This Carbon Based Life

By David Glenn Cox

Someday, yes, someday, the public will view these events going on in New Jersey. Holding humans in cages in a dirty warehouse and not letting anyone in to check on them? Someday, we’ll see this event with clearer eyes, like we see Japanese Internment camps today or worse. Put them in a warehouse district! Ah, very clever. Where there’s not so many nosy Nancy types, asking snoopy questions like, “What do you do in there?”

Do you know what we do in there? None of your business is what we do in there. Very similar in spirit to the Soviet NKVD. Fascism is like Mexican food; there are all kinds. Hot and spicy or heavy on the rhetoric and the Seig heiling all around the place. The NKVD was much more workmanlike in their approach than the Germans. Yes, of course they knew you were innocent. What’s that got to do with anything? They had a job to do, and you were it. Nothing personal.

Protestors, huh? Do you know what we do to protesters? No! And you’re not going to find out either! Not if we can help it. (The whole world’s not watching anymore!) A large gaggle of Police marched the small contingent of press out of the area with calls of “Back, back, get back, keep moving,” until the press was no longer able to cover the protest. Once the press was safely removed from the area, three flash grenades could be heard in quick succession in the distance. Do you know how we handle protesters? Do you know how we handle inmates? It’s an operating system we’ve learned from the Stanford Experiment school of penology. What you don’t know won’t hurt you. But we will.

“The very word “secrecy” is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are as a people inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret proceedings. We decided long ago that the dangers of excessive and unwarranted concealment of pertinent facts far outweighed the dangers which are cited to justify it. Even today, there is little value in opposing the threat of a closed society by imitating its arbitrary restrictions. Even today, there is little value in insuring the survival of our nation if our traditions do not survive with it. And there is very grave danger that an announced need for increased security will be seized upon by those anxious to expand its meaning to the very limits of official censorship and concealment. That I do not intend to permit to the extent that it is in my control. And no official of my Administration, whether his rank is high or low, civilian or military, should interpret my words here tonight as an excuse to censor the news, to stifle dissent, to cover up our mistakes or to withhold from the press and the public the facts they deserve to know.” – John F. Kennedy

These are people locked in cages in a warehouse in New Jersey. In America. It’s just nice to look back sometimes and see how far we’ve traveled. And someday, there will be documentaries on TV about those out-of-control ICE bastards. And none may enter, ist verboten! Section 7a, clause 3, paragraph 2 of the secret orders against secret orders protocol. Do you know what the boss wants done here? Do you need it explained to you? Can’t you read the room, Willie Bob?

If the boss wants you to bust heads? What will you do? Everybody else is doing it! Don’t you want to fit in, or do you want it to end up like high school again? It’s a good government job with retirement and a chance for promotion, so you’ve got to look sharp! Man, if the stockboys from the I.G.A. could see me now!

The machine is very dumb, but it does learn. Local police were called in to “secure” the local area. The police were in effect, standing guard, while ICE moved in. You see? They’re learning! Secure the area first, remove the press, and then move in to end the protest. Constitutional rights? Where? I don’t see anything. Your American fascism at work. Tell it to the machine.

GOOD NEWS Everyone! Donald Trump will host America’s 250^th birthday party after most of the celebrities and pseudo-celebrities said they were misled about the nature of the event and dropped out. Face it: when Milli Vanilli  cancels on you. You begin to wonder who drew up this artist list; your mother? Hey, Bob Hope has only been dead thirty years; dig him up! How about Dick Clark? All the kids like Dick Clark. I didn’t even know Milli Vanilli were still alive, let alone performing together. Wow, turned down by Milli Vanilli, that’s got to be some kind of record.  

America’s birthday party hosted by Donald Trump, what fun! With Professor Zeus and his six dancing chimps and Rollo the magician! And a host of the less famous. Sal Nagato, the spinning plate man! Chud Roadkill with his big country hit “My Pickup Truck.” An American birthday party filled with bad acts to celebrate the liberty we deny to others. Liberty in name only. Only if you’re quiet, and only if you play along, and don’t get in the way. Now, back up, back up, you’re still in New Jersey, back up!

“We know that they are lying, they know that they are lying, they even know that we know they are lying, we also know that they know we know they are lying too, they of course know that we certainly know they know we know they are lying too as well, but they are still lying. In our country, the lie has become not just moral category, but the pillar industry of this country.” ― Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn