Maybe I'm crazy. But if I am... They made me that way.

[Mythsaje]

Those who support BushCo at this late stage can be placed in three distinct camps. The religiously delusional and deluded, those who directly benefit from the cronyism and corruption that are the hallmarks of this administration, and those who simply don't have the attention span to pay attention to anything lasting longer than a soundbyte.

What's most ironic about those in the first camp is that they were specifically warned against following false prophets (which, btw, according to Thomas Paine, makes no sense in the first place, since the original translation of "Prophet" is "Poet," and its fundamentally impossible to be a false poet, but that's a different point entirely). Couched in some of the most obscure language possible, the Book of Revelations nevertheless warns against following humans who claim to speak for God, particularly in what many believe to be the "End Times." (I won't get into the absurdity of this, since every era since the death of Christ has been believed to be the End Times and, lo and behold, we're still here).

A person of true faith could just as easily argue that George W. Bush is the anti-christ, or at least one of his minions, as he might argue that he is an upright, righteous man. Only through the application of the most stringent deception known to man could someone so obviously opposed to the teachings of the Prince Of Peace could become a leader followed looked upon with such religious fervor.

By everything I understand about the Book of Revelations, the person they call the anti-Christ would rise to prominence by pretending to be, and be looked upon, as a new messiah. There is nothing about a great righteous secular leader rising to power to fight this anti-Christ, now is there?

Now I don't believe in such things, myself, but it strikes me as astounding that millions of people who do can stare it in the face and fail to see it.

Now the second group is at least understandable, up to a point. They gain a lot over the short term. Power, prestige, and more wealth than you and I might imagine. They can commit any number of moral and legal crimes and walk away without censure, much less punishment. Only in the most obvious cases do their crimes even come back around to haunt them later.

But ALL they can expect is short term gain, because what they're supporting is, in the long run, destroying the very creature on which they feed. This country's economic strength, the economic strength and industrial might that made it what it is, is vested in the success of the middle class, a class they are seemingly doing everything they can to destroy. It's a consumer class, and, even assuming that their globalization efforts lead to everything they dream it will, it's a class that has been, historically, contributed more to their coffers than from any other source. Americans buy a LOT of shit, whether they need it or not. Their efforts to destroy the Middle Class can only, in the end, bring about their own demise, or, if not demise, weaken them to the point they lose much of what they hope to gain.

Which brings us to the third group, which is often made up of that very middle class of which I speak. People so obsessed and consumed by the need to "get more" that they don't even see the ultimate price of their avarice. They're being taught to emulate people who are so morally bankrupt that they'd rather see people dying of preventable diseases than give up ONE PENNY of "their" money to prevent it. These people are being taught to envy and strive to be like the very parasites that are sucking the life not only out of them, but out of this very planet.

They sit in front of their shiny new HD television, fed misleading information by the truckload, and never, ever, stop to wonder if they can trust what they're hearing. How can they? It might provoke them into questioning whether they really need that new SUV, or that forty dollar hair care product, or that thousand dollar dress to go with those two hundred dollar shoes.

These are people who go out to the drugstore and wander down the hair care aisle and never wonder "why the hell do we need fifty brands of shampoo, or conditioner, or skin care cream?" They exist only to consume, and throw it away when it no longer suits them. They're like locusts the size of elephants, eating and crapping their way through life, totally unaware of the mess they're leaving behind for those who come after them.

Work, eat, sleep, shit, fuck, propagate, purchase, discard. This is their ultimate purpose and the only purpose the powers-that-be want them to serve.

There has to be more to life than that. There just has to be.

I don't want a utopia. I just want the promise of America back. Where people matter. Where the wealthy don't live a life so separated from the poor that they might as well live on two different planets. Where no one dies of a disease that could be prevented, or cured. Where those who are too mentally ill to care for themselves are treated with dignity and honor. Where all children have homes. Where the laws don't coddle the rich and persecute the poor. Where profits aren't considered to be more important than clean air, water, or soil. Where differences are respected rather than reviled.

I don't think that's too much to ask. I really don't.