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9/12/2022

Enamored of a Queen,
Is America wishing for
a King of our very own?

THE QUEEN at the Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland, ending a 2007 U.S. tour. CREDIT: NASA

(NOTE: This post has been updated to emphasize the difference between ceremonial and actual monarchies).

I'M SORRY that Queen Elizabeth is dead.
   And I understand the wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling, day-after-day, week-after-week, 24-7 news coverage, because there’s no such thing as proportional news. There’s just no way to get the volume of the news right: it’s either too little, or way, way, way over the top.
   It’s sort of like the weather, never perfect. Of course, the difference between extreme news and extreme weather is that one morning, we’ll wake up, and, poof, Queen Elizabeth will have disappeared from our TV screens and front pages. But the hurricanes, floods, wildfires, mudslides, tornadoes of the modern era will be with us and getting worse until we either fix the climate or, alternatively, end up like the Queen.
    Look. I’m not a dolt. I realize that the Royal Family has a hold on the American psyche. We are fascinated. Who said What to Whom (or is it Whom said What to Who)? Who is the racist(s) in the Family? Will Harry and Meghan be re-enfolded into the Royal Fold? Explain to me Princess Anne, again? What to make of the latest cryptic dispatch from The Palace (In a land where Palaces speak)? Who’ll take care of the corgis? What’s a Consort?
   And, it's true: Queen Elizabeth had style.

MY PROBLEM IS WHY?
   Why are we so besotted bythe Royal Family?
   Didn’t we fight a war, crack the Liberty Bell, winter at Valley Forge, write a Constitution and pay a fortune to see “Hamilton” so we could be be rid of the Royals?
   It seems to me that the Queen, and now the King, are the polar opposites of what the United States of America is supposed to believe in, is supposed to be?
   Don't we believe in electing our leaders, not in DNA determinism mapped out on succession charts interpreted by soothsayers with British accents on loan to MSNBC, deciding who'll end up atop the national pyramid.
   We Americans believe in the Common Man, the Common Woman, the Common Nonbionary, not the aristocracy, the Super Rich, the cryptocrats and the kleptocrats.
   Yes, we want to be rich ourselves, but generally we don’t “like” anyone else who is, except maybe The Deserving Rich, such as those who figured out same-day delivery, IOS 16 software and soft-serve ice cream.
   Or the thousands of 20-somethings granted fortunes to play in the NFL, NBA, MLB and the Premier League. Or geniuses, who are truly meritorious and exceptional like Oprah, Taylor Swift and the Powerball winner who lives next door and darn well better remember who shoveled their sidewalks during the most savage winters.

QUEEN MARY, touring London's dockyard area with her granddaughters, Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret Rose, May 1939. CREDIT: Federal News Photos / Library and Archives Canada

IT'S PRETTY CLEAR that long, long ago, when Britain, England, the United Kingdom, the Commonwealth - collectively The Empire - really amounted to something, and that it was run by murderers, militarists, racists, bullies and slave-runners – colonists, who exploited entire continents, but nowadays are left only with their pomp, their rituals, their uncomfortable costumes and a history of shame that deserves no honor, celebration or emulation.
   What worries me is whether that's what we want, too.
   A King.
   A functional one, as opposed to the ceremonial, symbolic variety.
   We’d settle for a Queen, of course.
   But a real King would be the real thing.
   Kings are easier. They know what to do. They’ll tell us how to think and when - or not. When to have an abortion, or, more to the point, when not to have an abortion. When we should wear a mask, and better still, when not to wear one. What books to read; or, better still, what books to ban; or even better, what books to burn. Who should immigrate into the country, and better still, who should not.
   A King will know which people should live in what neighborhoods; who should go to jail; who should treated politely by the police. Who should eat, who should be food-insecure. Who should be paid; who should be paid a lot; or not. Who should stay home; who should unload the dishwasher; who should own a dishwasher; our not.
   Democracy is hard. You have to make decisions, watch and/or read and listen to the news; have disagreements with your family and the people next door; go to city council meetings; donate to candidates; argue; settle for the lesser of two evils; figure out who’s telling the truth most of the time, or who’s lying the least. You have to worry who’ll win; worry whether you picked a loser; or worry that you've elected a winner who later you realize should have lost.
   Having a loving, empathetic, wise boss and doing what he says is easier than belonging to a union, and, regardless of whether your union gets you decent pay, and either way, still,having to pay dues.

PRINCESS ELIZABETH, in the Auxiliary Territorial Service, the women's branch of the British army, April, 1945. She had been trained as a driver and mechanic. CREDIT: Imperial War Museums

THE KING SYSTEM
   Under the King System, you're likely to get out of jury duty.
   By decree, there'll be no building codes.
   The King understands. He knows what to do. Leave it to him. Listen to what he says, then do it.
   It’s the most important issue to be decided in the election to be held this fast-approaching November, and again, in the fateful presidential election of 2024.
   Can we, should we, will we leave the headaches and heartaches and uncertainties, the anguish and hard work of democracy behind?
   Perhaps, unlike has-been England, with its fairy tale Queens and pretend Kings, maybe our country is still mighty enough, prosperous enough and mean and cruel enough to warrant the real thing, a genuine King of our very own.
   We could have Donald J. Trump and be done with it.

QUEEN ELIZABETH in Berlin, Germany, 2015. CREDIT: Berlin Police

2 Comments

9/2/22

9/2/2022

4 Comments

SURE, BIDEN'S TALK WAS POLITICAL.
BUT IS THAT SUCH A BAD THING?

