Gettysburg Reunion

 As the perpetrators of the January 6, 2021 insurrection take control of the government at last, they push their revision of recent history relentlessly. It was peaceful. It was legal. It was glorious. They call for unity, which for them only ever means complete capitulation to their position.

They seem to be looking for something like the Gettysburg reunion of 1913, at which the survivors of the battle from both sides displayed camaraderie and respect rather than the deadly enmity that had marked the entire brutal conflict. Through the lens of time, they could appreciate each other's valor, and embrace in the happy knowledge that they were all white men in a white supremacist nation. Maybe business practices and systems of oppression had to operate a little differently, and let's not think too hard about specific atrocities in the war itself, but life in general is pretty good for us all.

It's almost as sick as the Christmas truces of World War I, in which opposing forces took a day or two off to sing carols and share some festive beverages before snapping right back into the orgy of mechanized slaughter that dominated every other day for four years and traumatized an entire generation.

Reconciliation was deeply important to white male America and to the dependents who could do nothing to stop the men from picking fights if a difference of opinion got out of hand. Let's all embrace in a spirit of forgiveness and charity! Focus on the important part, which is that the essential system of dominance is basically intact.

Women and minorities have made steady progress out from under the various boot heels laid upon them through the last century and the beginning of this one. Just as resistance to oppression is intersectional, so is the oppression itself. Pure white supremacists don't want any mixing down the color chart, but male dominance does cross the color barrier. Some adherents to brand-name religions promote tolerance of other belief systems, while others have to be ready for the murder-suicide of unlimited holy war to make sure that they die in battle with the name of the correct deity on their lips. Every form of tolerance and abhorrence is on a spectrum. These spectra overlap in a dense maze.

In the stages of processing something disturbing, acceptance is always the last one. It can be the most elusive, slipping in and out of your grasp. So it goes with acceptance of differences among people. Things can be okay, okay, okay, until suddenly the cord snaps and we're back to anger.

We all have things that we find unacceptable. For me it's environmental destruction and all of the mechanisms that feed it. What color people are, and how they use their genitalia, doesn't matter at all. I want to be polite and supportive to people who have been persecuted for their unimportant differences. Let's all have comfortable, sufficient lives that leave plenty for those who inherit the planet from us, whether we birthed them or not. But that's not how our species has been living. We've been locked into a winner-take-all struggle. You can support the winners -- who are actually dooming us -- or you can hope to prevail in the violent conflict that the seekers of power always hold over us.

The United States -- the Reunited States -- welcomed the reconciliation that took the place of true Reconstruction after the Civil War, because it gave the losing side their dignity and enough of their old power back to keep them quiet for a while. They were right to the extent that destructive enmity would have halted all progress. But it wasn't a pure good thing. It abandoned the moral high ground and shoved the problem off onto future generations. Future generations have moved very slowly, backsliding frequently on the way toward an inclusive society.

There are a lot of people I don't want to hang out with, for various reasons. I don't insist that they cease to exist. We can go along, get along through a fair range of diversity, as long as the goal is actually to go along and get along more or less indefinitely. Some differences are enjoyable and add layers to our understanding. Others are merely tolerable. The judgment is subjective. Take good care of the planet, give each other some space. Appreciate the simple pleasures of food, shelter, and whatever level of companionship meets your needs.

Voting for saviors

 In 2020, voters rejected the chaos of Trump and chose the reassuring experience of Joe Biden.

Biden seemed like the typical "electable" Democrat: what would have been a moderate Republican in the 1970s. That species survived for a little while into the 1980s before being purged through the 1990s as the party moved further and further toward the radical right.

To quote an earlier Brain Lynt post: "Electable Democrats only slow the rate at which our country and the world decline. Electable means that they don't threaten corporate domination of our economy. Electable means that they don't do anything substantial to overturn endemic racism. Electable means that they water down or completely abandon measures to protect the environment. It means that they don't persist when seeking full freedom and respect for women at all levels of leadership.

