Wednesday, October 25, 2017

Flashbacks From Late 2016


 
 
 I gloat, therefor I am
Recently, a "former" supporter of the unhinged jackass who now poses as our "president" informed me that, "no one could have foreseen how bad this administration was going to turn out".

Beg pardon?

 Please, permit me to toot my own horn if you will:
 
November 3:
 
"The fact that Donald Trump would encourage the worst aspects of the character of his half-witted groupies is further proof (as if any more were needed) that the man is a dangerous sociopath. Were he to be elected in eighteen days I would have predicted that he would someday be remembered as the champion mass murderer of world history. Fortunately I won't have to make that prediction. Not even the American people are that dumb. Not quite."
 

I wrote that paragraph on this site less than two weeks ago. All bets are off. It probably would have been wise of me to remember the words of the legendary, muckraking journalist, H.L. Mencken, who once wrote that "nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people." Smart dude, that Mencken.

It's impossible to believe that the people of this doomed country (at least the ones that vote) are, quite possibly, within less than a week from electing the most Hitleresque candidate to come along since der fuehrer himself. Don't make the mistake of dismissing that last sentence as a wild exaggeration from an unhinged lefty. The fact of the matter is that for the last half century, the Republican Party has been crawling - ever-so-slowly and ever-so-surely - toward an insanely dark and disturbing place. If you've yet to notice this undeniable phenomenon, you haven't been paying attention. A Trump administration might be just the thing to awaken you from your apathetic slumber.

November 8 (Election Day):

And to think it has come to this. I'm not-at-all certain who is going to be declared victor at the end of what I know will be a very long day. I've so little faith in the civic intelligence of my fellow countrymen and women that a Donald Trump victory late this evening won't phase me in the least. In fact I'll be able to make some tasty lemonade out of those nasty lemons. If the Donald wins this thing, I'm the only person I know of who makes under a million dollars per year that will benefit handsomely.

Now is not the time for apathy, folks. I don't give a damn who you are or where you live: If you believe that there is a future for progressivism in America, get down to your polls and vote today as if your life depends on it. I am not sure whether or not Hillary Clinton will be a good president. I hope that she will be (that's assuming she wins). All I can tell you with any degree of certainty is that America will survive her administration. The alternative is too horrible to even talk about.

November 9:
`
For the last three-and-a-half decades, the United States of America has held the proverbial loaded pistol, pointed at its own collective, clueless head. Last night it pulled the trigger. According to the "experts" who are desperately attempting to put a smiley face on yesterday's electoral catastrophe, the American people were merely trying to send a message. Of course they were. And that message has been received loud and clear:

"WE'RE A NATION OF MORONS!"
 
FUN FACT: On the morning after Election Day 2016, I had to take two showers before the clock struck 12 Noon.

November 17:

Spending the last nine days adjusting to this to this new and quite nasty American reality has been interesting to say the very least. When I awoke early this morning, for the first time since the day after the election, my first thought wasn't that this electoral catastrophe was just a nightmare. I guess that means I'm somehow coming to terms with what I can only describe as the complete and utter lunacy of the American people. The fact that Hillary actually won the popular vote doesn't make the coping any easier. Thanks to a quaint relic of the eighteenth century called "the electoral college", disasters such as George W. Bush and Donald J. Trump are almost inevitable. The United States seems hell-bent on remaining the laughingstock of the rest of the planet.

On the morning of Election Day, bitter experience had me nearly resigned to the possibility of a Trump victory by day's end. When Dubya was reelected in 2004, no one paying attention could have doubted that he was the most insanely incompetent chief-executive in the history of the republic. When I received the news early the next morning that John Kerry had gone down to defeat, that was the moment I finally realized that these stupid fucking Americans were capable of just about anything. The star of a reality TV show is now the president-elect of the United States of America. The Ku Klux Klan and the American Nazi Party are this morning celebrating. Think about that.
 
December 1:

Irony of ironies: As impossibly corrupt and incompetent as George W. Bush was to the foundations of this once great republic, by this time next year, we-who-bother-to-pay-attention will find ourselves nostalgic for the contemptible  little thug. Honestly, even during Dubya's reign of grotesquerie and terror, I never dreamed it would get this surreal. What is coming is no mere constitutional crisis; what is on the bleak horizon is a fucking constitutional meltdown. Remember, you read it here, boys and girls!
 
