30 May 2020
Yesterday I turned Facebook off and left it off all day. I disappeared from social media from breakfast until after midnight. I had to. The waves of bad news just overwhelmed me. I needed some air.
Turing off the “stream” really didn’t make a difference. All through the day my news junkie son would bring me tidbits of what was going on. Exasperated he came to lunch saying, “They are flying predator drones over Minneapolis.” Seemed odd but I did not press the point. After lunch I fact checked it. Yes, indeed they were flying a predator drone (singular) over the city. The sources implied it was probably from the Customs folks but the news sources were careful not to state the drone’s origin as fact. Drones being used over American cities, just wow.
Off and on my son brought me numbers of people involved in the protests, and events that had occurred. Some of them seemed far-fetched. But each time I checked the facts he recounted were true. When he came to me with news the police were shooting reporters with rubber bullets, I was totally skeptical. Sure enough, one news team had come under fire with rubber bullets. When the looting starts, the shooting starts indeed.The free press has been marginalized with those who oppose the truth coming out with the rubric "fake news". But the arrest of the CNN crew and this show a far more troubling state of affairs.
Watching this unfold, I personally believe America is at a crossroads, a tipping point if you would. A dangerous disease is threatening us all, but especially the old. Black and brown Americans are being subjected to economic injustice and a system of legal machinery that is brutal, unresponsive and thoroughly not subject to being held to account. The world in which American stands has become much more unstable and we are distancing ourselves from any role of moral leadership. We have leaders incapable of empathy or of taking into account the needs of all Americans. Our President is incapable of admitting a mistake or saying he is sorry.
The riots, and that is what they are, we are seeing are not just about one man killed in one Midwestern city. What is occurring is the result of years of marginalization of large parts of our population by government and corporations. Jobs have been outsourced and a shot at being middle class has disappeared for wide swaths of our people, our fellow citizens.
Local government leaders and the police have allowed the poor and disenfranchised to be lumped into a group that is something less. Something less that the white people who live in the suburbs. Something less than trustworthy. Something less that a citizen equal under the law. Doing these things has ignited a fire that has been smoldering for a time but we are at a point where a hell of a conflagration could erupt, just like in did in 1968.
So, what do we do? I don’t know. I think a radical change in leadership is called for, but I am not really sure either of the major parties is really equipped to deal with what must be done. Corporations must be held to account. The outsourcing of jobs to Bangladesh and Mexico must end. Monopolies and near monopolies must be broken up. Lobbyists need to be kicked to the curb. Real educational reform must happen to ensure people have an equal chance at the start of their lives. The ranks of the police must be purged of white nationalists and overly violent officers. We need to purge the corrupting and curdling influence of social media on our politics. We need to fight the cyberattacks on our way of life from China, Russia and North Korea. The laundry list is long and we need real leaders, real statespersons to get the job done. The leader of the Senate and the occupant of the White House are not those people.
What we cannot do is look away. America is looking into the abyss. We are facing the unravelling of our democracy. If our leaders are incapable of taking charge, well we have to live the life of Americans who believe in equality and justice for all. One life lost can change the world, and we might be facing just such a change.
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