Buffalo Bugs and Features

Republic of China (1912–1949) / Xu Beihong/ Portrait of Rabindranath Tagore

Gotta thank Joe for the seed on this one. (later on that day:  wow, when you start thinking this one through, the whole topic of how we arrived at this point is truly vast.) 

 

This one is going to take some time.  There are facets here that I would like to explore and try and anticipate the possible tracks.  Unpacking this might take a while.  Or it could be just the dope talking.

 

Final Note:  Since I worked on this and it is time to put it up, I am still not all that happy with it.  Don’t be surprised if I come back and revisit it soon.

 

From a recent Bill Moyers podcast … interview with a Dr. Bandy Lee

"Bill, if you remember one of our earliest conversations, I told you about the 

concern that I had had for decades, in fact, of our collective state of mental health as a nation. Which is the reason why I have gone more in the direction of public health, because I was concerned about the public’s mental health which has allowed a large segment to become vulnerable to this type of manipulation, and, since the election of Donald Trump, I have always said that the Trump presidency is not really about Donald Trump the individual. But he was a barometer for societal mental health, that the public was vulnerable enough to be attracted to a severely impaired leader as he. That he was an expression of the national state of mind, as well as a highly pernicious aggravator of its characteristics and symptoms once he was in office."

I used to love Bill Moyers.  I still do, but just not as much. I think that he has been cheerleading for the plans that we laid down in the eighties and now that the fruits of those plans have come around, he is doubling down.

Now Bill loves interviewing the credentialed.  Stock in trade for Billy is smart charismatic folks with an axe to grind.  During my PBS years I was a religious listener because more than anything I wanted to be in that crowd.

But this little quote that the MD from Yale kinda reminds me why I started peeling away from that way of thought into the current amorphous and currently under review sets of beliefs that are, to understate the issue, a bit more heterodox.

I was concerned about the public’s mental health which has allowed a large segment to become vulnerable to this type of manipulation

Maybe I am looking at this all wrong, but I find it dangerous when people start equating political choices with mental health.  What this academic seems to be saying is that there are people who voted for Fuckwad the First only did so because of the steady deterioration of their mental health.  Wow!!!

But let’s take the step and pull out the quote and unpack it a little

I almost don’t know where to start here.  Dr. Ms. Yale-ie, who’s speciality seems to center around preventing violence in prisons, has been grinding a hatchet against fuckwad for a bit now.  I do have to admit that he seems to have delusions of grandeur and appears to be a narcissist, but I can’t remember that ever being a disqualification for the office of the president.  I might even posit that there hasn’t been anyone in that office since Jimmy Carter who didn’t suffer the same problems.

Nope, this is a dangerous set of ideas she is tossing around.  I don’t think that I need (maybe I do, if you need brushing up, send a comment and I will put together a bibliography) to remind people that talk like this was common in Germany, the Former Soviet Union, and during the Red Guards period.  Labelling your political opponent as mentally ill has a pretty established track record and that record ain’t good.

Trumpy was a shit President.  He lost his second term.  But the issues that he claimed to address weren’t addressed and the people who voted for him still don’t trust the Democrats to do anything but keep screwing them (all the while explaining that they aren’t screwing them as hard as the Republicans would). 

Maybe rather than trying to fasten the idea of “poor mental health” to people who respond to the way that a former TV celebrity and wrestling promoter uses them, she might ask what causes the complete loss of faith in the system that drives around 48% of the populace to vote for the clown?

There are some crazy-as-fuck Trump supported out there, but living in Portland, I can attest that there are some crazy as fuck folk out there who voted for Biden..  But it is my genuine belief that both of these are very small minorities and their ideas would probably appall the fuckwad in chief (either I or II).  I would also argue that the bulk of Trump supporters are folks you can get along with just as the bulk of Biden supporters are folks you can get along with.

Nope, this election is a place-holder.  Granted, few tears among the folk I know will be shed, I am including myself in this.  But right now, I am concerned about the labelling of folks and the tendency of payback and ostracization by winners in this game.  

For christ sakes, Trump’s supporters are mentally ill?  I have heard folks on CNN call for “re-education” and folks are talking about kicking people out of congress for supporting Trumpikins.  I am hoping that all this shit settles down and people calm down.  I am thinking that most of what is going on is just talk, but I think that this kind of talk bears watching.