I have been haunted of late that I am participating in a
great disaster that is inevitably going to destroy not only myself but also my
species. Perhaps not myself as I will probably not last long enough to see the end of times. I do not mean Armageddon, I
mean the real end of times, the point at which the earth is no longer able
to sustain a species so stupid as to preside over its own demise. My
participation in this coming disaster is not really by choice but is a result
of things largely if not completely out of my control. Oh, it’s true I can
choose not use so many plastic bottles (actually I do not use plastic bottles),
and I occasionally remember to bring my own cloth bag to the grocery store, but
I cannot avoid using plastic bags and other plastic objects no matter how hard
I try. I feel guilty about this as I know that plastic is already fouling our
oceans and our landfills but it seems virtually impossible to live without
plastic these days. When I occasionally have to go to the dump (to mostly throw
away more plastic) and observe the mounds of trash that accumulate there, I can
sense the disaster that I know must eventually await us. Of course this is just
child’s play compared with nuclear waste, the pollution caused by the overuse
of fossil fuels, the exhaust of millions of vehicles (how many vehicles exist
on our planet), the coming exhaustion of so many plant and animal species, the
damage being done to mother earth through agribusiness, and our neglect of
global warming. I am a participant in this disgraceful business and there is
little or nothing I can do about it. True, I guess I could move away to an even
more remote corner of the world, become a hermit, refuse to participate in the
everyday community, bury myself in a hole and pull a lid over me, but at my age
and financial situation that is simply not realistic. So it is that I continue
feeling guilty about my participation, and worry about what I believe will be
the inevitable outcome, but I still find myself using gasoline and natural gas,
plastic, depleted fisheries, and the artificial substances that nowadays pass
for food. I would like to apologize for my participation in such a stupid
culture, but to whom would I apologize? And what would be the point? I
sometimes remember to take my own bag to the grocery store, geez, that makes me
feel really good, and I drive to town much less than before, and I try to
recycle, but even these noble attempts do not allay the anxiety and fear I
experience more and more as things seem to be out of control. We seem to lack
even a basic instinct for survival. Sigh!
Something else thing that has been bothering me more and
more lately is the behavior of Republicans with respect to taxes. I obviously
cannot say this is an entirely new concern as I have no respect for
Republicans, but for some reason the obvious has not been obvious enough to me
until just now. That is, why are they so obsessed with maintaining lower taxes
for people so fantastically wealthy as to not even be bothered by their taxes?
What conceivable difference does it make to multi-millionaires and billionaires
if their taxes are raised by 2, 3, or even 4 percent (or hopefully even more)?
I assume that most of the Republicans (although wealthy enough themselves), do
not fall into these unbelievably high levels of income and are therefore not
merely out to protect themselves. So why are they so stubbornly determined to
not raise taxes even one iota on the already obscenely wealthy? What is the
motive for such a (to me) strange obsession? I think I have always known the
answer to this question, but probably only subconsciously, it has now reached
my consciousness more clearly and the answer depresses me. They are
prostitutes. People that were elected to represent their constituents are not
doing so, they are prostituting themselves to those who are willing and able to
pay them well for their votes. I guess I have known this all along but for some
reason of late it has somehow risen to a more conscious level in my somewhat
dim and carelessly trusting mind, thus upsetting its delicate balance (or indelicate
unbalance as the case may be). It was Saint Ronnie himself who observed this
feature of our political system some time ago:
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