My life in the America I have known will not be going on for too much longer.
Oh, I’ll still be alive, for the most part, but the America that so admired and loved John Glenn and then mostly voted for Donald Trump shows the underpinnings of a place I am about to come to know in a new way. I have wandered the hills of Eritrea, climbed the mountains of South Africa, sailed the seven seas of the world so many times I cannot count but I always had this rather idyllic place to come home to.
Not because it was home but because I would not be shivering in fear anywhere at almost any time within its borders. That was not true out there in most of the rest of the world. I was pretty much of a grandly successful player as a spy. I feared disease, parasites, lack of any medical care, and the complete ignorance of many around me to the basic tenets of science. I saw death coming from those causes all the time in this places, and now I see it coming in such startling detail in this country I’ve so loved and cared for. I know that almost nobody around me can see it, nor do they want to hear it. America did not do so much damage to its citizens with this vote. It did deep and abiding damage to its children and their children after that. What an awful Christmas present to the young.
A wrapped gift, with a big bow, the wrapping removed to reveal a box…and out pops Donald Trump, to take these kids place and put them in that box, to be wound up and popped open at his pleasure. In only one year, if the country gets that far, we won’t be able to find anyone who says they voted for the man. The ignorant will once more fade into the background to lurk and wait with sullen anger until the next likely thousand pound gorilla comes by to latch on to.
James, so I take it that you voted for that wench.That really surprises me ,if so Semper Fi
The opinions of those who were negative about some or all aspects of Hillary’s candidacy took, and still take, a very
distant back seat to what I consider the relevant issue of the campaign, and now our lives for some time to come.
We put a mentally deranged individual into the highest office for all the right reasons. We chose insanity to express
our frustration with favoritism, distorted news, the imbalance of assets and income and general unfairness in so many
areas. Hillary did not and does not matter. What continues to astound me is that there is yet little acceptance of
the likely results of what you get when you have mental illness leading the show. That will come soon enough. I just
hope that it comes with a smaller rather than larger price….but I fear not. I love my country. I love my fellow man
in so many ways. I love the culture and all of its weird iterations. Hell, I even love you Roger…and I’m afraid. Oh, not that visceral
shit from the story. I have never forgotten that central core terror that changed and bent my life into a twisted self-oriented pretzel
(and no, I do not today approve today of a lot of the stuff I did and am writing about). My fear is more general and for those around me.
I fear they won’t be able to come home to a place where fear isn’t the staple consumed by a voracious population all around, like it is
in most other countries of the world. Go to Sierra Leone and come home. Go to Allepo and come home. Go to so many places out there and come back to
this place of wonderful peace, no matter what the damaged press says. We built something special, somehow, and I fear that it will be torn apart
by people with the best intentions gone the wrong way. When compassion, generosity, altruism and kindness depart to be replaced by rationally applied
tough love and a more rigid ‘discipline’ the heart of a people will be hardened until it dies. That’s a long answer to a question you did not pose Roger, but
I thought important to discuss. Thanks for your comment and disagreeing with me. That’s another wonderful think I love about this country. Not just your
freedom to do so in a public forum but you willingness to do so.
Semper fi,
Jim