I'm a Pro at Crastination

 As I sit here on a Friday morning watching Thursday Night Football a phenomenon comes to mind that I believe does not receive its proper attention. I believe this partly because now that I am past the years when I had the physical capacity to participate in most sports, I think there should be new ones. Not to say we need to invent new ones, I just think things we already do should be viewed as sport. To give you an example of one at which I believe I have surpassed amateur standing, let's talk about crastination. Forget about amateur crastination, I want to talk about professional crastination. There oughta be a league!

Using myself and today as a tailor-made example, I see plenty of resorts lined up for this day before I get to my last one, the pile of marking I have to do. And if I may wax metaphorical, I look at the floor and I see it needs sweeping, while my guitar gently weeps. I look at my bed and I see it needs sleeping, while my guitar gently weeps. I look at my house and I see it needs keeping, still my guitar gently weeps. I look at my thoughts and I see they need... deep'ning? Yes and still my guitar gently weeps. 

I'm pretty sure my guitar's gonna be gently weeping all day today. I'll do up the dishes, probably throw on a load of laundry, sweep the floor, maybe even wash it, dust, I've been meaning to try a new broccoli and chicken casserole, that'll require a trip to the market for supplies, and hey, just got a letter from Mom, maybe that means Korea Post is cooperating with Canada Post again and I can write her back. But things like these "first resorts" would only qualify as amateur crastinating. I can do better than that. As a pro, I have plenty of second resorts, third resorts, and even beyond that could be applied before arriving at my last resort, my work that needs to be done.  

It's been a while since I've done maintenance on my computer. Also, staying with technology, I have to find out the password for my NON 5G wifi so I can use it on my new 4G phone instead of only using data. My computer and my old phone use the 5G, for which I know the password. And while I'm at it, I COULD go to a Samsung maintenance center and just get a new battery and get my sim card, along with all of my phone information, put back onto the old phone since the new phone can't do a lot of the things my old phone could. And, of course, this would require answering all the emergency messages from all of my regular websites telling me that there was a sign in from a new device, and changing, and recording the changes of, every password that must be changed. Then I'd have to write down, and promptly misplace, all of the new passwords. Afterwards, I'd try, and undoubtedly fail, to return the cheap-ass, low quality, probable knock-off of a phone I bought for what seemed like a fantastically low price. And since I bought my phone in Pyeongtaek, and since I also visited a doctor in Pyeontaek for pinkeye, twice, and got medicine, twice, that didn't work, twice, I could go in for round three. That's been making sleeping and waking up a bit harder and messier for a few months now. 7 different eye drops and 5 kinds of pills and it's hanging in there!

I could go into Seoul, the place I do my banking because they have a special place for foreigner banking that offers tellers who speak English well. My new credit card isn't working and I'm getting messages from the credit card company, in Korean, that I can't understand. I KNOW I COULD put them into Google Translate, but that is one of the many things my crappy new phone can't do. The reason I want to do this is because the chair I have, that I am sitting on now, is hard on my lower back and since I am working from home and using it an awful lot, I really want to get a good computer chair. One MADE for long-term use. Like a gamer chair. The best place to get something like that in Korea is online. But my card doesn't work. To make matters more of an ordeal, cuz that's the way she goes, my card is fine. It's just a complicated card certification and registration process that most sites in Korea require for credit card usage, and I am nowhere near proficient enough in the Korean language to tackle that. So I could go all the way to Seoul to get the bank teller to do all that for me. I could also study Korean, but that would probably qualify as a second to last resort. 

While in Seoul, I could get some dental work done. Or maybe a massage. Might help my sore back. I'll definitely visit the foreign food stores and probably have a beer at some regular places with the regulars at those places. My shoes are wearing out too so I probably should go to some areas, and they are by NO means easy to find for a guy with wide feet like mine, where they sell shoes made for non-Korean sized feet. 

Friends could be visited, sights could be seen, trips could be taken. For a pro, Covid shouldn't limit that crastination much. 

Orrrrr... I could write a long blog post, leaving all that constructive crastination undone like the consummate professional I am. And now for the highly strained segue into the topics I am following that necessitated a chest-unburdening blogpost today, I've noticed some other pro crastination that might not be viewed as such. 

