Old Geezers Out to Lunch

Old Geezers Out to Lunch
The Geezers Emeritus through history: The Mathematician™, Dr. Golf™, The Professor™, and Mercurious™

Tuesday, June 27, 2017

Citizens of 4F: June 27, 2017

The United State of Trump motors on. The legislature now has made it clear they want to move 22 million Americans off their health insurance in order to redistribute wealth back to citizens who are already affluent, and the Supreme Court is about to once again give businesses the right to discriminate based on religion and sexual preference. Recent special elections in which Republicans have won 4 out of 4 tell us that we have moved from the U.S.A to U.S.T. and aren’t swinging back, despite or melancholy hopes.

So this morning on the #4 bus into downtown Minneapolis, I began to evaluate my fellow passengers according to demographics that I can’t ignore.

In the last election, Minnesota went narrowly for Hillary Clinton, but only by the smallest of margins. And since this morning’s passenger assortment is mostly white and male, it seems pretty likely that it hews close to the national average that elected The Orange One into office.  So….

Arguably, the unholiest of the four
riders of the apocalypse...
Of my 25 fellow adult passengers on my bus this morning, half of them are standing in the aisle and did not vote at all in the last election, and may not have ever voted. These folks, studies suggest, may not know who the vice president is, nor their U.S. senators, and almost certainly do not know who their U.S. Representatives are. And as regards state politics, the only elected official they may know by name is the current Governor, though even that is not a slam-dunk. Such is the level of disinterest and apathy. Not that I can blame them, exactly. If the options are sitting next to Mitch McConnell or Nancy Pelosi, aren’t we all tempted to stand?

Of the remaining 50% on the bus, perhaps one voted for an off candidate, such as Gary Johnson, who ran as a Libertarian, or Jill Stein, the Green Party candidate. Or maybe they got no votes at all.  
...followed closely by this numb-nuts.

Of the other 12 or maybe 13 passengers on my bus who did vote in the last presidential election, 6 or 7 sitting on the right voted for Trump, and 6 or 7 sitting on the left voted for Hillary. Pretty much a tossup. In other words, out of 25 passengers on this bus, the Dems and Repubs each talked only 6 or 7 into taking a seat.

Many of us liberals saddened and depressed by the last election have spent much time in the last few months imagining that we must now convince one of the 6 or 7 Trump voters with their butts planted on the right side of the bus that they must switch seats to sit on the left.  But think about it for a moment. The reality is that 2 or 3 of those folks already have “Deplorable” labels on their underwear or maybe even tattooed on their inner thighs. (Hillary may have been stupid to say so, but she was right). And sitting next to them are a larger bunch of folks willing to overlook deplorable labels because they are too fearful of ethnic minorities or a gay people or liberal women.

Not that the Ragin' Commie is much better.
Do we really thing any one of these people is going to change seats? You’d have more luck converting a Baptist into a Hindu than to talk a Trump voter into taking a seat next to Bernie Sanders or Al Franken, who are yacking up a storm sitting just behind me. And don’t get me started on Nancy Pelosi, who none of us want to sit near.

But here’s the thing. About half the passengers on this bus didn’t vote at all. They are just standing in the aisles, bored and frankly repulsed by what they see. All that’s necessary is to make friends with a single one of them. What is shameful about our nation is not the 25% of  passengers that sit on the right side of the bus, and not even the  10% or 15% of 'em with "deplorable" stamped on their underwear. No, what is shameful is the 12 or 13 passengers that are standing up while we on the left ignore them.

Forget about those sitting across the aisle, my friends. They ain’t movin’. If we didn’t win a single one of the four recent special congressional elections when the Republicans are led by the worst excuse for a president since Warren Harding, who are we kidding?
And here I have no words...



But I suggest we each have a look at those folks standing in aisle, the ones who have no desire to sit by any of the four loudmouths shown here or others of their ilk. Offer up the seat next to you to a single standing passenger and make friends with him or her. Suddenly, the bus changes its destination, and we’re headed back towards America.  

12 comments:

  1. A great illustration and admonition. The Democrats need to find a way to relevancy. Your example is a great foundation for messaging.
    Good to see the lights on at the Geezers again!

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    1. Yup. Dems simply don't speak for those standing anymore. And show no signs of finding leaders who have heard the death knells.

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  2. who then, do we select at the offering to these non voters. Who out there, dem or 'pub, would catch their fancy? I can't think of a one. The issue seems that they don't care, they just don't effing care, who is president. We're at a point in history I can't find a parallel for, where the vast majority just doesn't care.
    How do we get them to care? I'm not sure anything less than a full fledged crisis will do it.
    As far as I can tell you are correct.....we have dems who wouldn't vote for a republican if you paid them, and the same for the 'pubs. then we have the aforementioned. They don't care not because neither party has appealed to them, they don't care because they don't care. Most can't even name their guv, slightly more can name the VP, maybe.
    Looking back over history, most countries last 200 years without radical changes, or break up. I don't think we're any different, except we've lasted longer than most.

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    1. A SCOTUS decision yesterday, nearly overlooked, proclaimed that governments were required to use public tax money to pay churches for playground equipment. The details are more complicated, of course, but that was the gist. Then they said it was fine for a public business to decline to serve gay people if they didn't want to for religious reasons. If you ask me, this is full-fledged crisis for the highest court in the land to casually wipe out separation of church and state this way.

      The crisis is upon us. Merely remains to be seen how dramatic of violent the revolution will be.

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    2. Because of their life terms, we are at a point now where the SCOTUS is nearly a lost cause. If RBG retires we are screwed for a long time to come. The presidency and congress still has a chance, however not until the dems grow a pair. Bernie and Elizabeth have carried the banner alone long enough.

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  3. It is indeed depressing but advances are made in small steps sometimes. First of all, we need to roll back the Reagan rules on allowing crazy people to walk our streets. And vote.

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  4. Where there is life there is hope. I am old, however, and don't have a lot of life left in me.

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  5. There are certainly an awful lot of people who have been so distracted by what is required to simply remain standing on their feet (but bowed by worry, ill health, hunger, not to mention msm disambigulation and social media's tendency to generate reactionary opinions) it comes as no surprise that so many have been left standing in the aisle. That neither party provided a viable candidate in the recent presidential campaign is no surprise. That the democrats can't even begin to understand they need to make major changes is a tragedy. That Overton Window won't ove itself.

    Thanks for a very neatly written analogy.

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  6. Someone needs to be putting their foot on the brakes before we go off the cliff!

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  7. Yep! It is all one big mess. Since you posted this, it's even gotten worse...

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  8. It is indeed depressing but advances are made in small steps sometimes.


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