During the campaign, Trump promised his moronic base that, once he was in charge of things, there would be no more corporate lobbying at the executive level of our government. In the days following the election he announced the appointments of these same lobbyists to run and control the very federal agencies that they have dedicated their careers to destroying. And the shit storm hasn't even begun.
 
December 6:
 
Welcome to Idiot Nation. Come to the place where dreams go to die. Don't feel sorry for us when the gazillion dollar shit hammer hits the fan. We stupidly did this to ourselves. In a nation that was once viewed by the world as a beacon of hope, this would be the darkest of comedies were it mere fiction. But this isn't fiction, campers. This is too real and catastrophic for contemplation. If you cannot understand this now, you'll get the picture very soon.This is going to end badly, folks. Very badly indeed.

Forty-five years ago, the legendary gonzo journalist, Dr. Hunter S. Thompson, accompanied by his attorney, Oscar Acosta, went off in search of the American Dream. They didn't find it. What they did find were the sure symptoms that the dream was terminally, mortally ill. They found out in Las Vegas - the city where the game is rigged in favor of the house. Today we awaken to find the game rigged all across the American nation. We find ourselves living in a plutocratic dictatorship. An unhinged sociopath - who lost the last presidential campaign by over two--and-a-half million votes - will be living in the White House in forty-five days. I was tempted to say that the game is over - but it's not over. The house will continue to deal its deck of marked decks. We will be forced to play by their rules - on their corrupt terms.

The American Dream is deader than Hunter Thompson and Oscar Acosta combined.

December 13:

We did this to ourselves, America. For nearly forty years, the American voter has been playing Russian Roulette with right wing extremism. The gun finally went off on Election Day 2016. None of this will make any difference to me. I thrive on chaos, dysfunction and despair. For anyone who makes his or her name commenting on America's doom, a perspective Donald Trump administration will be the gift that keeps giving and giving. As for the rest of you? You've had it.

December 19:

There are an awful lot of people who should have been a bit more careful what they wished for. Maybe they don't understand the ramifications of their error now, but they'll understand them soon enough. The bazillion dollar shit hammer is about to hit the fan. In four years you won't recognize this place. I can't wait to see the looks of mass-shellshock on the faces of so many Americans. That'll be the funniest thing of all. So many of them and their elected representatives  will attempt to blame the economic carnage that is surely coming on Barack Obama. Blame the nigger. It works every time. Why do you think there are so many innocent black men in prison in this country? C'mon, folks! Put on your thinking caps!

December 29

After the complete failure of the Bush years,  I was naïve enough to believe that America might finally have learned its lesson. The first piece I wrote on this site ten-and-a-half years ago predicted that Bush would be the last Republican president. I was still making that prediction as late as the summer of 2016. I should have remembered the words of turn-of-the-century journalist, H.L. Mencken, who once famously observed, "No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people." After this calamitous year, I promise you that I'll never again stray far from such sage wisdom. I'm suspecting that the Donald will be reelected in four years, and I trust that the inmates of this doomed republic will be just fine 'n' dandy with that.
---------------------------------------------------------
So there you have it, folks. I fucking nailed it. And the ultimate irony is that I wasn't the only one - far from it.

Idiot Nation

Tom Degan
Goshen, NY

SUGGESTED LISTENING:

Blue Moon
by Fats Domino

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mDO78-0a4ho&feature=share

Fats Domino has joined the legends. In a 1969 Las Vegas press conference, Elvis Presley, referred to him as the real king of rock 'n' roll. I have to agree. The Fat Man started it all.

17 Comments:

At 6:42 PM, Blogger Darrell Michaels said...

Wow. This is what it must be like living in the leftist enclaves on the coasts of the nation. Everybody that is conservative and doesn't agree with the progressive agenda of bigger government is obviously an idiot and probably shouldn't be allowed to breed, right?

Trump truly is narcissistic, reckless, and sometimes even dangerous, but the nation will survive. We survived Carter and we survived Bush and Obama. This too shall pass.

It is interesting to note though that those leftist brothers and sisters of ours that look to government for many of the solutions to their lives' problems are the ones screaming the loudest about Trump, whether for real or imagined transgressions. How little introspection so many of these good folks possess.

 
At 2:11 AM, Blogger Mozart1220 said...

T Paine,

Please explain how Carter and Obama compare to Trump. Even Bush's frat boy ineptitude can't compare to the catastrophe that is Trump.