While I am right behind the American drive to oust the current president and replace him with almost anyone, and, make no mistake, I see Joe Biden as fully fitting the bill of "almost anyone," I have concerns. My concerns are the same ones I've had for Canadian politics and world politics since the time, somewhere late in my university days, I really began to understand politicking for the professional crastination it actually is. Maybe it takes a pro to recognize a pro. At least that is my seemingly negative, but in actuality, highly optimistic political point of view. Let me splain. No, is too much. Let me sum up.

There are two courses for humanity - harmony or doom. I believe, maybe against all my better judgment, and definitely against signs the world over, that we are destined for a world in which of necessity we practice principled, scrupulous, meritorious behaviour across the board. I foolishly believe that this is possible through cooperation. Maybe the best word for it I've heard is "Ubuntu."

Compare the meme above to the American teacher who used the "chocolate scramble" to illustrate savage capitalism and how it compares to refined and orderly socialism. The selfish, who want more than everyone else, and more to the point, who think they DESERVE more than everyone else, are the only disappointed students when chocolates are handed out evenly. Outside the classroom a highly concentrated form of capitalism is practiced in which people are directly and indirectly killed for the "chocolate" of the world's wealth. Yet, the fear of the far more civilized system has been fostered by politics over the years. That has, indeed, been one of its main purposes. Just say the word "socialism" and Americans, like so many Pavlovian dogs, think of Russia, China or Venezuela, countries where socialism is blamed for drastic failures. They won't think of Scandinavian countries, Canada, or even THE U.S.A., where socialist principles have succeeded. It's probably the word. Maybe Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez could get elected if they formed a new political party called the Ubuntu Party. Any state that chose them would be called a "green" state. 

Sadly, it seems that in countries with the most wealth, greed is more prevalent, and politics, with its primary purpose of protecting the opulent classes and thereby legislating division, is an impediment to our international evolution. Regardless of whether we have the monstrous leadership of Trump, or the monstrous-light leadership of anyone else, the problem is the system. Voting is supporting the system, thereby perpetuating it and keeping us from doing what we should be doing. Voting IS professional crastination. And what I see coming in a couple of weeks is something that may have been cleverly planned for years for all we know. Trump will be crushed and America will give the credit to the vote, something that had been evolving out, and rightfully so. 

Is it possible that after Americans suffered through the presidency of Bush the younger, who they didn't vote in, and a long string of disappointing leaders before that who did so little of what they'd promised, that the whole country was losing faith in their "democracy" and their votes? And, as you can tell from my quotation marks, I think they were right. In the past 4 elections, voter turnout has been around 55%. Or at least, that's what we're told. No possible way of verifying that, but let's move on. No matter how that was divided between the ruling parties, let's say 27.5% Republican and 27.5% Democrat, if just two thirds of the 45% of non-voters decided on ANY third party, like the Ubuntu Party, or worse, some wildly popular private interest party, the Chinese American party or the Marijuana Smokers of America Party for instance, that party would have a great chance to win! And that is absolute disaster for the politicians from the two parties who've ruled the U.S. for so long. Why do you think the Chinese Communist Party puts people in jail for practicing Falun Gong? It's too popular. And for that matter, why do you think so many Chinese people are living in Canada? Watch out for the Chinese Party of Canada. I'm not kidding!

So would it be absurd to suspect that the Dems and Republicans collaborated to save their careers? They needed to re-establish faith in the vote (and while at it, maybe have a villainous presidency during which many of the bills the opulent class paid so much money to be turned into laws are hammered through) so wouldn't it be a good compromise to let the GOP have 4 years of Trump's shoring up of all the corporate legislation and tax breaks and whatnot, while in exchange creating heroes of the mediocre at best Democratic reps that will follow, all while re-legitimizing the vote and the fake democracy that postpones the evolution of America into the proper democracy the majority has longed for since the country's inception?

How many people on the supreme court? Nine. Did you know that Trump, a president who received a reported (and again there's really no way we should believe this) 46.1% of the popular vote, and again that's of the 55% who voted, so that means 25.3% of the voters in the U.S., has put 3 of them there? Let's assume quite accurately that all three of them will do exactly what he wants, with a quarter of the actual U.S. voters' support, he's now got a third of every supreme court decision... for LIFE!

To make matters worse, here's what I think happened: Bernie Sanders supporters, who really WERE the deserving winners of the DNC vote and probably the presidency in 2016, got pissed off when Bernie got shafted by the Democratic party, a party that proved their NON-democratic nature by overlooking the clear favourite for their party leadership and using "SUPERcandidates" to try to force (gender equality?) a woman into the Whitehouse. So many of the angry Bernie supporters either didn't vote, or gave their mutinous party a big fuck you by voting for Trump, who, come on, let's face it, has no possible chance of winning. This and probably a little Russian interference won the day for Trump. Or, didn't, but with the electoral college...

