I woke up this morning, as I usually do… but this time with the rising morning sun in my face. It’s been raining here on the southeast side of the Big Island of Hawaii now for the better part of three months, but lately it’s reverted (albeit temporarily) to our old late Summer “Camelot” weather pattern: clouds move in starting at 4:45 PM, sun sets- rain squalls roll in off the ocean starting at 8:30 PM or so, then intensify into roof-pounding gully washers off and on until around 3:00 AM or thereabout. Clouds peter out by dawn cracking over the ocean, then broken sunshine all day until it repeats itself by day’s end.
Anyway with the bright warm sun in my face for a change I found myself in a pretty nice mood and state of mind - kissed Mrs. Anakai good morning, waddled into the bathroom to take my morning meds then proceeded to take my usual perch at the breakfast table, grab a couple of apple bananas, pick up the old iPhone and survey my usual on-line news haunts. (was it really that long ago when the first order of morning business was to trot out front and get the Mercury News from the front porch?) I kind’ve miss the rustle of newsprint that used to accompany the smell of frying bacon.
As I breezed through news site after site and even Daily Kos during the course of 20 minutes and plowing through a large bowl of Cheerios and fat-free yogurt, I finally arrived at a conclusion that suddenly hit me like a roundhouse punch in the face:
I AM SICK AND F—KING TIRED OF READING ABOUT DONALD F—KING TRUMP.
Not just irritated, over-exposed, burned out or merely fed up: I mean, deeply, profoundly, physically nauseous at that damned Five Letter Word. As in GERD-induced acid reflux. As in wanting to hurl but couldn’t because a container for the expulsion wasn’t close by.
It wasn’t the Cheerios - they came from a freshly opened box, well within the expiration date, as did the yogurt. Nope: the reaction was entirely an emotional reflex. I guess it had been building up to this for quite a long time - and for the all-too-brief moments when Harris and Walz completely overwhelmed and dominated the entire news cycle, I thought perhaps there was a glimmer of hope that the Five Letter Word would finally be diluted to a point where the flow of information wouldn’t be as toxic as before.
But no: HELL NO. My god, the media saturation of that skeevy bastard is now even worse than the coverage of the friggin’ Beatles back in 1965! “Trump called Harris a f—king b—tch on tape - news at Eleven!” - “Trump is flying around in Jeffrey Epstein’s old RapeJet aircraft” - “Trump website was hacked by Iranians” - “Trump now On To Debate Harris in September” - “Trump and Elon Musk try to talk about Stuff but Musk’s online play toy went belly-up”.
YADA - YADA - YADA - My god - is there no limit to this madness?!
Before you know it they’ll give blow-by-blow live reports of him using the bathroom and replacing the toilet paper roll as he cops a squat. And Fox News’ Peter Doocey will be right there on the scene to do a splash-by-splash report on the dropping turds.
So here’s a Public Service Announcement from Yours Truly, intended for the entire United States Media:
“Trump’s brand has become an unpalatable liability in public opinion, bullshit tolerance, and as such challenges the limits of thinking people’s gag reflex. Trump is NOT the Second Coming. Trump is NOT the American paragon of righteousness, virtue and magnanimity, no matter how hard you people try to project him as such. Good lord: he’s a convicted felon- 34 counts worth! You’re treating him in ways that give other felons wet dreams!
"Trump replaces facts with lies. He replaces opinions with lies. He even has proven that he replaces love, religion and ethics with lies. He is a decrepit, drooling, pants-shitting thug with a narcissistic mental disease that would have made Joe Stalin or even Joe McCarthy cringe; at least those guys had a modicum of class to their butchery and character assassinations, unlike Trump who has managed to surface as the most classless piece of low-rent white trash in America… and that’s coming from me, a white guy. He’ll do and say anything, as long as it’s wrapped up in a lie.
"Trump and his MAGA mental midgets are NOT what defines America. Stop reporting him like he is!"
I am so fed up with that Five Letter Word that I damned near threw a $1,200 phone through a $2,800 television screen the last time I watched a network news program. I absolutely dread what could happen if he actually does lose this election - the antics that will result from the fascist interlopers to decertify the election, the weeping, wailing, gnashing of teeth and chewing the carpet in a conniption fit of psychotic rage - oh, hell yes! Those ratings will soar! Think of all that ad revenue!
So much for waking up in a good mood…
