Monday, January 20, 2025

MENE, MENE

  Thus was the beginning of a warning to the Emperor of Babylon -you have been weighed and found wanting and there will be an accounting for it. Unfortunately. I believe that we, humankind of these times, have also been weighed and found wanting - terribly so. The gap between the haves and the have nots grows day by day. Worse is the fact that we are not only not addressing this gap, but we are exacerbating it, fomenting its growth. The policies of this country, the policies of many other countries in the world foretell of the worse, even the worst, to come unless we rapidly change our ways; however, that is not looking too likely a possibility.  

We are building and reinforcing a skewed society. It is quite obvious, and a serious accounting will have to take place. Soon. We will be forced to    acknowledge our deficiencies, our backwards values, will be forced to investigate ourselves and not via corrupted committees but rather from a higher source.  I fear the payment due after the   accounting is over will not be a slap on the wrist   nor a ruler on the knuckles. Far more serious than that.

We will reap the nasty crop we have sown and tended so well. The unfairness of our world, the grossness of it, the thumbs on the scales of justice and the consequent loss of justice and honesty in society at large. The devaluations of true values and the insistence on violating the gifts of this earth to us. We never learn, do we? Even when there is a slight reawakening, it is quickly squelched and on we go. Same old, same old. Or even worse. 

We might ask ourselves, we actually must ask ourselves how this situation has come about. Why have we not realized that this would be the only outcome possible. We've charged down this road. over and over again, banging our heads on rocky overhangs and travel along perilous rut filled roads and slippery curves. The road narrows, ever. tighter, ever more difficult to maneuver. Certainly not successfully, certainly not without harm to us and our loved ones. 

We have forgotten the ties we have in common. The dreams we share. Despite the accents of our speech. Despite the color of skin, despite national origin, despite the different religions or the interpretations within a religion, or no religion, these differences are of no lasting true account. Yet we make it so, perversely so. In so doing we damage not only the 'others', but ourselves as well. Too late we realize that indeed, one cannot look overlong into that abyss without absorbing some of the characteristics of the monster down below. That is a fact of life. Unfortunately, we are proving it so well.   

We know better. We have been better. But for some reason not so clear we have bought into the philosophy of a man crazed with desire for wealth and power. Impressed only by himself, he reserves the privileges of an Emperor, of a powerful tyrant of old - and newer ones as well. No slack here. He has coins cast with his image upon it. He has bronze statues made, arm raised high in the air,    fisted at the end as did the old tyrants.   Mercurial in behavior, only he and his family are entitled. His followers, ever eager for a crumb of what he has, cower in fear before him, grovel in front of him, and whisper in fear of his dastardly and demented actions and statements.   

This man makes mockery of all that we know is right and proper, moral and just. His ego is larger than the universe, equally as inflated as is his opinion of himself. He is the new emperor of the world, and we have allowed this, bought into it without thought of what lay ahead. Despite all that we know, we allow him to go forth even more, the ruts on the road more dangerous for us, but on we go, perhaps refusing to admit how wrong we were - and are - and we continue to follow him wherever he leads. Perils and traps and pitfalls of the road increase in number and danger. 

We take him at his word. We create excuses for his misfunctions. As of today, he has taken our nation down a road of misdeed and malfunctions, a nation ruled by a dictator, ruler by edicts known as Executive Orders, by threats of being cast to the ground, out of a job, disgraced for daring to disobey or simply just because. Because the man is nuts, pure and simple! And here, I insult nuts. What have we done? What have we allowed, even encouraged? Perhaps we deserve what we are facing these days and unfortunately our risky and uncertain future.  

 He will shred our society, hammer it into the   ground. It will be nigh unto impossible to raise us up and rectify all that has gone wrong. What will we do when our economy collapses? When we   have no workers? When will we have no little stores or businesses. Only the Giant corporations who care not for the little people. When supermarkets have empty shelves and poor pickings at the fruit and vegetable section. The middle class will cease to exist, its higher living standards a thing of the past, and will perforce become one with the lower economic levels, even to the point of poverty. Higher education and training, of growth of opportunities will vanish as mist in the air. 

 What we want will be no more. Dreams and wishes of our ancestors who came here for that purpose, for better life for themselves and their children, will be no longer our dreams, our realities. That is not the society we will live with. This is what we had, and this is what we now lack. We spurned the blessings of the past. and we denied the ever clearer images of the future.

We did this by adhering to the wrong values. By being selfish beyond any point of responsibility and probability, of what is right and just. We chose poorly and put into place leaders of poor capability and monstrous egos. We then followed these leaders as lambs follow their shepherds.

Worse, is the reality that we, the citizens born here, raised here, once appreciated and proud of our citizenship within a most wonderful nation, will now be denied that status. Where does one draw the line when a right etched into the Constitution is voided, declared null. Where does this loss of citizenship end? Is there an end?

More on this, the disappointment of our leaders, political and cleric, along with the lay members. How they have done us wrong. Yesterday's debacle of the release of three tortured battered brutally attacked women ripped from their lives are part and parcel of the consequences of poor choice. Our poor choice. and the pathetic specimens of leaders. that we thus created.   

More - On the morrow.  

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