This Carbon Based Life

By David Glenn Cox

The big build up and then the big fizzle. On a pretty Saturday afternoon in Texas with no football on television. The big self-described protest at the border. With anti-gun control slogans and Trump flags a waving could only muster a couple of hundred folks, kids, vendors, and dogs included. The results were NOT GOOD! Tepid.

This is the Republican’s main campaign issue for November. This year’s Willie Horton is now called Pablo Gonzales. The scary, scary crisis at the border. “Oh Jesus, help us, help us!” There’s a convoy a comin! There could be tens of thousands of them comin this way. Stand back! Proud, strong, straight American patriots ready to take time out of their busy Saturday and put their foot down. To say, “No More, Joe Biden!”

All the networks were there, this was big news. This wasn’t an Astroturf event. No really, it wasn’t. Trust me, it wasn’t. To the dull-witted, this was an honest spontaneous protest. But then, Trumpstock turned into a Texas backyard barbeque. An estate sale with a band.

We want to send a message to those no-good bureaucrats up there in Washington to get off their backsides and do something about the border! Oh yeah and vote for Donald Trump. (Rabble, rabble, rabble!) Then we’ll vote it down! (Rabble, rabble, rabble!)

Part protest and part Trump rally? How does that work? Part funeral and part yard sale or part child’s birthday party and part dental appointment? The bastard child of twin mothers. KISS! Remember, always keep it simple for them. Get mad, come on, get good and mad. Vote for Donald Trump. The message is to get mad at the other guy! You should be mad; you should get angry too!

Only 200, huh? Including vendors and kids and everyone in a blood red state such as Texas. The one-star state, on a Saturday and without any football to distract them? Organized and planned out at the highest levels of the RNC nationwide and…200? Part Trump rally! Come on out and show your support for Donald Trump! Roll up, roll up, see the show. It’s free! Don’t forget to let the air out of your shoes.

It seems there is a decided lack of enthusiasm. The Trump minions don’t seem all that excited about attending a Trump protest. What with the unfortunate events which occurred at the last Trump protest. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, and I could do one to five in the federal correctional center! Or there was no star power. No face painting or free hot dogs and balloons for the kiddies. You gotta give them something.

They aren’t just going to come out just to look at each other! Boy oh boy, look at those teeming throngs of American lemmings here to show their outrage and update their Trump fan club merchandise. Maybe the message isn’t working, better increase the drip. But with a message at cross purposes of being both a rally and a protest. It is difficult to determine which shiny object failed to draw the simian crowd’s attention.

Either the message isn’t working or Trump ain’t working. The new Trumpism is a quieter and more subdued or just depleted in its ranks? It is a genuine fail for Trump/Concerned Americans everywhere. If it is a one-off, it should be treated as such, but if the phenomenon were to repeat itself? Alarm Bells!

A massive division of the Republican Party engineered by Donald Trump. The enthusiasm is gone, and it’s just not fun anymore. The bloom is gone and after summer comes fall. Where Trump once led jocular chants of “lock her up” Trump is now angry and bitter. Promising camps and mass deportations as they begin to slowly back away from him. Trump supporters not wised up but tired of all the drama and burned out by it all.

Trump’s march through the Republican Primaries like Sherman through Georgia, has put the final nail in their metaphoric coffin and wing of the party. It’s Trump, and there is as much apprehension as joy in Mudd town. Trump lost the last election handily, and will most likely lose this one the same way. A doomed rubber chicken dinner cruise over the falls in a barrel.

Having all the earmarks of a movement which has reached its apogee and is now in decline. The generals always fight the last war, don’t they? Republicans peddling the same prepackaged bullshit which didn’t work on Saturday last.

The media is forced and or required to attend due to the events of the prior January 6^th event. We better cover it; just in case they decide to do something crazy. But what they did was not show up and that’s a bad sign for Republicans. Never mind the polling; they didn’t show up. One of the reasons could be fatigue.

People fall out of love every day. Trump lost the election in 2020. Trump lost the popular vote in 2016. You don’t need to be the amazing Kreskin to read the tea leaves.  

The full court press, Lights, camera, Fox News! Migrants armed with clubs and machine guns are waiting just outside YOUR house!

This is the theater of the short attention span, using base actions to achieve base results. Just bust ‘em over the head with it, making sure they get twice the recommended dosage of Scary! There is fatigue, a sense of “Oh no, not again.”

In most cases, the Republicans still like Trump but not enthusiastically, not like before. There is no way to balance out the ticket. Putting a crazy person and a real sane person? No person who could be chosen as Republican Vice President could balance things out. No person who could please everyone or anyone. We’ve been there, tried that and it turned out badly.

Out of the blue
And into the black
They give you this,
But you pay for that
And once you’re gone,
You can never come back
When you’re out of the blue
And into the black.

The king is gone
But he’s not forgotten
This is the story
Of a Johnny Rotten
It’s better to burn out
Than it is to rust
The king is gone
But he’s not forgotten.

-Neil Young