Hypnotize (Scenes From The Fall, Seven.)

Ha, sicker than your average
Poppa twist cabbage off instinct
Niggas don't think shit stink
Pink gators, my Detroit players
Timbs for my hooligans in Brooklyn (that's right)
Dead right, if the head right, Biggie there e'ry night
Poppa been smooth since days of Underoos
Never lose, never choose to, bruise crews who
Do somethin' to us (come on), talk go through us (through us)
Girls walk to us, wanna do us, screw us
Who us? Yeah, Poppa and Puff (hehe)
Close like Starsky and Hutch, stick the clutch
Dare I squeeze three at your cherry M-3 (take that, take that)
Bang every MC easily, busily (take that, haha)
Recently, niggas frontin' ain't sayin' nothin' (nothin')
So I just speak my piece, keep my piece (come on, now)
Cubans with the Jesus piece, with my peeps (thank you, God)
Packin', askin', "Who want it?" (who want it?)
You got it, nigga, flaunt it
That Brooklyn bullshit, we on it

Biggie, Biggie, Biggie, can't you see?
Sometimes your words just hypnotize me
And I just love your flashy ways
Guess that's why they broke, and you're so paid (uh)
Biggie, Biggie, Biggie (uh-huh), can't you see? (Uh)
Sometimes your words just hypnotize me (hypnotize)
And I just love your flashy ways (uh-huh)
Guess that's why they broke, and you're so paid (ha)

~Notorious BIG, Hypnotize.

...

We welcome change and openness; for we believe that freedom and security go together, that the advance of human liberty can only strengthen the cause of world peace. There is one sign the Soviets can make that would be unmistakable, that would advance dramatically the cause of freedom and peace. General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization, come here to this gate. Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate. Mr. Gorbachev...Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!
~Ronald Reagan

...

"I will not trash talk. I will not be a divider in chief or an agitator in chief. I won't be out there blowharding, talking a big game without backing it up. I think the next president needs to be a lot quieter but send a signal that we're prepared to act in the national security interests of this country — to get back in the business of creating a more peaceful world."

[Silence. A muted TV plays FOX News in the background behind him Silence.]
"Please clap."

~Jeb! Bush, February 2nd, 2016

I saw this yesterday.

Trump is basically trying to hypnotize people now.

And yes, that's exactly what he's doing.

There's an ad running on FOX News; The ad features hundreds of quick-cut pics of Trump, the military, and Trump's voice says "Together we will defeat Communism, Socialism and Marxism in America" mixed with praise of Trump while the backing singers sing "love me, love me". A GOP campaign message and the video taxpayer funded. 

That's also supposedly illegal.

Or it would be for anybody else, even another Republican.

And all these Republican politicians, "Influencers" and shit are basically trying to gin up Fear Of Basically Everything. Tommy Tuberville gave a speech freaking out about *Checks Notes* Furries. Hey Tube-steak, I used to work with a couple people like that. Nobody's doing that shit at work and hell, if they were, the average "Fur Suit" is about 70 pounds or more; If somebody can work with all that gear on, that's actually impressive. The vast, vast majority of these people are weird but harmless younger folks. They're not hurting anybody. 

The entire thing appears to have come from an in-joke on the radio between a couple members of a civil Aviation club (You know, people with enough money they can afford to fly a Cessna 172K Skyhawk as a hobby) in Alabama that was deliberately and maliciously taken out of context by *Checks Notes Again* local and now national Republicans. Homie, in Alabama if somebody can afford to be in a local flying club...they're probably a Republican.

Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows. ~George Orwell, 1984. 

More to the point if this is the promised Capitalist Republican Utopia they've been threatening us with since Reagan, I can't afford to live in it. My Mom can't afford to live in it, my Partner and the Kid can't afford to live in it. My Mom is retired with a pension, my partner works 2 jobs, I work and get military disability.

If these idiots are really afraid of "Communism" well we've got nobody  who ain't rich being able to afford to get by, a government overrun with right-wing authoritarian horseshit, and an elite class whose basic attitude is "Let Them Eat Shit!" on both sides of the figurative political aisle (Even from Democratic leadership.)

