Paranoid Style (American Revelation XV, Four.)

And now, ladies and gentlemen, that we've enjoyed some good times this evening, and enjoyed some laughter together, I feel it is my obligation to remind you of some of the negative, depressing, dangerous, life-threatening things that life is really all about; things you have not been thinking about tonight, but which will be waiting for you as soon as you leave the theater or as soon as you turn off your television sets. Anal rape, quicksand, body lice, evil spirits, gridlock, acid rain, continental drift, labor violence, flash floods, rabies, torture, bad luck, calcium deficiency, falling rocks, cattle stampedes, bank failure, evil neighbors, killer bees, organ rejection, lynching, toxic waste, unstable dynamite, religious fanatics, prickly heat, price fixing, moral decay, hotel fires, loss of face, stink bombs, bubonic plague, neo-Nazis, friction, cereal weevils, failure of will, chain reaction, soil erosion, mail fraud, dry rot, voodoo curse, broken glass, snake bite, parasites, white slavery, public ridicule, faithless friends, random violence, breach of contract, family scandals, charlatans, transverse myelitis, structural defects, race riots, sunspots, rogue elephants, wax buildup, killer frost, jealous coworkers, root canals, metal fatigue, corporal punishment, sneak attacks, peer pressure, vigilantes, birth defects, false advertising, ungrateful children, financial ruin, mildew, loss of privileges, bad drugs, ill-fitting shoes, widespread chaos, Lou Gehrig's disease, stray bullets, runaway trains, chemical spills, locusts, airline food, shipwrecks, prowlers, bathtub accidents, faulty merchandise, terrorism, discrimination, wrongful cremation, carbon deposits, beef tapeworm, taxation without representation, escaped maniacs, sunburn, abandonment, threatening letters, entropy, nine-mile fever, poor workmanship, absentee landlords, solitary confinement, depletion of the ozone layer, unworthiness, intestinal bleeding, defrocked priests, loss of equilibrium, disgruntled employees, global warming, card sharks, poisoned meat, nuclear accidents, broken promises, contamination of the water supply, obscene phone calls, nuclear winter, wayward girls, mutual assured destruction, rampaging moose, the greenhouse effect, cluster headaches, social isolation, Dutch elm disease, the contraction of the universe, paper cuts, eternal damnation, the wrath of God, and PARANOIAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!

~George Carlin

I saw this yesterday.

All I can think of is, why the shit would the federal government give a good goddamn if I shopped at a Bass Pro Shop?? Also, last I checked the government has no business having an opinion on whether I or anybody else buys a Bible or not. In point of fact, it's not a Constitutional right to shop at a Bass Pro Shop but it sure as hell is a Constitutional right to read the Bible, and I'll note which one Jim Jordan brings up first.

Yes, it's baseless, immoral paranoia...but it's also because, well, people like Jim Jordan want to live in that kind of society, or they wouldn't be projecting this shit onto other people, and they all think they're going to be the one who gets to be Big Brother surveilling the shit out of anybody and everybody they don't like...which is everybody. Where does it stop??

And then Republicans do this shit, just sayin. Republicans basically just tried to designate every Latino in Oklahoma as a "Terrorist." And now they're having to walk that shit back.

When is enough, going to be enough??

Pro Tip, Republicans; If you really want a more Christian society...not to mention one that might even be more conservative...bring in a shit-ton of Black Africans and Latinos, prioritize immigration from countries like El Salvador and Guatemala, or Nigeria and Zambia...all of which have are more conservative countries with relatively high percentages of Protestant Fundamentalists and Pentecostals who, if treated well, could likely be convinced to vote Republican. 

But of course we know that's not the world current Republicans want to live in, at all. They don't think anybody should vote at all, they believe they should simply be given power by the masses who cower before what the "Republicans" (such as they are) imagine themselves to be. And according to these vicious small-pond, zero-sum motherfuckers, god forbid anybody do anything to make the pool bigger, even if (or maybe more accurately, especially if) that's what would be needed to actually win. (They'd rather lose if they think it'll justify hurting more people.) 

Here's another one, yo; If Republicans keep losing like they have been, give it five or ten years and they might need an influx of very-conservative Nigerians onto the rolls of American citizenship in order to be more than a regional, rural political party. (And apparently one full of people too stupid to figure out how a subway turnstile even works, and afraid anybody smarter than them is out to "get" them, somehow.)

But ya know, really accepting Black Conservatives or Latino Conservatives would mean Republicans couldn't be so reflexively mean to Black and Brown people (which typically means those other conservatives will vote for the other guy) and as long as Trump is around, at the very least, these idiots will never be able to see further ahead than the length of Trump's dick...so about three inches or so?

