What follows is a rant. I cannot help it, as I saw Joe Lieberman’s sanctimonious face grinning at me on site after site yesterday.<\/p>\n
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The nihilism that is rotting away Western modernity’s heart showed itself yesterday. <\/span>The self indulgence and ugliness of a society whose dominant elites have come to believe in nothing but their own narcissistic and sociopathic selves, and their lust to hold onto power and wealth at any cost, without any sense of responsibility, or service to the country that makes their ascendancy possible.<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n <\/span>How else can we explain the huge How else to explain the cravenness How else to explain the dark How else to explain a Democratic How else to explain the Republican How else to explain the How else to explain a corporate How else to explain a business elite<\/b> How else to explain a significant Across the board, with few The “religious” right is correct <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" What follows is a rant. I cannot help it, as I saw Joe Lieberman’s sanctimonious face grinning at me on site after site yesterday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[111,9,108],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-437","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-events","category-social-and-political-theory","category-spirituality"],"yoast_head":"\n
\ngrin plastered across the face of Joe Lieberman<\/b> as he pulled his last minute
\ndouble-cross against a compromise he himself had agreed to only a few months
\nbefore. On the issue most Americans are most personally concerned about. <\/span>His power and name
\nrecognition was magnified as never before despite its harm to the millions who
\nexpect something from the so-called “representatives” they put into office or his
\nfellow senators who groveled at his feet.
\n<\/span>That more Americans will enter into bankruptcy or die while Joe preens
\nin the public eye is of no concern to him. None at all.<\/p>\n
\nof a Harry Reid<\/b> who continues to prove his utter lack of fitness for his post
\nby repeatedly demonstrating his inability to do the American people’s work, or
\nto focus the Senate’s abilities on the major issues facing this country
\ntoday? <\/span>Whether in the majority or
\nthe minority, Reid has demonstrated a singular inability to lead on anything,
\naccomplish anything or stand for anything. <\/span>He is a man of a thousand excuses and few accomplishments.<\/p>\n
\ncynicism of a Rahm Emmanuel and the President, Mr. “B+<\/b>,” who gave him his
\nposition. <\/span>Yesterday they urged
\nReid and the Democratic Senate to reject the wishes of a majority of Americans,
\nincluding the great majority who voted Democratic, to compromise with a man who
\nhas proven he negotiates in bad faith, proven his personal pettiness while the
\nnation deals with big issues, proven his dishonesty to his constituency and his
\ncontempt for the craven Senators who keep providing him privileges and perks he
\ndoes not merit. <\/span>They urged Reid to
\nignore significant health care reform the better to do Joe Lieberman’s bidding.
\nTruly the semblance of “winning” matters more for the White House than the
\nsubstance of the win.<\/p>\n
\nSenate <\/b>comprised largely of old men who stand for nothing, neither defending
\nthe constitution from Republican assaults when in the minority nor
\naccomplishing much of their own agenda when a potentially powerful
\nmajority. <\/span>Repeatedly they allow
\ncorrupt single senators to grind the institution to a halt with their anonymous
\n“holds” on issue after issue, from appointments to executive and judicial
\nbranch offices to important legislation.
\n<\/span>Then they put up with “filibusting” the people’s business without the
\nsupposed filibusters even having to say a word. <\/span>One time the filibuster actually had to be used to be
\neffective. <\/span>The person making the
\nthreat had to carry it out. <\/span>No
\nmore. Now they just need to drop a hint.
\n<\/span>It saves Senators the stress of having to vote for their corporate
\npaymasters or the people who elected them so long as they keep issues from coming
\nto a vote. <\/span>But they do find time
\nto give billions to those who gave us our financial crisis while almost
\nignoring the millions who suffer from that crisis, and who voted for them. <\/span>No one puts holds on that. <\/span>Daily the bulk of Democratic senators
\nshow they believe in nothing, will fight for nothing, and care only for their
\nperks and status in their club. <\/span>I
\nmean men like you Max Baucus and Ben Nelson – and women like Diane Feinstein.<\/p>\n
\nopposition<\/b> who has forgotten the first principle of politics in a free society:
\nthat opposition must be loyal opposition, one that however strongly they
\ndisagree over how best to serve the nation, agree that serving the nation is
\ntheir top priority. <\/span>Seeking to
\nbring government to a halt, the country to its knees, hoping for failure on all
\nfronts in order to pick up the pieces not because the public supports you but
\nbecause they loath the other party even more than they loath you, is not the
\nstuff which preserves a free society.
