, don't fix, don't change. They know that they have a very fixed and limited timeframe and therefore any amount of reform imposed on the economy or the status quo "system" will impose cost on them, but none of the benefit. Even though that generation extracted undue reward from the 30 year debt accumulation. Somehow the Baby Boomers started out as flower power hippy peaceniks and ended up either as hardcore right-wing Neocons or let-them-eat-cake phony limousine liberals. How the hell did that happen? To begin with, read "They Knew They Were Right" about the history of the Neocons, to understand how those thought dealers who were against U.S. involvement in WWII, went from being ultra-left Trotskyists in the 1930s to being right of Attila the Hun today. The Neocons are hardcore shape shifters who will hijack whatever societal trend is in vogue at the time and make it their own. And how is it that the Baby Boomers are the beneficiaries of the largest intragenerational wealth transfer in human history, yet still managed to squander the Social Security surplus on pointless wars and irresponsible tax cuts and also undersave on their own retirement? What can you say about a generation that takes down the largest inheritance in history, squanders its own retirement savings and then goes on to spend its own grandchildren into bankruptcy? Just like they were in the '60s, dancing around on LSD - Morally fucking bankrupt. The biggest irony in this lurching clusterfuck is that the alpha males who have always been the most vociferous in their phony flag waving support for a strong military, are also the ones who have mortally weakened their own country by endorsing successive false flag military campaigns financed by decades of supply side voodoo economics. They are a generation of glassy-eyed MBA con men, too lazy or stupid to make anything, so instead they sold everything that wasn't nailed down. Picture about a million George W. Bush-style undereducated frat boys ensconced in the highest echelons of Corporate America and one begins to comprehend the extent of damage that has been wrought. As I wrote recently, the Temple of Greed is already collapsing and anyone caught at the altar of greed this time is going to be trapped inside. Reality only owes us so many chances.
The 30 year guerilla war against the middle class is now essentially over. Most people who think they are still in the Middle Class, are really only one paycheck away from bankruptcy. This next major "battle" will be between generations. The aging of the Baby Boomers has been a key factor in the overwhelming inertia behind the ongoing set of ludicrous and totally unsustainable policies. The Baby Boomers, being the largest voting bloc and also at or near retirement, have one overriding goal, which is to maintain the status quo at all costs. Don't reform, don't fix, don't change. They know that they have a very fixed and limited timeframe and therefore any amount of reform imposed on the economy or the status quo "system" will impose cost on them, but none of the benefit. Even though that generation extracted undue reward from the 30 year debt accumulation. Somehow the Baby Boomers started out as flower power hippy peaceniks and ended up either as hardcore right-wing Neocons or let-them-eat-cake phony limousine liberals. How the hell did that happen? To begin with, read "They Knew They Were Right" about the history of the Neocons, to understand how those thought dealers who were against U.S. involvement in WWII, went from being ultra-left Trotskyists in the 1930s to being right of Attila the Hun today. The Neocons are hardcore shape shifters who will hijack whatever societal trend is in vogue at the time and make it their own. And how is it that the Baby Boomers are the beneficiaries of the largest intragenerational wealth transfer in human history, yet still managed to squander the Social Security surplus on pointless wars and irresponsible tax cuts and also undersave on their own retirement? What can you say about a generation that takes down the largest inheritance in history, squanders its own retirement savings and then goes on to spend its own grandchildren into bankruptcy? Just like they were in the '60s, dancing around on LSD - Morally fucking bankrupt. The biggest irony in this lurching clusterfuck is that the alpha males who have always been the most vociferous in their phony flag waving support for a strong military, are also the ones who have mortally weakened their own country by endorsing successive false flag military campaigns financed by decades of supply side voodoo economics. They are a generation of glassy-eyed MBA con men, too lazy or stupid to make anything, so instead they sold everything that wasn't nailed down. Picture about a million George W. Bush-style undereducated frat boys ensconced in the highest echelons of Corporate America and one begins to comprehend the extent of damage that has been wrought. As I wrote recently, the Temple of Greed is already collapsing and anyone caught at the altar of greed this time is going to be trapped inside. Reality only owes us so many chances.
Bullshit: The Pablum of Comfort Seekers
So, no surprise, the market for bullshit is booming. If you want to know who is addicted to Faux News, sure the ESPN boy-men will tune in for their regular dose of mind-numbing pablum, but it's really the blue haired ladies of yore and their Clint Eastwood-resembling spouses who are the primary addicts of that endless river of bullshit. And every mainstream media outlet has figured out that productized infotainment is the best way to maximize profits. There is no market for reality in the Idiocracy, so it can be no surprise that there is no media outlet catering to the unvarnished truth at this juncture. Each media outlet has finely honed its infotainment package to ensure that it contains only those minor fragments of truth that are palatable to that targeted segment of the comfort seeking populace. Therefore, we can fully expect that when this shit show comes crashing down out of the seemingly clear blue sky, all of these mainstream purveyors of formulaic propaganda will simply say "Nobody saw that coming".
