This Carbon Based Life

BY David Glenn Cox

I spent my Sunday afternoon quietly protesting the Gestapo murders in downtown Casa Grande. It was a respectable turnout, given the size of the town and the suddenness of the event. We even had three, count’ em three, counter-protesters. Their leader was a well-known village idiot. Known in these parts for parading around town with a large American flag. I had seen him before and had even spoken to him once. (harmless, if not riled) And considering I don’t get out much, it illustrates just how well-known this character actually is. So let me paint you a picture. Around 200 anti-ICE protesters versus three pro-ICE protesters.

Flag boy had dressed up for the occasion by strapping an assault rifle to his chest. Arizona is an open- carry state, and that is how flag boy displays his patriotism. Clueless, brain injury perhaps? That while he’s parading with a gun to illustrate his Free dumb. Alex Pretti lies dead in a morgue for doing exactly the same thing. Cognitive dissonance, perhaps? The two droids behind him, the junior apprentice village idiots, appeared to be unarmed. This is a small town and three village idiots would certainly bust the village idiot budget. The true irony was that as they marched along the sidewalks, they were indistinguishable from the Anti-ICE protesters, save for the assault rifle.

Those who supported us gave us the thumbs up and honked car horns. Those who did not support us would hit their gas pedals and rev their engines at us, displaying their disdain. Nothing makes a political statement in America quite like revving your car engine! I was personally very hurt by it and mourned most of the night. “They don’t like my opinion and revved their engines at me.” Gosh, how can a fella argue with such a well thought out and well executed political argument like that?

They actually believe that by expending petroleum and making a noise it counts as a counterprotest. Much in the same way a baby shits itself and then cries, sitting in its own stink, somehow qualifies as a political protest. “Forgive them, lord for they know not what they do.” What is allegedly, nominally, a government is murdering its citizens in the streets, and Americans peacefully protesting offends them. Offends them so much, gas mileage be damned! “Give me liberty or give me fuel economy!” I detest what you say, but will defend to the death your right to roll coal at me!

If the government reserves the right to murder its citizens. What makes them so special? How does the government differentiate between the GOOD Vietnamese from the BAD Vietnamese? ICE would have dragged flag boy to the ground and shoved that flag pole right up his ass, just as quickly as they would have grabbed me. This is the part they fail to understand. It’s not about my side or your side, my opinion versus your opinion. ICE didn’t murder Americans in the street because of their opinions; they murdered them because they were there and they suddenly got in their way.  

Power is not a means; it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship. The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now you begin to understand me.” – Orwell.

These are the good Nazis with gas pedals. Trained not to think, but to just blindly obey. Trained since grade school to put their hands over their hearts and recite the Pledge of Allegiance. To believe our government only does good things! Like sidewalks and band concerts in the park. If they do a bad thing, it can still be a good thing if they do it under the guise of patriotism. “I support the troops! Even if I don’t personally like Hitler.” These Americans are complacent. Concentration camps? Oh, they only put bad people in there! People who deserve to have their rights stripped away and to be abused. That could never happen to me! That just happens to, you know, you know. Other people. I have my Ram pickup truck and my flag pin; I’m safe!

Everything you ever needed to know about Nazi Germany and the Holocaust was right there on display in beautiful Casa Grande, Arizona. It’s not that they protest with noise and fumes, but that they believe it substitutes as a protest for people complaining about the crimes of this government. “Well, I guess that I’ve done my part!”

“The tragedy of modern man is not that he knows less and less about the meaning of his own life, but that it bothers him less and less.”  ― Václav Havel

I was watching some BBC interviews. And these normally staid and understated, calm Brits were ripping to shreds pro-Trump lackeys. I’ve never seen anything like it on the BBC. These people are pissed off and angry. Not mildly pissed off, but GET THE HELL OUT OF MY HOUSE! Pissed off. It was what the BBC might have sounded like interviewing George Washington in 1776. And the boycotts have begun. These people are furious with the United States. If you were planning a trip overseas, I’d reconsider.

King Donald the turd, our orange overlord, was planning to host and preside over the FIFA World Cup Games much like the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games. Celebrating the new America. Then the ticket holders began to cancel by the thousands. Is a football match worth visiting a police state? Maybe Jesse Owens is safe and welcome at the games, but you’re not. The FIFA management were suddenly caught in a quandary. Would they have to give the sponsors’ their money back for half-filled stadiums? Plans were quickly made to relocate some of the games OUTSIDE the United States. Maybe that would work and make everyone happy! Because what if the orange overlord were suddenly made unhappy?

But then came another shot across the bow. Germany is discussing boycotting the games. And if Germany boycotts, others will follow. And the big-money sponsors wouldn’t like that at all. It could create a domino effect where Ghana plays Nepal in the final. A TV ratings disaster! Whoever coined the phrase “Loose lips sink ships” had no idea how relevant that phrase might become in the 21^st century of the turd. FIFA is considering moving more games to Canada and Mexico, but is it enough? The US boycotted the 1980 Olympic Games in Moscow to protest Russia’s invasion of Afghanistan, and it was a TV ratings apocalypse.

Some say sports should be apolitical. But is that really possible in an age of national insult and Donald Trump? Of Gestapo arrests and state-sponsored murders. When they say apolitical, do they actually mean, just look the other way? Just be glad it’s not you! Don’t make waves; remember there’s a lot of money riding on this. Just be quiet and say nothing. Just follow the camp guard to the showers and undress quietly, maybe it will be alright.

There’s a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart that you can’t take part! You can’t even passively take part! And you’ve got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus — and you’ve got to make it stop! And you’ve got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it — that unless you’re free the machine will be prevented from working at all!! – Mario Savio

“The dissident does not operate in the realm of genuine power at all. He is not seeking power. He has no desire for office and does not gather votes. He does not attempt to charm the public, he offers nothing and promises nothing. His actions simply articulate his dignity as a citizen, regardless of the cost.”
― Václav Havel