Anti-Americanism
I've been accused of being Anti-American by a few commenters on my blog and I'd not really paid it much mind until last night when I realized that I don't like the Democrats any more than I like the Republicans - which I guess kind of DOES make me Anti-American.
I mean, this whole healthcare issue down south and the recent partisan attacks on the messenger (in this case the Frosst family and their 12 year old son) has made me wonder why the hell Americans don't have publicly funded universally accessible healthcare just like we do here in Canada. Afterall, it's not as if the Democrats haven't ever been in power to bring in some kind of sensible system, either.
I dunno. There's something so cowardly about politics down south where everybody is so terrified to not appear patriotic enough or faithful enough that it really kind of makes me sick. It's like being next door to a big stupid powerful country of hypocritical idiots. If Obama caves and wears that gawddamned American flag lapel pin to shut up those idiots on their retarded nooze shows, I swear - I'm going put myself on a no-fly list just so I can never visit their numbskull country and witness firsthand their drooling moronism.
And maybe it's my imagination and maybe it's not but I'm pretty sure having Stephen Harper and his New Conservative Government running Canada has made me Anti-Canadian as well. I mean, sure he's doing by stealth and not overtly (ala Bush Inc.) what any clever Christian Evangelical (I know, I know - that's an oxymoron) would do if Thomas Flanagan, rightwing socially conservative politico and author, can be believed. He's pretending to not be a Christian Evangelical while slowly but surely putting into place all those things Christian Evangelicals love - which is all things Christian Evangelical and faith-based and religious rightish and really gawdforsakenly stupid and awful for civilized humanists like me.
Think back to the recent Provincial Election in Ontario, too. I mean, faith-based education funding was THE issue of the 2007 campaign?! And look at all that negative advertising it engendered - as if we had descended to the level of Americans on account of it's all about religion with us now, too - or, at least, with our dumbassed altar boy goody twoshoes politicians.
But that's just it, isn't it. Look at our politicians. Stephen Harper's political grassroots are shared by those frothing lunatics out in Alberta once led further into the wilderness by Preston Manning and Stockwell Day with the added hideousness of rightwing think tanks and dead-eyed accountancy on top.
And I'll be damned if I didn't hear an entirely believable rumour the other day that McGuinty's wife is a member of Opus Dei - THE most whacked out group of freakin' nutbars on the friggin' planet.
My only hope that the rumour is false is that I can't imagine they allow women in Opus Dei - do they?
Anyway, my point is that no one stood up during the campaign and said, "Fuck religion - this is politics!" did they? And yet it would have been the right thing to do. Religion has no place in education and it certainly has no place in politics and yet down south - that's all politics is - it's religion and gawd forbid you should campaign to take all that kooky Kreationism out of the Kurriculum or risk getting lynched by a wild-eyed mob of moral majority thugs.
In any case, the fact that Americans don't have publicly funded healthcare is their own fault. Their politics is so craven and cowardly that no one dares go there for whatever reason and I can't see that they have anyone to blame but themselves. It's really a kind of collective insanity, I think. So yeah, I'm Anti-American, not proud of it, really - just clear-eyed about it. I mean, what's to be Pro-American about? That what they most revere, patriotism and faith, are based on fear and more fear? That they engage in wars on terror anywhere but at home? That they can't get it together to look after each other when they're sick? That their politicians have to have gay sex in public washrooms? That they think it's fair game to attack the messenger of their fucked up stupid political system - even if he's a 12 year old accident victim?
Anyway, I would think all is lost, but here's something a little cheering with regards to the Frossts (because where the lord giveth in globs of ignorance to most Americans he taketh a little away so a few balance out to decent):
TimeHealsAllWounds,EvenSelf-InflictedOnes
And I suppose there's always hope that Obama WON'T wear the American flag lapel pin and closer to home we will realize that, in spite of himself, Thomas Flanagan is telling us who Stephen Harper really is and why we should be very afraid. The book is called, "Behind the Scenes in the Conservative Rise to Power" and although it's not intended as such, it's quite the horror story. Don't buy it, please. I'm Anti-Right to the max and boycotting any and all products and people that have anything to do with it.
