Pale Blue Dot: Lost in the Supermarket

“I’m all lost in the supermarket
I can no longer shop happily…”
-The Clash

Although Joe Strummer told guitarist Mick Jones this song was about how he pictured Jones’ early days living with his grandmother, ‘Lost In The Supermarket’ is about the futility of consumerist assimilation.

Oops, I buried the lede. Let me try again. My task is to provide a liberal viewpoint in a red-majority area of a blue- majority state. My wife thinks this is a greeeat idea.

Sam: “Hello. My name is Sam and I don’t watch CNN.”
Liberals: “Hi, Sam.”
Conservatives: “You probably heard that on CN… oh.”

The codependence is real.

I was born into big L Liberalism. When JFK died, our household went dark for about a year. My mom was an Irish Texan lass, active in politics, and JFK’s fiercest advocate. Her heart was broken. She taught us how people should be treated but she did not suffer fools. She had four boys. We were often not suffered.

My pop was a WW2 vet stationed in Burma, and a building materials guy who also worked at City Hall. Our last name was on almost every lumberyard in the area as my great-grandfather, grandfather, and his brothers started most of them.

I went to John Wood when QU was QC. I played just about every sport, have played in local bands since the 1970s, ran a music store, like building stuff, wrote a book called Bear Girls and Derelicts, and am lead guitarist of the Maulers. IYKYK.

I’m a statistics guy, but I’ll tell you how I feel in this article.

I’m a centrist liberal. I feel the farther on the scale you move to the right or left, the more ideological silliness you’re willing to entertain. Conservatives and liberals essentially want the same thing, are unrelentingly told they don’t, and, as a result…We’re lost in the supermarket.

The Founders’ subtractive stretch goals of liberty and equality- the conveyance of as much freedom as possible while supporting equality for all- are being subverted by the two-party system’s endless need for cash, along with their cottage industry, Big Yelling.

The acquisition of said cash is accomplished through ad dollars and clicks by talking heads making people feel emotional about subjects better approached intellectually, an ancient political game now on steroids, persistently magnified by outside interests.

Sorry. Sometimes I get a little Green Acres’ Mr. Douglas while talking America. But.

The emotional component is often achieved by showing the other party’s extremes and
underlining them as the norm. Who could possibly think this way, you are meant to ask.

“The enemy” is the giddy reply. We are kept angry for bucks. But we are the ones who keep pulling that Chatty Cathy string.

Predictably, fraternity, the third bit of the French tripartite motto we borrowed, has vamoosed. Politics is compromise.

I’ve been asked by my friends at MRN to outline the concerns I and other liberals (and conservatives, and persons of other stripes) have with this Trump presidency.

I like talking politics. I hope anyone in our little dysfunctional Q-town family reading this does so
without undue ideological acrimony. Life’s too short.

Here are a few things I’m concerned about, or would be if I knew whether to take any of it
seriously, at the moment-

1. Are we invading Greenland? Or Denmark? Colombia? There is an adult conversation to
   have regarding the precious minerals we need to make our cars and Ipads run, but
   mining there is available to us right now. Yes, it would be cheaper to own everything. Do
   we believe there are no ramifications of colonialism? Google British late-stage Raj
   effects. Or better, don’t.
2. Re- California wildfires and the admin response: do we believe states should now
   receive help during calamities based on how their political landscape conforms to the
   one in office? I can’t wait for the Alabama McAbortion drive-thrus of 2029. I don’t have
   to underline why this is performative and unpresidential, whether trolling or not, do I?
   Our people are in trouble; if we can, we help. I think we all agree on that.
3. Are we going to threaten every country with tariffs when we want something? Perhaps
   hammers are better tools for surgery than scalpels. Let’s find out.
4. Are fealty-swearing neophytes as good at their administration jobs as longtime
   independent professionals with experience in the field? Who can say?
   What are the possible outcomes of a storied fraudster never being held responsible for
   his actions? I wonder.
5. To that end, do we have any inspectors general left? Did they do anything? Probably just
   Deep Staters anyway. Bye.
6. We rescinded reduced pricing on ten oft-used drugs for seniors and the apparatus for
   reducing drug prices because it was, quote, “unpopular.”
   Unpopular with Pharma, for sure. Super popular with anyone on Medicare.
7. Freezing federal aid to other countries. Do we believe we’ve decided to make these
   investments for kicks? We’ll hope all angles beyond the ledger are eventually
   considered.
8. Firing general counsel for the National Labor Relations Board. I understand Republicans
   are all about management, but removing a key source of worker protections benefits
   who, exactly? Jk, it’s management.
9. The Secretary of Transpo’s first action was to reverse fuel economy standards.
   Republican voters could not stop asking Biden to raise gas costs and, finally, you’ve got
   a guy with the guts to do it.
10. Zuck is handing Trump 25 million dollars.
    No judgment. Except for the judge’s.
11. I was going to applaud the freezing of federal funds but evidently Mississippi and
    Alabama were unhappy about not getting their cut so that got rescinded immediately.
    Except maybe now it’s not? Trump said he wanted to look at “scams.”
    Always learning.
12. If RFK jr is approved as HHS head, 12-year-olds will be legally smoking Luckys, and it’s
    about time. The lungs are muscles that must be exercised, or maybe they’re bones or
    organs or whatever.
13. The Tulsi Gabbard nomination. Popular with Republicans, Dems are not fans. She
    definitely should be head of national intelligence though, she’ll spot a double agent like
    that.
14. GazaCondomgate. The nonsense, it burns.
15. The attempted federal employee buyout. Destruction or creation of the deep state?
    I dunno, but Worst. Office. Pizza. Party. Everrr.

I am 100% on board with Trump doing a complete 180 from Term One and becoming an incredible president (the CSPAN, Siena, and Newsweek historian polls all put Trump’s first term in the bottom 4 all-time, so whether or not we agree, historians sure do). I hope he accomplishes things that make America great.

He is talking about reform of our institutions. I think we can all agree on the utility of reform, if not on the intent.

Based on his history, and the fact that he is removing checks and balances to his power at historic levels, I think his goal is to hug flags, make money, and keep lawyers busy until 2036.

I also don’t think that’s a secret in Washington.

I love my country’s stretch goals and a bunch of its citizens, so I can’t wait to be wrong.