He's stirring up nuclear war with N Korea and maybe Iran.
He's embarrassing us on the international stage, weakening our reputation and position when we need to build coalitions.

His refusal to honor the Iran deal will undermine all our other treaties.

His hiring of the WORST possible people for every position (when he's bothered to fill one at all) weakens our ability to serve the PEOPLE and protect the environment.

So just stop it with the deflection to "leftist brothers and sisters". This one is ALL YOURS.

The "leftists" will clean up the mess AS USUAL, if there is any nation left to save.

 
At 6:36 AM, Blogger Tom Degan said...

To compare Trump to Obama, Carter - or even Bush - is about the silliest comment someone has made on this site in quite some time. Congrats.

 
At 10:08 AM, Blogger Just the Facts! said...

Mr. Paine,

You must understand that Tom suffers from the Dunning-Kruger effect.

 
At 10:19 AM, Blogger Barbara Carlson said...

Just found your blog -- via TheNastyLiberal -- and couldn't agree more. Have added it to my must-read morning links.
Living in Canada since 1965 (Vietnam war) and now a dual citizen, I would turn my back on America and be done with its stupidity but for you and other clear-seeing progressives. I will enjoy (if that is the right word) "breaking bread" with you in the future.

T. Paine and his ilk are not paying attention and have little judgment and less introspection.
And questionable grammar.

 
At 2:11 PM, Blogger Mozart1220 said...

R.I.P Fats Domiono, though Chuck Berry is the TRUE "King of Rock N Roll"

 
At 5:00 PM, Blogger Dave Dubya said...

Mr. Paine has offered his generalized and false beliefs about leftists, rather than facts.

Mr. Paine seems to have forgotten that fanatic Trump supporters worship the man "sent by Jesus" who would "fix everything" with his "government solutions" like walls, brutal law enforcement, and Muslim bans.

Wasn't that the point of the MAGA BS in the first place? Trump promised "solutions to their lives' problems" at every damn hate rally. Amazing how that fact is filtered out in a simplistic blanket accusation for liberals.

Now the "man of the people" is planning "massive tax cuts" for the rich and giving Wall Street banks immunity from legal recourse by their victims. How does that "make America great"?

It doesn't take much introspection to see that scam, does it? Well, it takes a bit more than Trumpists and Republicans can muster, apparently.

..."whether for real or imagined transgressions".

Why couldn't Mr. Paine provide us an example from his enlightened perspective?

More accusation without specifics. Standard far Right, and Trumpist, MO.

They don't need no stinkin' facts. Just like their paranoid Big Lie that Obama was coming for their guns. Just ask 'em. It was only real in their imagination.

See how easy it is to find one of those "imagined transgressions"?

I appreciate Mr. Paine's optimism. We may survive his reign of arrogant authoritarian ignorance, but mark my words. Human beings WILL suffer the consequences.

Bush gave us endless war, deep recession, and ISIS.

Just wait for the next Trump/Republican disaster. They will blame liberals, of course. It's how they are programmed.


Aww, how quaint. The Dunning-Kruger President has his Dunning-Kruger true believers projecting their gullibility. LOL!

 
At 7:03 PM, Blogger Michael Stivic said...

Tom,

After lying about not having a private mail server until proof came out she did have one, Hillary is now claiming that she didn't fund Fusion GPS which, with the help of the Russians, came up with the phoney unverified Trump Dossier.

The Clintons are professional liars. They could lie there way through any polygraph test. I trust Hillary as far as I could throw her extra large arse.

I still can't believe Mozart voted for her.

 
At 11:00 AM, Blogger Darrell Michaels said...

Mr. Mozart, Carter's poor governance brought the nation to its lowest point at that time since the Great Depression economically, socially, militarily, and on the world stage. His ONLY true achievement was brokering peace between Israel and Egypt, not that this ended up doing Anwar Sadat any good.

Obama, counter to Leftist claims, did not restore our place on the world stage. On the contrary, he only emboldened and even appeased our enemies. True, he didn't taunt North Korea like Trump does, but he surely did nothing more with that foe other than to kick the can down the road. Further, after seeing the dangerous example of what happens when you appease a dictatorial enemy, he then went and gave Iran a deal to continue their nuclear "power" program and $150 billion in their assets. Why would you embolden an enemy that chants "Death to America!" and vows to wipe Israel off the globe? Within a decade they too will have nukes, just as North Korea does now. The difference is that North Korea is the fault of many presidential administrations. Iran is all Obama's fault.