Motherfuckers have set up the standard historical Communism Origin Story and I'm pretty sure they do actually know this.

Or at least both Democrats and (in particular) Republicans used to.

And deceives them that dwell on the earth by the means of those miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the beast; saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast, which had the wound by a sword, and did live.

And he had power to give life unto the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak, and cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed.

And he caused all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads:

And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.

Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six. ~Revelation 13:14-18

And again, Trump is literally trying to hypnotize people.

The mental image that I had was of all those Left Behind books that I read back in the late 1990's with Nicolae Carpathia (the Antichrist) constantly hypnotizing everybody but certain End Times Prophetic Christians who'd been supernaturally protected. 

As if those books themselves weren't basically just Christian Nationalist Slop, which they at least became after the first six books or so when Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins looked at that shit and simply said "That's a lot of damn money" and just started mailing it in.

We've got to take the neighborhood back. We've got to go in there. Just forget telling your child to go to the Peace Corps. It's right around the corner. It's standing on the corner. It can't speak English. It doesn't want to speak English. I can't even talk the way these people talk. "Why you ain't where you is go." I don't know who these people are. And I blamed the kid until I heard the mother talk. Then I heard the father talk. This is all in the house. You used to talk a certain way on the corner and you got into the house and switched to English. Everybody knows it's important to speak English except these knuckleheads. You can't land a plane with "why you ain't…". You can't be a doctor with that kind of crap coming out of your mouth. There is no Bible that has that kind of language. Where did these people get the idea that they're moving ahead on this? Well, they know they're not, they're just hanging out in the same place, five or six generations sitting in the projects when you're just supposed to stay there long enough to get a job and move out. ~Bill Cosby, the "Pound Cake" speech.

I was reminded of my ex-wife going all constant eye contact and sultry-voiced like she was trying to hypnotize me the first time we got together.

Hell, as the thread on Blue Sky where I first saw this shit progressed, I was reminded of when my Mom and I watched the Berlin Wall fall, live on CNN, while bringing in the groceries and eating a Supreme pizza from Dominos after we got home from an appointment I had over here, and going to the grocery store and the mall.

I watched that shit fall live on TV when I was 15 years old but sure, okay "Communism is forever" If you say so.

Until it isn't.

I watched ordinary Germans tear it down when I was 2 weeks out from getting my driver's license.

People cannot possibly not know this, it's all bad faith.

But of course, none of this crap is ever really about what they say it's about. It's really about fake "Conservatives" trying to protect their imagined "right" to be nothing but bigoted filth.

Because none of that other shit is happening either.

Now this was the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy. They were haughty and did detestable things before me. Therefore I did away with them as you have seen. ~Ezekiel 16:49-50 (NIV)

But you know what is happening??

Trump literally rolled out the red carpet for Xi and gave Chinese state media the run of the White House because the US media pool is still not covering him in solidarity with CNN, MSNBC etc.

And just to make it more creepy, I guess they literally took Monica Crowley out of the pic and AI-slopped Natalie Harp in her place. That says some things that are really fucking creepy as far as I'm concerned. 

You can't be servile enough to please Trump unless you're some broken creepy religious nut that's 100% obsessed with him, I guess??

Even a lot of MAGA's have figured out now that Trump doesn't give a fuck about them, and they're fucked and stuck paying too much for everything and they didn't get whatever they thought they all wanted and too damned bad, I say.

But the motherfucker can sure roll out a literal red carpet for Commie Xi.

Trump doesn't hate Communists, he wants to BE them.

Trump isn't a Christian, he wants to usurp the place Christ allegedly held in these people's hearts.

And when Cometh Hell's Legions?? Trump ain't gonna even try to protect ya'll. He'll be egging them on.

Anything but America.

Anything but "Love Thy Neighbor."

Loretta Smith: I'm Loretta Smith. You killed my son. You're a handsome fellow.

Donald Groves: Thanks.

