The American Doppelgangers

Once upon a time, America stood for something, and it was much more than the so-called American dream about a postage stamp lawn and a quaint house for everyone, presumably, with a convenient 401K. It was the land of Neil Armstrong, who faced tremendous adversarial odds, and took a giant leap for mankind, not for profit margins. It was the country of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who despite being crippled and in a wheelchair managed to forgo self-pitying and steered a suffering nation through the Great Depression and World War II, prioritizing people over plutocrats. It was the home of Jonas Salk, too, in contrast to Big Pharma today who refused to patent the polio vaccine because, as he put it, "Could you patent the sun?" These men-- pioneers, leaders, visionaries who also had their faults and foibles --represented the greatness America aspired to.

But today, we live among their myriad and well confusing doppelgangers from President Trump to the Republicans to the Democrats, too, who were given a professional makeover and their own very well worn guises, hollow reflections of that former greatness. In addition to this, they hold many powerful positions with many so-called important names from both sides of the aisle. Instead of Armstrong, we have billionaires launching themselves into space, not for the advancement of humanity, but for self-indulgence. Instead of FDR's New Deal, we have corporate bailouts and tax loopholes that serve the preoccupied rich while ordinary Americans drown in debt. Instead of Salk's selfless service, we have pharmaceutical giants pricing life-saving medicine beyond the reach of the sick and desperate.

And yet you remain a Couch Citizen observing it all?

America is no longer a democracy as it is as plain as the nose of your face; it is an oligarchy wearing democracy's skin, a grotesque masquerade where money speaks louder than votes, and power is not won through public service but purchased through Super PACs and dark money. Our institutions, once designed to serve the people, have been hijacked to protect the wealth of the few at the expense of the many. Gerrymandering distorts representation and false rhetoric entraps us as we use Crayola Crayons to redraw districts. Voter suppression laws strip away rights. Courts once meant to uphold justice in a blind folded manner now bow to the highest bidder.

Innocent people are being approached by plain clothes ICE agents who then put on masks and summarily arrest innocent citizens and place them in unmarked vehicles. Where will they go? To ICE centers and jails across the country, and the least fortunate, go to an El Salvadorian prison with no chance of release.

And what of the indolent and unaware American people? Many have not only accepted this pathetic reality-- they have become inebriated, stumbled and then embraced it. Truth is no longer a virtue but an inconvenience tugging on our sleeves. We hide it at every turn. Fact and fiction have blurred into a postmodern fog, where reality is dictated not by evidence but by who controls the contemporary narrative, and the national and regional presses and TV stations that give us false choices. In essence, we have chosen power over truth, greed over greatness, and self-interest over the common good.

And like a bump on a log, you sit there?

This mysterious chemical transformation did not happen overnight. It was not a coup in the traditional sense, with tanks in the streets and martial law declarations and the seizing of Parliament. It was a slow, insidious erosion-- one corrupt deal, one deregulation, one moral compromise at a time. We were promised endless growth, the myth of meritocracy, and the illusion of upward mobility. And so, we traded away our American birthright and became something else -- Tik Tok stars, Amazon consumers and co-opted fossil fuel buyers. We stopped being participants in democracy and became spectators of our own decline along the fifty-yard line, strangely clapping.

Yet, there is still a Faustian choice before us as each Road leads to a Hundred Others. History is not static, and decline is not destiny even though we have red lined and the medics are presently trying to save us. "Clear!" The same country that produced hollow doppelgangers also produced the real thing-- flesh and blood people who saw injustice and fought it, who sacrificed their own comfort for the greater good. The question is not whether America can reclaim its soul, but whether its people are still willing to fight for it.

Are you ready to Defeat your Fears and Doubts?

Because if we continue down this tenuous path, adamantly, refusing our own enlightenment like spoiled children, we won't just be a nation of doppelgangers -- we will be ghosts of what we could have been.

To our trustworthy Allies, I say lead by example and by a meritocracy of ideas basing our societies on both self-realization and self-actualization by viably splitting the atom of human potential in the 21st century, so that it's explosion dwarfs the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. We can embrace the humanity of each other that still remains and learn to systematically expand and de-condition human consciousness so that we learn to think again and shed our false personalities that are pledging allegiance to a self-destructive system.

Kevin Marley