Liberty And Justice Weep Silent Tears For America

It is not often I find myself enraged to incandescent incoherence, nor swept by the overwhelming desire to shout from the rooftops, but this is one of those times. Today marks a particularly dark day in American history, one that will not be noted as such for many decades to come, but is clear enough to those of us with patriotic hearts who worship knowledge over ignorance and freedom over tyranny. The event that has me so worked up? The handing of the gavel in the House of Representatives to John Boehner.


Many will read hyperbole into my words and thoughts, but I assure you, there is none intended. You see, while the man has ridden to a position of power on the coattails of rich benefactors through the auspices of supporters whipped to a frenzy by fear-mongering and scare tactics, he cannot fool those of us with clear vision and comprehensive intellect, for we see him as he is: a son of Janus. No Christian man, he, but a power-hungry mongrel who would seek to enthrall the masses with his “care and compassion,” all the while selling them into slavery, beholden to rich corporate masters, made the true drivers of the Republic through their purchase of such toadies as the new Speaker of the House.

His self-righteous, self-aggrandizing pronouncements are not the stuff of a leader or governor, but of a carnival barker, wont to separate the gawking crowds from their money by offering them a view of wonders never before seen. Perhaps more so, he is a sidewalk magician, teasing passers-by with tricks and misdirection, or a shell game proprietor, whisking the pea about with such deft skill that his marks are bewildered and relieved of their hard-earned dollars. He is a huckster, a shyster, a snake-oil salesman, bent on keeping his sycophantic lackeys busy obfuscating and pandering, obscuring the true nature of his darkened soul, as he hands the keys to the kingdom to his shadowy benefactors.

You would think me intemperate, and you would be right, for the idea that this man has risen – or more like slunk – to such a position of power, sets my blood to boiling and my mind to fuming. He and his cronies went out of their way to convince an electorate jaundiced by bailouts and oil spills, that the President of the United States was sailing the ship of state in the wrong direction, and only they could stop him. Such prurience conveniently glossed over the fact that the ship of state did not get as far as it could have, due to the hefty anchor the Republican Party had heaved overboard in their constant and stubborn refusal to govern. They found it more convenient to blame a nation's woes on a President who had inherited a dire mess, and was forced to make unpopular choices to try and save the nation from depression and misery, rather than pinning the blame squarely where it belonged: on themselves, with their constant kowtowing to corporate America, weakening regulation, crippling a nation's regulatory structure to allow companies to ship jobs overseas and with them, the hopes for a bright future.

Yes, they would like you to forget their push for an unnecessary war, and the weakening of financial oversight and regulation that allowed Wall Street to bet with no money and reap the rewards of a nation that had no chance but to bail them out. They would shuffle their feet and clasp guilty hands behind their back when confronted with the hypocrisy of wanting to establish fiscal responsibility, all while pouring more money in the coffers of the rich and blowing an even larger hole in an already massive budget deficit. They would prefer to whistle a sprightly tune, rather than answer for the two-faced shame of claiming they want government to leave Americans alone, even as they seek to put it in the womb of every woman, like it or not.

At the head at this gang of self-satisfied political thugs stands this man, nay, tear-streaked mountebank, faced washed in tears from having to choke back the laughter boiling inside him for having so easily and successfully snowed the American electorate under with lies, half-truths, and equivocations. Now he takes the gavel, ready to marshal his energies, not to govern, not to support the people, not to provide for a nation, but to fight political battles to prepare for the next Presidential election. He has no interest in righting wrongs, providing services to those who need them, or following the mandates and the credo of the Constitution, which make him subservient to the needs of the nation and the people. He cloaks himself in the flag, waves his copy of The Holy Bible, and declares himself the new messiah, hearkening back to the Revolution and the Constitution, claiming reverence for both while showing incomplete comprehension of them. He would place his needs and the needs of his party – and its not-so-secret backers – ahead of each and every struggling American, if only to align himself for a future that would see him make himself king.

This grandiose buffoon is but the tip of a fetid iceberg, a frozen block of iniquity and self-importance and thirst for power, that threatens to stand astride the path of the ship of state, consigning it to a watery tomb, as he and his henchmen pull away in the lifeboats. One only hopes the President sees the signs and heeds the warnings, and steers us away from certain doom, for Speaker of the House Boehner is most assuredly not up to the task of leading. Let him and his motley crew be rounded up and set adrift on their own, to bother us no more.