Rush, Rush

If you wanted to sum up America in one word or catch phrase, how would you do it. Like if you had to boil it down to one idea, what would it be? An easy answer would be something like "fascist" or "full of idiots" or something along those lines, but that's not what I am after. Let's suspend disbelief. Let's act as is America is "the way it should be", what would that be like? If the founding dudes were clear thinking and honest and didn't have any ulterior motives, and we lived out those ideals they laid down as a national birthright, what would it be? If America is the best country, what makes it so? I ask because their are certain cats and kittens in the news who are boldly illustrating what they feel our national birthright to be, and I disagree.

Of course, in a land with the beauty of freedom of speech, there can be conflicting ideas of what our ideal enactment of America would be. During the election of 2008, big thick lines were drawn, and after the dust settled, the conservative side didn't have anyone in the system who could both espouse conservative ideals in an accepted political arena and be liked by the people of the country. So, what happened was figureheads took the place of real politicians on the right. These figureheads are commentators, not politicians or broadcasters, they are more or less as qualified as an adept blogger, but are wildly famous. Most famous out of these types are Mr. Rush Limbaugh and Mz. Ann Coulter. If you study these two's backgrounds and motis operandis, you find their motivation first and foremost is to extend their own fame and sell books... Money.

Whether it was intended or not, the conservative side of U.S. politics comes off as interested first and foremost in money, their money. They abstract their views enough so that it appears they are interested in the well being of the country, but only to those who want to believe. The rest of America shakes their heads and gets mad or offended or frustrated. Then they tell you Americans are on their side and only Upper East Side liberals feel the way most Americans do, and those who want to believe, do. They find any possible chink in the left's armor and lie about it to exploit it, or rearrange it to alter the point. For example, I have always thought that the worst thing about Hitler was the ethnic cleansing. Seems obvious right? Evil because of the attempted extermination of a race. BUT, in extensive reading of Mz. Coulter, I have found that she does not object to the Third Reich's eugenics at all, but considers Hitler an evil man because of the "socialist" economic system he sort of aped.

And there it is. These people blindly worship capitalism. Their ideal America involves an out of control free market wild west where anything goes. I talked to a Vietnam vet who actually still believed going over their was the right thing to do because of the "socialist" Vietnamese and what could have happened if we didn't clog their gears with dead kids. To the brainwashed Limbaughist or Coulterite, Capitalism is God and anything that veers slightly away from complete unregulated free trade is evil. In their view, President Obama'a economic recovery plan is evil because it federalizes once free market institutions. The possibility of helping anybody is enough for me to hope it works, but a thriving nation of happy people is not in these folks ideal America if it comes at the expense of a little Capitalism. This seems extra dull-witted to me. You see, I am a punk rocker. I hate Thatcher and Reagan and always will because they were Capitalist Pig-Dogs. The free market is a happy coincidence of our governmental system (representative democracy), and not the nexus of U.S. being U.S. Mr. Limbaugh says he wants the Prez to fail, and explained that veering towards socialist economic ideas (Are we really? No.) would harm the country that he knows. He actually said that he wants America to stay the same.

I guess we shouldn't be surprised that Rush is an anti-evolutionist. Not just to close one's eyes to the obvious truth of evolution (you can actually watch it as well as Darwinism every damn day, if you look), but to hope it does not occur and try and stop it. Organisms as well as organizations must evolve or die, be they viruses or humans or America's economic system or America's government. Evolution is our only hope! Some folks say global warming is a sham. They say that it would happen no matter what because of volcanoes, etc... These people tend to forget that if you have five pounds of shit naturally lying around and then heap five more pounds on top, you now got ten pounds of shit, half of which you are responsible for. Some more philosophical antagonists, like my man the late George Carlin has a slightly better view. "Fuck the Earth," said George. He explained that the earth has been here for a damn long time and will be here way after humans. True. BUT, I feel it is my responsibility while I'm here on Earth to evolve as much as I can. Evolution can take ANY form, and one form may be having a much more Earth-conscious attitude to make it last a little longer (my conservatism) and be part of what's left after humanity is done.

Complaining about evolution that may just save our bacon is laughable. When compact discs relegated vynil to collector status, it was a natural progression, just as is digital media phasing out hard copy record store purchases. It sucks for that right wing alcoholic Bert from Bert's CD's, but TFB! That is evolution. When the X Gene appeared and Iceman, Beast, and the rest of the X-Men made the scene, humanity got pissed and resisted, just like neanderthal man did when humans first showed up, and where are they? British Museum, bitches. Which is where our exclusionatory and out-dated economic system belongs.

I am always very interested in moral high ground, and I know enough that it doesn't come from what actually happened. I have moral high ground in knowing that the Ramones were the best band that will ever be, even though they didn't sell the most records and Dee Dee was a junky and Johnny was in the Klan. I have moral high ground knowing that the Philadelphia Phillies are the best team ever, even though they have only won two world series, have the most losses of any pro sports team, and balked on getting black players in the 1950's. So, moral high ground for being an American is possible, despite the legendary missteps we've taken since our inception. But people like Mr. Limbaugh and Mz. Coulter make it very hard to hold moral high ground and pride in Americanism when it translates to straight up pride in only Capitalism. In fact I love my country and am so proud of it that I mentally distinguish those aforementioned types as un-American. A real American loves their country because of what it could be, and what it is at it's best, not because of what it was. For the Bill of Rights, and not for the bill of sale.