"But these weren't the kind of monsters that had tentacles and rotting skin"they were monsters with human faces, in crisp uniforms, marching in lockstep, so banal you don't recognize them for what they are until it's too late." "- Ransom Riggs, Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children
Enough already.
Enough with the distractions. Enough with the partisan jousting.
Enough with the sniping and name-calling and mud-slinging that do nothing to make this country safer or freer or more just.
We have let the government's evil-doing, its abuses, power grabs, brutality, meanness, inhumanity, immorality, greed, corruption, debauchery and tyranny go on for too long.
We are approaching a reckoning.
This is the point, as the poet W. B. Yeats warned, when things fall apart and anarchy is loosed upon the world.
We have seen this convergence before in Hitler's Germany, in Stalin's Russia, in Mussolini's Italy, and in Mao's China: the rise of strongmen and demagogues, the ascendency of profit-driven politics over deep-seated principles, the warring nationalism that seeks to divide and conquer, the callous disregard for basic human rights and dignity, and the silence of people who should know better.
Yet no matter how many times the world has been down this road before, we can't seem to avoid repeating the deadly mistakes of the past. This is not just playing out on a national and international scale. It is wreaking havoc at the most immediate level, as well, creating rifts and polarities within families and friends, neighborhoods and communities that keep the populace warring among themselves and incapable of presenting a united front in the face of the government's goose-stepping despotism.
We are definitely in desperate need of a populace that can stand united against the government's authoritarian tendencies.
Surely we can manage to find some common ground in the midst of the destructive, disrupting, diverting, discordant babble being beamed down at us by the powers-that-be?
Disagree all you want about healthcare, abortion and immigration-hot-button issues that are guaranteed to stir up the masses, secure campaign contributions and turn political discourse into a circus free-for-all-but never forget that our power as a citizenry comes from our ability to agree and stand united on certain principles that should be non-negotiable.
For instance, the U.S. government is operating in the negative on every front. For the first time in the nation's history, it is expected that the federal deficit will surpass $1 trillion this year, not to mention the national debt which is approaching $23 trillion. Meanwhile, the nation's sorely neglected infrastructure-railroads, water pipelines, ports, dams, bridges, airports and roads-is rapidly deteriorating.
No matter how we might differ about how the government allocates its spending, surely we can agree that the government's irresponsible spending, which has saddled us with insurmountable debt, is pushing the country to the edge of financial and physical ruin.
That's just one example of many that shows the extent to which the agents of the American police state are shredding the constitutional fabric of the nation, eclipsing the rights of the American people, and perverting basic standards of decency.
Let me give you a few more.
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