Democracy — Bob and Dave
Democracy has several things going for it. First, if it all goes wrong, there’s no one person to blame. It is faceless. I had this thought while having a beer and sitting in a pub here in the Midwest. The very best thing about Democracy is optimism. It assumes overall superiority.
Elected officials flinch first and change course second. Take the guy sitting at the other end of the bar; he seems a genuine red-neck Republican. But, no, seriously, they have a specific look. He’s flipping a beer mat between his fingers, thinking the Biden administration has ruined his life. He is without hope or happiness. I heard him curse, dropping the beer mat to the floor, falling out of his finger, twirling grasp. His eyes are tired and bleary, his face long and sad, his brown hair combed back, trying to cover his baldness.
I’ll call him Bob. Bob is a Trump Republican, so the Midwest bible, Trump Book of Truth, explains Biden is a crook and his son even worse.
Poor old Bob felt so alive when Trump ran the country. He thought he could leave everything in the capable hands of his presidency while he went back to watching quiz shows, Hannity, Baseball, and raising the suspension of his Ford truck.
His wife, I assume, wearing a tee-shirt with Truck Slut written on the back of it, has never heard the term bouquet of roses, looks about 27, her hair withered and damaged from too many color changes, and is now propped up in a huge bundle on top of her head. Her name is Tina; she dreams about owning a washing machine and a hairdryer, gets high on black coffee early in the morning, and generally looks like a piece of distressed furniture.
Okay, well, it looks like Bob is leaving. But wait, he’s not taking Tina! That’s weird; she’s with another guy now. Well fuck me, he looks like a democrat!
See, now I must start over. I’m just doodling but fuck it. There are, of course, big men in government, the movers, and the shakers, but you wouldn’t guess in ten rounds which ones they were. No way, you’re conditioned to accept the facts presented to you. We don’t see the lobbyists, the big boys.
I have this idea that lobbyists all went to college together where they learned how to tell the difference between the mustard and hotdog guy from the dark ring spectacle chap who takes more than a passing interest in Canapés. All three sorts will appear again in their chosen government roles.
Jesus, look at that! Tina is tonguing that Democrat’s ear. I’ll tell you why that is weird; Democrats are basically cowards. Their features are sharper than republicans, their voices higher, and they drop red cigar ash the size of Vesuvius. (That isn’t a joke to get a laugh from a republican. Republicans are generally unintelligent and less melodious, so jokes like that go over their red necks.)
Democrats are cowards because they don’t like to be seen in public, let alone have their ears tongued clean. The typical democrat wife will wear brightly printed cotton when accompanying her husband to public meetings and designer clothes on all other occasions. You can pull a democrat’s leg unmercifully, but only his judicial leg.
Watching David speak to Tina, he likes to pause, think, and answer with extreme care.
Oh hell, Bob is back. He looks pissed. You must admit that Republican men and women are happiest with a whiff of battle in their nostrils. Right or wrong doesn’t come into it. Democrats’ triumphs are short-lived.
David suggests that Russia, on paper anyway, must be a far greater threat than China will ever be. (Where the fuck did that come from? I must have missed something somewhere along the way, probably while David was getting his ear tongue fucked.)
Russia has been a pain in the butt of Democratic countries for many years. However, the new threat is significant, if only because they possess nuclear weapons that can reach the west coast of America tomorrow.
Bob is quite indifferent. Russia always gets a bad rap, in his opinion. Russia and the Putin guy got along famously with Trump. Ukraine isn’t worth anything to us; they’re all out of the same breadbasket anyway. Putin is only trying to put his country back together. Biden sends in billions of dollars of our taxes and is trying to fuck Putin in the ass.
Tina seems to like that argument; she’s got the palm of her right hand on the bulging crutch of Bob’s nob! But, goddam, she really is a Truck Slut.
I’m confronted by people who do nothing but suggest there is something to be proud of in our democratic government. It’s hogwash. There is a lot to be suspicious about and to be afraid of. Not least the capitalist control of government against the vote of the people.
Sitting in this bar, )at least the Guinness is cold), Bob and Dave want to control the world, clearing it of autocratic and competitive regimes in their different political styles. Their faces are infectious and confident, perhaps too sure.
I have a right to voice my displeasure and disappointment. It’s all I can do. It is tiresome to listen to people arguing about what they think is right.
Democracy inspires greed and encourages selfishness.
Our children live in a selfish and ambivalent society. We promote war, finance it, build from it, and re-arm ourselves for the next battle off our own shores. We do not encourage education, only sport. We do not manufacture less expensive medicine; we prefer to save banks.
No, I don’t want to live under a dictatorship, close as we came to that. I don’t want to live under the rule of religious leaders. But, I want countries with different perspectives to be allowed to choose their destiny.
And for western democracies to support that choice.
We must accept that Bob and David are leaders now…not the Islamic empires, not the Asian tyrants, not the communist dictators. Bob and David are our leaders. But, unfortunately, their government doesn’t know its right arm from its left leg!
So here we stand. Trying to ensure growth in the body bag industry.
Don’t you love capitalism?
Ha, there goes Bob and David, still rattling on. Tina looks lonely.
“Hello, can I buy you a drink?”
“Sure.”
“Can I ask what you do. I saw you with those two guys and wondered.”
“I’m a lobbyist,” she said.