Loretta Smith: You broke God's law: Love thy neighbor. I wanna hate you but I can't. I feel pity, tears, but no hate. I didn't realize that until this moment. You are my neighbor and I love you. And I forgive you with all my heart. That's all.

~From the HBO series "Oz" Season 1, Episode 7 "Plan B."

These Fucking People all hate each other and are all using each other.

And they aren't even subtle about it.

Everything sucks, unless you're a rich Republican, and the Wall Street Journal is trying to say that telling the truth about that is a "Risky Bet."

Fuck these motherfuckers.

Truth is the only floor most people have to stand on to push back against Power. 

I can't call up some idiotic Super PAC and scream and yell into my phone until somebody produces an ad to vent my grievances. 

My partner or the kid ain't got some dipshit lawyer on retainer to stand up for them, they have an issue? I'm that guy. And we had a late night last night cuz she locked the keys in her car, we got it resolved and she got to work this morning, but fuck.

When is enough, enough with this bullshit??

What we have to stand on, in politics, in the world, with each other and with God above...is the Truth.

If I had to pick between that or a bunch of money, I'm gonna take The Truth every time, because then my Salvation doesn't depend on *Checks Notes Yet Again* Donald Trump.

And I don't have to hypnotize nobody to get what I want.

Worse, for all their absolute bullshit and all the money these motherfuckers are pouring into trying to influence the election, 40 days out their bleak numbers remain unmoved. Things are so bad even Karl Rove is voting Democratic. I guess he doesn't like actually having to be a miserable bastard, either.

You either believe in freedom or you don't.

And either you're willing to fight for it, or you're not.

It's really that damned simple.

Слава Україна!

[Kuiil and Mando have successfully repaired the Razor Crest with the parts recovered from the Jawas]

The Mandalorian: I can't thank you enough. Please allow me to give you a portion of the reward.

Kuiil: I cannot accept. You are my guest, and I am therefore in your service.

The Mandalorian: I could use a crew member of your ability. And I can pay handsomely.

Kuiil: I am honored. But I have worked a lifetime to finally be free of servitude.

The Mandalorian: I understand. Then... all I can offer is my thanks.

Kuiil: And I offer mine. Thank you for bringing peace to my valley. [leaves the ship and mounts his Blurrg; to Mando] And good luck with the Child. May it survive and bring you a handsome reward. I have spoken.

~From the Star Wars series; The Mandalorian, S1.E2 "The Child."

Six

My black face fades,
hiding inside the black granite.
I said I wouldn't
dammit: No tears.
I'm stone. I'm flesh.
My clouded reflection eyes me
like a bird of prey, the profile of night slanted against morning. 

I turn this way—the stone lets me go.
I turn that way—I'm inside
the Vietnam Veterans Memorial
again, depending on the light
to make a difference.
I go down the 58,022 names,
half-expecting to find
my own in letters like smoke. 

I touch the name Andrew Johnson; 

I see the booby trap's white flash.
Names shimmer on a woman's blouse
but when she walks away
the names stay on the wall.
Brushstrokes flash, a red bird's
wings cutting across my stare.
The sky. A plane in the sky.
A white vet's image floats
closer to me, then his pale eyes
look through mine. I'm a window.
He's lost his right arm
inside the stone. In the black mirror
a woman’s trying to erase names:
No, she's brushing a boy's hair.

~Facing It, by Yusef Komunyakaa, US Army Veteran

...

And so tomorrow, as we take the campaign South and West, as we learn that the struggles of the textile workers in Spartanburg are not so different than the plight of the dishwasher in Las Vegas; that the hopes of the little girl who goes to a crumbling school in Dillon are the same as the dreams of the boy who learns on the streets of L.A.; we will remember that there is something happening in America; that we are not as divided as our politics suggests; that we are one people, we are one nation. And, together, we will begin the next great chapter in the American story, with three words that will ring from coast to coast, from sea to shining sea: Yes, we can. ~Barack Obama

When men stop believing in God, it isn't that they then believe in nothing: they believe in everything. ~Umberto Eco