Oh, and by the way, the Iran deal was NOT a treaty. It was never allowed to be voted upon by congress thanks to our constitutional-law professor Obama's own doing. It simply strengthened a foe who is the leading state sponsor of terrorism, even as Obama's State Department acknowledged.

Further, President Obama managed to double our national debt under his tenure. This is something that he rightly proclaimed President Bush as being irresponsible and even unpatriotic when he recklessly spent under his administration. As our friend Dave Dubya might say, I guess it is okay if you are a Democrat, right?

As for Trump, I agree with you on some aspects of his ineptitude and foolishness, especially with some environmental issues. That said, the nation will survive him too.

I know you are so partisan as to be incapable of objectivity, but if you were to truly look, you would see that the Left has just as much... indeed more... culpability in the mess this nation is in right now. They are hardly in a place to clean it up considering the fact that they think they have made this disaster better.

Mr. Degan, the fact that you think my comment was silly shows just how far down the Leftist rabbit hole you have ventured too, my friend. I am concerned by the utter contempt your writing shows for those who don't think and vote as you do. I guess to many Leftists we are indeed idiots and deplorables, right? And we wonder why this nation is so fractured.

Ms. Carlson, if America is so messed up by conservatives, what is making you hold onto your American citizenship at all, if I may ask? I am not trying to be snarky, but am sincerely curious.

 
At 11:41 AM, Blogger Majormajor said...

Something I can agree on with Mozart (has the end time come?)

"Chuck Berry is the TRUE "King of Rock N Roll"

 
At 11:53 AM, Blogger Clueless It Seems said...

I was told by a former girlfriend who lives down there in Pearl River that "... a vote for anyone other than HRC is a vote against her...." I voted, but not for any of 'em: Hillary is a Wall Street owned POS whiner, Bernie was a no, Jill Stein was a no, Trumpf obviously was a no. They allow us to waste our votes and write them in here in the Commonwealth so my "vote" was essentially wasted. Who cares? At least I don't own a pink knit cap...

 
At 9:43 AM, Blogger Dave Dubya said...

Mr. Paine is falsely claiming the Iran agreement is “Obama’s”. It is an international agreement and is supported by Trump’s own Mattis and Kelly.

Unfortunately Mr. Paine won’t enlighten us on how they are wrong, and how Mr. Paine and Trump are right. Perhaps they prefer the path to war with Iran, but won’t say so. They complain, but offer no thoughtful alternative. Just blame.

Mr. Paine has a lot of blame for Carter, ignoring the oil embargo’s effect on the world economy. He also ignores the fact Reagan and his tax cut madness took the US from a creditor nation to a debtor nation.

He also ignores the Bush Great Recession, which hurt more Americans than did the economy under Carter. He ignores Trump coddling Wall Street for the next round of swindle and market crash. By all this evidence it is apparent that, yes indeed, Mr. Paine demonstrates IOKIYAR after all.

 
At 2:39 PM, Blogger Mozart1220 said...

Tom, why doi you allow Clucky to post under several different names?

T. Paine, you need to turn off Fox Entertainment and become enlightened. Everything you say is off the Sean Hannity teleprompter.

 
At 12:24 PM, Blogger Michael Stivic said...

Hey Tom,

Looks to me its okay for Russian colluding as long as Bonnie and Clyde Clinton benefit but not anyone else. amirite?

 
At 4:05 PM, Blogger Mozart1220 said...

Micheal, Clucky, Archie, whatever it is today...

Can you stick to the subject for 5 minutes? It's not about the Clintons.

 
At 4:24 PM, Blogger Darrell Michaels said...

Mozart, I don't watch Hannity. In fact I find him to be a smug, arrogant, and somewhat more feminine version of Rachel Maddow. As I have told you before, I get my news information from many sources, both left and right of center. That is why I can be more objective and perhaps even agree with you on rare occasions on a given issue. You, on the other hand, seem to only get your information from the Left and perhaps from the DNC talking points memo, sir. That hardly helps your goal to be enlightened, Mr. Mozart.

 
At 6:16 PM, Blogger ArchieBunkerNYC said...

Thank you Donna Brazille. Looks like Trump was right after all.

The election was rigged - by the DNC in favor of Hillary, who forever more, will be known as Crooked Hillary.

 

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