LISTEN FOLKS, I know that Joey Biden's speech the other night in Philadelphia sounded downright political.
   And let me be frank, it was political.
   What’s more, I’ve been around almost as long as Mr. Biden, so I’ve heard my share of political talks, and I know what I'm talking about when I say that as a political speech it wasn’t one of the great ones.
   Which is not my point. Joe Biden said what needed to be said.
   Okay, he went off script to address hecklers - nicely - even though one of them kept shouting the fuck word.
   But the important thing was the really important thing he was talking about.
   Here’s a sample:

...there is no question that the Republican Party today is dominated, driven and intimidated by Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans, and that is a threat to this country.
    These are hard things.
    But I’m an American President — not the President of red America or blue America, but of all America.
    And I believe it is my duty — my duty to level with you, to tell the truth no matter how difficult, no matter how painful.

   Even political speeches aren’t that over-the-top simplistic.
   “Me, good."
   "Opponent, bad.”
   “The other party? Scoundrels."
   "My party? Angels in America.”
   Then there was the stuff better said from the church pulpit than the political soapbox (Remember those contraptions? Easier to fall off from than bicycles) that “soul of America” malarkey Biden always talks about.

BUT LOOK, FOLKS, Joseph Robinette Biden Jr.’s talk outside Independence Hall last Thursday was special. And here’s the thing: everything he said was true. Every sentence. Every word. Period.

MAGA Republicans do not respect the Constitution. They do not believe in the rule of law. They do not recognize the will of the people.
They refuse to accept the results of a free election. And they’re working right now, as I speak, in state after state to give power to decide elections in America to partisans and cronies, empowering election deniers to undermine democracy itself.
MAGA forces are determined to take this country backwards — backwards to an America where there is no right to choose, no right to privacy, no right to contraception, no right to marry who you love.

I'LL BE PERFECTLY HONEST: Who was listening?
   Reporters and a few hundred invited guests.
   None of the TV networks bothered to carry the speech. Not CBS, NBC, ABC, PBS.
   Which surprised me as I was clicking around the channels, since the talk was billed as a “prime time” speech, which is when most Americans used to do most of their TV watching, and even now, with streaming, cable and "handheld devices,” millions still do.
   Here’s the thing.
   The 46th president of the United States was saying something really important: that American democracy may collapse, and the reason is that Donald Trump and Republicans are working hard to bring our country down.
   Surely that’s worth a 24 minutes of America's time.
   You don’t think democracy is important? Ask the Ukrainians, the Afghans, the Russians, and every one of the 1,451,326,413 people who live in China.
   Folks, Biden was telling us that Donald Trump, America’s once and future king, and his machine gun loving shock troops of Zombie Republicans are up to. And let me be absolutely clear: it’s scarier, more frightening than anything you'll ever see on any network, cable, streaming TV or handheld device.

   They promote authoritarian leaders, and they fan the flames of political violence that are a threat to our personal rights, to the pursuit of justice, to the rule of law, to the very soul of this country.
   They look at the mob that stormed the United States Capitol on January 6th — brutally attacking law enforcement — not as insurrectionists who placed a dagger to the throat of our democracy, but they look at them as patriots.
   And they see their MAGA failure to stop a peaceful transfer of power after the 2020 election as preparation for the 2022 and 2024 elections.
They tried everything last time to nullify the votes of 81 million people. This time, they’re determined to succeed in thwarting the will of the people.

THE FAILURE of the major networks to give Joe Biden a half-hour of their time was more symbolic than anything that really counts.
   Fact is, that if you were determined to watch Biden, there were plenty of other places to find his talk in real time: CNN, MSNBC, the Washington Post’s website and C-Span.
   From a network executive's point of view, you could find plenty of sensible reasons not to carry it: it was political, not about something presidential or nationally important, like a declaration of war. And snippets of the talk would appear on the 11 o’clock news, albeit after both of the latest car crashes, the weather and the hamster rescue.
    The real issue of TV's disinterest is that it reflects much of the country's attitude: that nothing is really wrong with the country. There's no emergency. It'll be okay. It's just politics.

LISTEN, FOLKS. I’ll put this plainly as I can, just like Biden's dad might have said when he got off the third shift in Scranton: “Joey, the networks should have carried your speech.”
   Why? Because it was political. Politics are the lifeblood of democracy. Politics are how we solve our problems and govern ourselves.
   Let me be clear. What Biden was saying was as important as anything any president has ever had to tell the country: democracy is in peril. The November elections will determine which party will control Congress – the good one or the crazy evil one.
   And that, in turn, could determine whether Trump – or someone worse and there are plenty who are worse – will be elected president in a couple of years.
   What Biden did in Pennsylvania is what politicians are supposed to do when there's a threat the the nation: warn us, rally us, pry us off the couch and lead us into action, in this case into the voting booth.

   For a long time, we’ve told ourselves that American democracy is guaranteed, but it’s not.
   We have to defend it, protect it, stand up for it — each and every one of us.
     * * *
   I ran for President because I believed we were in a battle for the soul of this nation. I still believe that to be true.
     * * *
   Our task is to make our nation free and fair, just and strong, noble and whole.
   And this work is the work of democracy — the work of this generation. It is the work of our time, for all time.
   We can’t afford to have — leave anyone on the sidelines. We need everyone to do their part.
   So speak up. Speak out. Get engaged.
   Vote, vote, vote.

4 Comments

9/12/2022

Enamored of a Queen,Is America wishing fora King of our very own?

9/2/22

SURE, BIDEN'S TALK WAS POLITICAL.BUT IS THAT SUCH A BAD THING?

Categories

Enamored of a Queen,
Is America wishing for
a King of our very own?

SURE, BIDEN'S TALK WAS POLITICAL.
BUT IS THAT SUCH A BAD THING?