Even though this year Bernie AGAIN was the true Democratic rep, he got shafted again all because of the national blind spot when it comes to this scary word, socialism, and Biden won't do as well as Bernie would have, the same thing won't happen again and Biden will still win. And still, in my opinion, in a crushing landslide. But all this will do is postpone the proper trajectory of American politics further. I think the time has come to vote on ideas, not people.

Now immediately, like so many Pavlovian dogs, people will jump to the proper arguments: "Why, that's just not cost-effective." "Not everybody will be represented and that's CLEARLY not a problem with the current system. ahem." "It's logistically not possible!" Ummm yes, it is, yes, it is, and yes, it is. Again, all of these arguments were established long ago to protect the prime objective of politics: to maintain the rule of the opulent class. But all of these arguments have been rendered spurious by technology. 

Let me ask you this: If the election is challenged, and it will be, no matter how big a landslide, and the decision reaches the supreme court, which by then will have 3 Bushes, 2 Obamas, a Clinton and 3 Trumps, what do you think will happen? Let me also ask you, given the mockery of democracy that supreme court stacking, not to mention house and senate stacking, super-candidates, the electoral college, massive under-representation, and perennially impotent candidates have made, what kind of a world class professional crastinator do you have to be to put off the comprehensive system reboot that is so drastically overdue? 

And don't be mislead by the above, the majority of the political decisions made that are horribly against what the majority of people in today's "democracies" would vote for, if they could, are made without the knowledge of the people upon whom those decisions have the greatest effect.  

This pro crastination is extended year after year by a small number of filthy rich scumbags who just want it to continue until they have claimed all of the resources of the world for themselves... at the vast expense and most likely the demise of the rest of mankind and possibly even the planet. 

Don't get me wrong, I'm going to glory in the embarrassing defeat of that turd sandwich who is the current president, but what I'm not going to be happy about is people breaking voting records and being encouraged by what they can do with their vote when they get the better leadership of Biden/Harris in the Whitehouse. This will further put off the even stronger encouragement in what they can do with their vote if it were properly placed on issues and not highly flawed people. 

But... maybe someday the world'll get around to it. If the greedy take that long to destroy the whole world. I guess we'll see...

I told the blogger above that I'd done a similar experiment and had to access my old blog to post it for her. While doing so I got a bit nostalgic and started reading old posts. I actually found a blog entry of mine from 2006 that I think I should tack onto the end of this. Yeah, I've been blogging for 14 years! I actually DID the Hershey's Kiss experiment with my HUFS classes too and got very GOOD results meaning most weren't selfish and realized that if they worked together, they'd get unlimited Kisses. Here's the post: 

Sunday, June 11, 2006

Progress?