\n<\/span>These are the tactics of the Communists and Nazis in the doomed Weimar
\nRepublic. <\/span>Supporting the lurid
\nfantasies of birthers, global warming conspiracy advocates, “death panel”
\nimbeciles and teabaggers does not create a country able to preserve democratic
\ninstitutions. <\/span>I mean people like
\nyou, Mitch McConnell and James Inhofe.<\/p>\n
\nself-described “religious” right<\/b> who prove over and over again that they will
\ndo anything, say anything, to gain power over the rest of us. <\/span>The God they really worship is power,
\nnot the power to create or preserve but the power to dominate. <\/span>They <\/span>despise the principles this country was founded on, seeking
\ntheocracy over a world they claim is doomed but are possessed by the lust to
\nrule anyway. <\/span>Little things like
\nthe constitution and rule of law are so much chaff in the wind. <\/span>I mean people like you Mike Huckabee
\nand Sarah Palin.<\/p>\n
\nmedia<\/b>, highly paid men and women who spend more time focusing on Tiger Woods’
\nsexual shenanigans than they do on medical reform, Afghanistan, global warming,
\nor the economic crisis. <\/span>Like so
\nmany of the above, their real love is seeing their own face in the public eye
\nwhile they collect millions for their alleged talents as “journalists.” <\/span>Polls have shown that Americans who get
\ntheir news from the comedy channel understand more about what is going on than
\nthose who get their news from you “newsmen.” <\/span>I mean people like you Chris Matthews and George
\nStephanopolous and Cokie Roberts.<\/p>\n
\nwho treats capitalism as a sophisticated casino where the public pays for their
\nlosses and they keep their wins.
\n<\/span>Creating products and services is secondary to million dollar bonuses
\n(bonuses for what? <\/span>Certainly not
\ncompetence.) <\/span>These are men who try and fill their inner emptiness with multiple homes, cars, jets, and boats
\nwhile preening themselves as somehow having earned the wealth they extort
\nfrom those who create it. <\/span>I mean
\nyou, the bloated leaders of corrupt institutions such as Goldman Sachs and
\nCitigroup, men who could not even be bothered to meet with the president to
\ndiscuss the devastating problems you caused.<\/p>\n
\npercentage of the American public<\/b> who continually finds excuses for whomever in
\nthe above they claim to support because they loath the others more. <\/span>Cutting perpetual excuses for any of
\nthe above has trapped our country in despair, stupidity, and hardness of heart
\nat a time when integrity, clarity of mind and openness of heart, are necessary as
\nrarely before.<\/p>\n
\nexceptions, America’s elites have proven themselves nihilists at best, monsters
\nat worst. <\/span>They reward failure and
\ndishonesty and ignore competence and
\n<\/span>integrity. <\/span>I increasingly think countries have life spans that come to an end when their elites have
\nbecome self-perpetuating incompetents challenged by an opposition whose only
\ngoal is to destroy and take power on the ruins. <\/span>This is why a majority of incompetents cannot triumph over a
\nminority of undemocratic radicals even in a democratic body. <\/span>The secular pursuit of wealth and power
\nas the highest things in life, mostly challenged by a power obsessed religion
\nwith its demon god, cannot maintain let alone expand, the basic attitudes,
\ncommitments, and loves needed if a country and a culture are to remain worthy
\nof respect, let alone devotion.<\/p>\n
\nabout one thing, even if they have nothing positive to offer to help, and much to make it worse. <\/span>We are in the midst of a moral and spiritual
\ncrisis. T<\/span>he Enlightenment
\nideal of a society that takes only the tools and methods of science and
\ninstrumental reason as legitimate knowledge, and believes that knowledge is power, that power is the common denominator, is proving itself bankrupt. We desperately need a spiritual awakening to
\nthe immanence of the sacred and the intrinsic worth of this world and all within it.<\/p>\n