Freak Out

At this point, Clownstick is leading 244 electoral votes to 215, with a handful of states left to call. Friends 'n' neighbors, it's going to be a squeaker from hell at best, and he's likely to win. The betting markets were 80-20 for Hillary yesterday; they are 80-20 Clownstick right now. I don't know what the fuck happened in the last 24 hours, but there ya go. Feingold and Bayh already lost their Senate runs, so that's gone. It's looking pretty rough right now. She basically has to run the table on the Rust Belt states, and she's behind about 60-80k in each of them right now.

It would be a good time to repeat the last part of the penultimate paragraph of the previous post:

And if Drumpf does manage to win, then it's all over anyway, not only because of the destruction he will wreak on the very foundations of this country, but because it would mean there really are enough self-destructive morons to tear it all down, just to watch it burn.

I'm not sure what else to say. Regardless of the outcome, it might be a good time to pick up a new skill or three, do some more and different writing, figure out some monetization strategies to supplement income enough to save up some discretionary income, look for greener pastures.

Years ago, I used to frequent a chat forum that also counted the noted writer/blogger David Ehrenstein as a member. (David Neiwert was also a regular poster, as was the infamous blogger Ace of Spades.)

I like Ehrenstein's writing a lot, even when I disagree with him on occasion. But one thing David could be counted on that always dismayed me, was whenever there was some sort of act of mass violence or riot, especially when minorities were involved, he would invariably come down on the side of the rioters. Even the L.A. riots of 1992 (remember, this was about 1999-2000, so that event wasn't all that distant in the past) had his tacit approval, as the necessary and natural catharsis of justified rage, borne of decades of mistreatment at the hands of the LAPD. It was all very much Do the Right Thing kind of stuff, without acknowledging that, you know, maybe Radio Raheem and Buggin' Out were simply assholes. We all understand anger and lashing out, but most of us draw the line at harming otherwise innocent individuals, and mindlessly destroying their property.

Something is deeply wrong with a huge chunk of this country, and we're clearly just arguing over whether the percentage is 40 or 50 or 60. Rage and ignorance are a deadly mix, and we're on the verge of seeing its effects. Whatever the number is, it's enough to be the electoral version of a riot, an unpredictable wave of electoral violence for its own sake.

Drumpf is only part of the problem, and really not even a major part of the problem. He has surrounded himself with the worst sort of people -- incompetent, vindictive, hypocritical, petty, cruel. Giuliani, Gingrich, Christie, the perv Rogers (Stone and Ailes) would all be put in positions of power, to wreak havoc for years, possibly generations to come. And his supporters take a bizarre and inordinate amount of pride in being "deplorables" and "haters" and all that.

Being a straight, white, middle-aged guy who has been in both the blue-collar and white-collar, I personally have little to worry about. Growing up in a deeply red county, I learned how to speak the lingo and "pass" long ago. I'll be fine, though it's difficult to look at Drumpf's "business" history and not come to the conclusion that he'll fuck the economy up for everyone; if you believe the hoary teleology of a rising tide lifting all boats, you then must also believe its corollary that a receding tide makes them run aground and leaves them stranded.

But I care about the country my daughter lives and grows up in, and has to make a career in, dealing with lecherous assholes who think it's funny to greet women they don't know by hugging, kissing, or grabbing at them. And that behavior, among his many other loathsome behaviors, just got legitimized.

And the sweet irony, the sole consolation, would be that the angry, under-edumacated peckerwoods who voted for him with full-throated spite and bile will be the first ones to fall under the wheels of the short bus. Again, there are a few critical things that separate me from the typical orthodox librul, and one of those things is that I have no compassion for fools, none at all. I believe what W.C. Fields said about it being morally wrong to allow suckers to keep their money. I believe what H.L. Mencken said about democracy being the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.

Some people do not learn until life breaks one off in their asses. And when you cast your lot in with a vain, incompetent clown whose sole skill lies in gulling rubes and perpetrating cons, you are going to get screwed sooner rather than later. Their coal-mining and widget-stamping jobs aren't coming back. Their health-care costs aren't coming down, just getting reappropriated. Their rundown towns will continue apace in their decrepitude, the smart kids getting the fuck out the first chance they get, the less smart scrabbling around for whatever's left. They are still going to watch their neighbors fake back injuries for funny money and oxy, half to sell and half to take.

The blame and recriminations for the Democratic loss will start immediately, and they'll be correct -- the candidate, the media, the electorate. The problems are always the same, only the names and locales change. But losing Florida, Ohio, and North Carolina right out the gate pretty much gives you the flavor. I think HRC ran a better campaign than I had given her credit for early on, and she nailed him in the debates, but she's always been the queen of unforced errors, and dopey little things like the "basket of deplorables" and the email stuff just eroded her margin, which was never going to be what Obama's was.

Does the media suck for giving the email nonsense more attention than it deserved? Sure. Be consoled in knowing that they'll be the first up against the metaphorical wall. All the teevee talking heads will be relegated to Billy Bush status, even the pretense of "news" will have to be run through your new DHS head Hunchback Giuliani. Jim Comey sucks too, and he'll get his karma by being summarily dismissed by his incoming boss. It won't change things, but those interfering entities will get at least some comeuppance in all this.

You get the idea. And this shit campaign and these shit people have lived in our heads rent-free for too damned long, and I'm not giving them another four years -- especially when, again, it just doesn't matter. If the idea of a Drumpf regime pisses you off, morally and aesthetically, you are surrounded, a stranger in a land that just got a lot stranger. That gut-punch ain't going away. When the fuckers win, the fuckery just gets worse.

The blog is still alive for now. I'll check in here and there, y'know, just to vent my spleen as needed. But this impending doom victory is tectonic, and will affect any other topic I might write about, for the foreseeable future. It's basically a political 9/11, in terms of scope of impact. Everything that occurs will be viewed through that filter for the foreseeable future.

And I have no interest in it right now. There is no longer any point in writing about current events -- or even ideas and ideals -- in such a climate. Some folks will reflexively spew the brave rhetoric of fighting the good fight. I am telling you it is the anti-epistemology of The Purge that that they will be up against. At best, things have to cool down, and that may take a while.

So we're not closing up shop, not just yet. But the rest of the calendar year will be devoted to finding and creating enough opportunities for supplemental income to put together a get-the-fuck-outta-Dodge stash. I don't know this country or its inhabitants anymore, and I fear what this vile man and the scumbags he surrounds himself with will do to it. He's been humping America's leg for almost forty years now, and he's always been a jerkoff, a lousy businessman and a worse human being. If that's what they want, maybe it's just time to let them have it, see how it works out for them.