You can't do anything if you don't get elected at all. But you really won't do anything anyway if you're an electable Democrat."

Biden surprised everyone by jumping back further, to the liberal consensus laid down by Franklin Roosevelt as he steered the country out of the Great Depression and through most of World War II. Immediately post-war, even Republicans embraced the idea of a government that served its large middle class and lower-tier workers, who conduct most of the real life economic activity.

Certain problems go unaddressed by both parties: a growing human population creates and exacerbates environmental problems. Economic prosperity in the short and medium term evolved through the 20th Century into the 21st to depend more and more on wasteful consumption. The dominant technologies of industrialization are killing the planet at a rapid rate. Correction could have begun with fairly minor disruption if we'd had good leadership in the 1970s, but the one president who hinted at it, Jimmy Carter, got flung out of office like the election of 1980 was an ejector seat.

When Biden started pushing legislation that actually helped, and his administration managed to guide a troubled economy to a softer landing than any other country enjoyed, his success might not have showed in his polled approval rating, but it certainly showed in job numbers and infrastructure improvements. He also gave unreserved support to social causes helpful to the targets of Republican persecution. He wasn't the progressives' dream president, but he was doing okay.

The Republican propaganda machine went into overdrive, screeching about the various aspects of residual inflation beyond the reach of government intervention, and fanning fears about various kinds of stranger danger supposedly sweeping the country in crossing waves.

No one on the right was going to say that the Biden administration and the barely Democratically controlled Congress was doing a good job. A whole bunch of them bragged to their constituents about the economic benefits of legislation that they all voted against, but never credited the authors and promoters of that legislation. Meanwhile, in a chronic attempt to demonstrate "fair mindedness," liberal analysts spoke in reserved terms about the successes of the Democratic government.

Side note here: I understand speaking in reserved terms about government programs from either side, but particularly from the liberal side, because of the fear that they might turn out to be exploding cigars or whoopee cushions instead of the fine products they appeared to be at first. Because the left is generally made up of more thoughtful, scientifically-minded people, we like to observe for a while to make sure that a policy is producing the desired -- and advertised -- effect. But we're in a public relations war here, and have been since the 1970s. Techniques and technology have evolved, but the basic conflict remains the same. The past 50+ years have only been the modern incarnation of the great debate: who is America for?

The incoming occupant of the Oval Office did not win because of his massive popularity. He won because people on the left did not show up at all. We had this. He could have been defeated and left to the legal system to be duly prosecuted for numerous, documented crimes against the entire nation. In other words, all of us. Instead, a small faction of sniveling whiners stayed home pouting because the Biden administration didn't do enough for the Palestinians.

The situation with the Palestinians is horrific. The Israeli government is acting with a cruelty worthy of their worst oppressors. It's a good lesson in the fact that the oppressed are often only looking forward to being on top, wearing the boots that trample their foes, not creating a world in which oppression itself is never tolerated.

Oppression is a slippery word, though. Pampered citizens of an affluent country whine about being oppressed when they're required to do simple things as part of a cooperative society.

While not every voter is hoping for a savior, enough of them are to distort the image of government power both positively and negatively. Christ and Antichrist seem to be running for every office every time now. Insert hero and villain of your choice. Gotta say, the villains really seem to be living up to the title. Heroes, they're always rarer, especially in government. It's hard to stay in office and still exhibit the sacrificial nature of someone truly heroic. I'd settle for competent administrators who govern with compassion and can adjust their stance to new information as they receive it.

The incoming majority is already fracturing because the various groups that chose them as saviors aren't getting the instant gratification they expected. Nor does it look like they'll get delayed gratification. Above and behind all of the political theater and street performers, the weirdo oligarchs who funded the campaign will continue to thrive and play with the country like a giant computer game. Global wealth considers nations to be playthings, governments to be employees, and workers to be disposable tools.