And the thing is, where all this shit comes together is Republicans are winding themselves up to react violently to anything they imagine challenges their almost-entirely-imagined "Authority." (Which they believe to be unlimited, also.)

Which somehow challenging their bullshit "Authority" includes the fact that other people simply exist and have beliefs, it doesn't matter whether those other people who exist have similar beliefs or not. Modern "Conservatives" don't believe other people have the right to exist or breathe the same air they do, it doesn't matter who those people are; Not being Them is enough. This whole bullshit belief system utterly falls apart the second they either don't have enemies to hate, or don't have to hate and fear everyone, including each other. No, this is not sustainable.

And I think, as much as anything else, this crap is going to be undone by Republicans' perpetual desire to be mean to other Republicans.

Of course, yet again as soon as people stop and think and realize they don't have to put up with bullying and racism and various collections of ass-kissers and wannabe autocrats, they tend to stop being Republicans, so maybe there really is something just plain rotten at the core of American conservatism??

Or ya know, maybe it's just the same old Calvinist rot that has infected White America since the Pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock??

I hit my breaking point in September of 2008 and left. The Pentecostal craziness Sarah Palin brought with her was simply too much for me to put up with, and now that crap has been utterly secularized by conspiracy theories, just as the previous Calvinist rot and slouching towards Christian Nationalism has since been stripped of any religious meaning by Trump. The Golden Idol was a hint, people, this was Trump rubbing White Christian America's nose in his desire to replace Yahweh, much less Jesus Christ, as their god...trouble is, a hell of a lot of people are too immoral and stupid not to bet their souls on Trump.

I couldn't do it.

Not just because I didn't like Trump when I was one of those people, either, but because I actually read the Bible once or twice, and I know that's how you go to hell. I'm an Agnostic and I'm not willing to take that bet!

I've also had the lived experience of seeing cults and false doctrines take over people's lives before, and it's all the worse when it's millions of people and not just one person that you know.

I mean, how else could all these so-called Christians and conservatives be completely unmoved by a traditionally Christian, conservative country like Ukraine fighting for its life against armies marching under the Hammer and Sickle??

I get it, MAGA is still mad because the Ukrainians couldn't or wouldn't manufacture something to smear Joe Biden with and that led to Trump's first impeachment...but the man wears criminal indictments like medals, so whatever it is, it's not that. Not really that, at least.

And deep down, they know it's all crap. They know Trump sucks, that he's losing his marbles and that he sucked before, but he enabled them to do the kind of shit they already wanted to do, and that's the ticket, isn't it??

Trump gave them the figurehead, the illusion of "Authority" that they craved, but they know he's going down, that he'll fall to age-related health problems and dementia if not to the Law, and when he does, the Party's over. Like a friend of mine said, they've shackled themselves to a corpse. I rather suspect they know they're going to lose if anybody at all actually has a choice in the matter.

Which is why they're threatening civil war, trying to undermine Ukraine, and hoping they can hang on long enough and make it so somebody like Vladimir Putin is in a strong enough position to help them, and to get that they'll have to salute the Red Banner.

Republicans hate America. And the reason Republicans hate America is that America can't, Constitutionally can't let them be the KGB or make them The Party.

And Republicans really do want a world where everybody thinks they are or have to be an informer, a political flunky or a spy for These Fucking People. The totalitarian political talk is a fucking clue, yo.

That's what Jim Jordan is telling you. They don't want the endless paranoia and shit to have to stop somewhere because the American right-wing Paranoid Style gets people to turn off their damn brains.

If these motherfuckers ever really were opposed to Communism, or especially to the methods thereof, it was out of professional jealousy.

You either believe in freedom, or you don't. You either believe in Truth, as a concept, or you don't.

And freedom isn't free.

Sometimes, you have to fight for it.

Sometimes, you have to realize that the old, shouty White man in a suit is perfectly well willing to lead you into hell if he thinks the Devil will give him thirty pieces of silver, or something.

Слава Україна!

"The fight is here; I need ammunition, not a ride." ~Volodymyr Zelenskyy, allegedly 25 February 2022, Associated Press.

Three

There's a man goin' 'round takin' names
And he decides who to free and who to blame
Everybody won't be treated all the same
There'll be a golden ladder reachin' down
When the man comes around
The hairs on your arm will stand up
At the terror in each sip and in each sup
Will you partake of that last offered cup
Or disappear into the potter's ground?
When the man comes around
… Hear the trumpets hear the pipers
One hundred million angels singin'
Multitudes are marchin' to the big kettledrum
Voices callin', voices cryin'
Some are born and some are dyin'
It's alpha and omega's kingdom come
And the whirlwind is in the thorn tree
The virgins are all trimming their wicks
The whirlwind is in the thorn tree
It's hard for thee to kick against the pricks. ~Johnny Cash, The Man Comes Around.