You sometimes wonder why people came up with fairy tales and fables. They sound so unreal because they are meant to be not entertainment, but lessons for humans, disguised as fantastic stories. Because long ago it was determined that apparently facts easily slip through many people’s minds, but odd stories stick and get attention (Compare Lehrer Report viewers' discussions numbers vs. American Idol’s, for instance). And right now I’m seeing an unfortunate cautionary tale coming true for the vast majority of Americans.
(I’m not going to recount the story of the frog and the scorpion because frankly if you don’t know it you are uneducated. I refuse to be part of this huge American media trend of explaining over and over again the simplest things and well-known -- or what should be well-known -- information, instead of covering new ground. That is what so much of our “media” is, from news shows to magazines to entertainment to political talk shows. Pretty pathetic. Chalk up one for the scorpions)
The few times a week I pay attention to US news media instead of real world news is almost as depressing as coming here to DKos and skimming the first paragraphs of almost all blog entries with their despair, rage, hopeless loss, noting of yet another triumph for the forces of evil, legal and political battles lost to greedy entities, etc. The depressing media isn’t just the coverage of 20 little kids blown to pieces by a murdering fiend (though when advocates of gun control go to testify or protest at some hearing they should take and show the pictures, not of the smiling little kids taken at home, but the police and coroner photos taken of the actual state of the small bodies after the carnage, bloody and all, to shock and sicken the public. For God’s sake, people, this is all-out no-holds-barred war against the deathmongers – and you’re being polite to them? Another point for the scorpions) but bland recounting of reports, without emphasis or emotion, on the step-by-step disintegration of America’s standard of living. All nicely disguised as “news”.
This “budget crisis”, Congressional logjamming and its kowtowing to special interests, corporate propaganda, and the outright illegal violations of state constitutions and laws by extremist legislative bodies – this isn’t “news”, little stories parceled out to fill prime time newscast: it’s a catalog of our own destruction.
For example: I saw tonight that Chicago is closing down dozens of public schools (mostly in poor or minority neighborhoods) because of “budget shortfalls”. As if this is just inevitable, as if this is the consequence of “our” high-powered, high-expense American lifestyle (Notice, however, this consequence doesn’t affect the rich and powerful – even when they lose billions, the government gives them more). Why isn’t the real story that taxing the rich and the corporations more would make that “shortfall” disappear? Why isn’t it a universal rejection of the bizarre theory that if WE (the people who still have – or think we have -- a decent chance at living well) want to keep what we have, then we must accept losing this or that part of the social fabric that made America a great country for ALL its citizens? That for our forward progress as individuals, we have to tear up the road that brought us here to build more road ahead of us? (again, does not apply to the rich and powerful) When did that because the accepted national consensus?
And the insidious presentation on news stories of other facts as just side details hurriedly, casually, tacked onto the end of the main story of “shared, necessary sacrifice”. In the Chicago school closing story, the last sentence of the report telling us that this won’t be that bad because Chicago will be authorizing a shitload of charter schools – and who’s going to pay for those? (maybe they’ll be tuition-free –NOT!) But the real crime about all this is in the numbers. Chicago expects to save $570 million over two years -- but to do that will cost Chicago over $223 million dollars this year to “reapportion the school system” and re-locate the students from the closed schools. Oh really? $223 million dollars for what – say, private contractors, consultants, legal firms, education-related corporate advisory teams, and other “outside” resources? What did you say? Spend that money on educating the kids? “SHUT UP, FROGS, AND LET US SCORPIONS SETTLE ON YOUR BACK.”
Insane nation, that’s the US. Most of the population, I’d have to say, since it enables and supports the insane people they choose to run the place. Authorize spending two trillion dollars we don’t have on a hopeless boondoggle of a war, and then make the military recoup it by cutting two trillion from its budget over the next 10 years? Nahhh… but shit! These damn schools have no way to pay for themselves so get rid of them! (and replace them with private-owned ones, FOR PROFIT)
Tax the rich? Are you serious? Then who would keep all our money? Certainly those running this country don’t think we frogs should have any. The fat rich scorpions are piling onto the frogs’ backs, and we just let them. How about a political answer (a "solution" which blithely disregards the fact it’s our political system that strengthens and enables this infamy)? Yeah, that’s it. Let’s vote in the same/ a new crop of self-serving bastards and that will solve our problems. After all it's because Chicago has a teabagger RW Republican mayor that this is hap--- oh wait, it's "Democrat" Rohm Emmanuel. Whew! Lucky for us, huh? “A vote for Scorpion is a vote for YOUR future!” Unfortunately in all the hype and excitement of loading up with scorpions us frogs always forget that once in the river, our future tends to be very bleak.