C.R.E.A.M.ocracy

Last week saw the election of multiple candidates from the Tea Party, revelations of Keith Olbermann’s failure to disclose small donations to multiple Democratic candidates and Mitch McConnell’s admission that the Republican Party’s first priority for the next two years isn’t the sinking economy, jobs or even the war.

Rather, the party’s main priority is to remove President Obama and complete its personal partisan power grab while Obama maintains that if we work in a more bipartisan fashion everything will coalesce into a Youngbloods sing-along.

In the face of an election dictated by cries of socialism, and in the words of Inigo Montoya, “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”  
Large groups of citizens gathered to fight for more liberty — well, except for the gays and stoners. So really there was just more liberty for Comcast to censure Olbermann for a $2,400 donation while it cements its hold on American media and telecommunications.

Is it any surprise that a majority of Democratic voters didn’t bother showing up?

In the face of such ardent, irrational and deliberately misinformed pseudo-populism, the only thing left (in the words of Hunter S. Thompson) is “there is not much left except TV and relentless masturbation. It’s a strange world. Some people get rich, and others eat shit and die.”

And considering Goldman Sachs continues to turn in nearly mathematically impossible high profits to the tune of $1.1 billion in the most recent quarter (a “fall” compared to the previous year’s record highs) while mass unemployment continues, it’s a good thing that the Packers and Fringe are getting better each week.

When the adage “the rich get richer, and the poor get poorer” is no longer merely a sad truism about society, but an entire political and economic philosophy, there’s not much left to do but sit on the floor and listen to Nick Cave records while waiting for the power to be shut off.

It can be hard to find hope for a more rational and just society when every president for the last 18 years has admitted to smoking marijuana and yet continues to justify the war on drugs and wasted billions going yearly to the Drug Enforcement Agency, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and the prison bureaucracy.

And when the Supreme Court has to waste time debating the decision to sell violent video games to youth instead of allowing parents to take responsibility for their children, it can be hard to find hope for a more rational, logical, reasonable and just society.

When you live in a pay-to-play, cash-rules-everything-around-me society, sometimes the only thing that keeps you going is the ability to retreat into your home and listen to old Sam Cooke albums.

And for me, that’s perhaps the highlight of the end of this election season; there’s finally a chance to go back to what truly matters — great
music.


E-mail: mrstraw@indiana.edu