Monday, October 14, 2019

Yelling at the Empty Chair

Image result for clint eastwood empty chair image

Does anyone still remember that during the Republican Convention in 2012, Clint Eastwood infamously spent 10 minutes yelling at an empty chair, wherein sat an Invisible Obama? 
Well, just as Eastwood's Man With No Name represents the American West hero, so does Eastwood's Yelling At The Empty Chair represent our present political dilemma.
Increasingly, it seems to me, the conservative right wingers in our society are attributing to us on the left every possible bizarre belief, misbegotten philosophy, corruption, perversion, conspiracy theory, and malign intent, then yelling at us for it. 
We are all "Libtards" and the greatest joy is to "own " us by spouting increasingly racist, sexist, and misogynistic insults to which we are supposed to react with fear and loathing.
We have all become the Empty Chair.
And it appears to be increasingly violent too -- Trudeau had to wear a bulletproof vest during a rally this weekend, due to a security threat.  At a Republican gathering last week, prospective donors were "entertained" by a video edited from one of the worst scenes in the Kingsman movie, showing Trump in a church gleefully shooting and stabbing and crushing all his political opponents and reporters, all of them considered to be Libtards who are supposedly "against" their hero Trump - even John McCain and Mitt Romney were in this video.
In a nation increasingly plagued by spree shooters, the whole thing also seemed more than a little tone-deaf.  And the video was shown at Trump's Doral resort, where he wants to hold the G7!
Not to insult pre-pubescent males, but sometimes I wonder if the conservative movement in Canada and in the United States is actually run by 12-year-old boys -- the ones who think it is the nadir of wit to  scream insults at each other, create imaginary "enemies" and run around with cap pistols shooting them in the head.
I'm not sure where this will end, but I am concerned that our civil democratic society may not be sustainable when conservatives have such irrational and free-floating hate toward their fellow citizens.

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