Okay, time for another serious entry. I've been bombarded by messages all month about this topic from all sorts of sources so that it's been on my mind constantly and I'm starting to see that almost everything relates to it. Recent news stories all have a bit of it. Recent blogs I've been reading contain it. TV shows I've been watching. Even an e-mail I got from Kasia had this little story about a wise woman.
"The Wise Woman's Stone" A wise woman who was traveling in the mountains found a precious stone in a stream. The next day she met another traveler who was hungry, and the wise woman opened her bag to share her food. The hungry traveler saw the precious stone and asked the woman to give it to him. She did so without hesitation. The traveler left, rejoicing in his good fortune. He knew the stone was worth enough to give him security for a lifetime. But a few days later he came back to return the stone to the wise woman. "I've been thinking," he said, "I know how valuable the stone is, but I give it back in the hope that you can give me something even more precious. Give me what you have within you that enabled you to give me the stone." Author Unknown
Those are ALWAYS author unknown stories! Probly because the author wasn't selfish enough to publish it for personal profit.
My topic today my little cheeky monkies is selfishness. Or really selflessness, and how the further we "progress" as a species, the further behind we leave it. And before you cast any stones, I'm thoroughly guilty of selfishness myself. I count it as my worst vice, yet am perfectly happy to try to practice selflessness passively. I'll do unto others... if the opportunity should arise.
Excuse me whilst I wax religious: The golden rule is not so much a trite tidbit of advice we should think of occasionally, but a commandment that, being golden, should be foremost in the lives of good people. I believe there is a golden rule in all religion that is pretty much the same, and indeed this is a sentiment I have found to be innate in all good people religious or not. No matter how it's said, "Do unto others as you would have done unto you." is the answer to all the world's problems. If we could all just DO it, we wouldn't need Heaven. Or for that matter, Hell. Or Nirvana or Valhalla or Enlightenment or the thousand virgin party or whatever.
I found Kasia's wise woman story to be a pretty good test of how good a person I am. And I failed miserably. If a person is able to even imagine the woman being happier to have given the stone to the man than the man at having received it, that person is well on his/her way to being good, heavenly, enlightened, or whatever. While I was reading it I was saying, "No, no, no! What kind of a jerk asks for a gem from a woman who is kind enough to offer him food? He doesn't deserve the gem!" I found myself thinking, "How phony is this? What woman would part with a valuable gem, much less give one to a stranger?" I was even guilty of thinking, "HAH! Of course it's a WOMAN who gives the MAN the stone! And a WOMAN who sent it to me! Womanly wiles! Delete, delete, delete!" I certainly am not enlightened enough to understand how the woman could be the happier of the two after giving away something so valuable. What did YOU think when you read it? More to the point, what do you suppose led you to think that way?
I was recently watching 20/20 on my beloved AFKN and there was a story of a middle school teacher in the States somewhere who did a little social experiment in her classes. She divided her students into groups and gave them a jar full of Hershey's Kisses. She gave the jar to one member of each group and told him/her to take as many as he/she wanted and to pass it on. After all members got the same chance, the number of Kisses left in the jar would be doubled and they could do it again. So if they had six Kisses left, the teacher would give them six more and they could pass the jar around again. The teacher said that none of the groups had any remaining Kisses and most groups had one or more members who got no Kisses at all. The group members were thinking less about doing unto others and more about what they would have done unto them.
Now it could be argued that if they had thought long-term and stretched it out for several rounds, they could all have several jars full of Kisses and that THIS is the more selfish thinking. I disagree. I think "get all you can NOW" is the worst kind of selfishness and that's what is killing our planet. And, with all due respect to my American buddies, I haven't heard about this test being successfully replicated in other countries around the world. But then again, maybe it could be. What has brought us to this point? And can whatever has brought us to this point be accurately called "progress"?
Anyone ever heard of Martin Frobisher? He was an English explorer who visited the arctic in Elizabethan times. He found the "savages" living there to have some very "crude" and "uncivilized" customs. For instance, they had no concept of ownership. Anyone could borrow anything from anyone else, including wives, without being expected to repay it. Frobisher's crew had a field day with this custom. They took all kinds of Inuit goods and inventions like furs, kayaks, sleighs, mukluks etc. with no concern about how well the people could survive without them. They even picked an Inuit man, kayak and all, out of the water beside the ship and brought him back to England where they GAVE him to the queen as a present. He was treated like a well loved pet. Elizabeth enjoyed watching him hunt swans on the Avon in his kayak. He eventually died, (of a COLD for crying out loud!), far away from his family and his "uncivilized" land where many of his friends and family died off due largely to inequities in trade with the British.
The other natives in Canada had no concept of ownership when white men arrived either. Over the years they sure have smartened up haven't they? While I was living in Thunder Bay about 10 years ago, my neighbour, a native guy, unlocked my bike and took it. His wife had their car. I was almost late for work when he returned with the bike. I was really mad and told him he could borrow it any time but he had to ask me first. He challenged me to a fight because he thought I was saying he had stolen it. If I wasn't late for work, I may have taken him up on the fight offer. But I didn't. I just took the bike and rode it to work. I was late. Then one night my roommate and I were having a noisy party and guess who came over to complain about US infringing on his house owner's rights?
And then there's Ann Coulter talking about how some 911 widows are complaining about government officials, police, firefighters etc. all for personal gain. It seems to me if Ann Coulter is buying up 1.5 million dollar condos and 1.8 million dollar homes, maybe she's complaining about these women for her own personal gain. If she really just wanted to get her message out; if she really believed in it; if she really wanted to be like Jesus; she wouldn't charge for the books and may even leak the stories out like the story of the woman and the stone: author unknown.
The lyrics of an old song written by Kerry Livgren of the group Kansas come to mind.
Progress! We are marching backward,
Progress! as the captains of our fate.
Progress! We are marching backward,
Progress! We destroy and annihilate.
I'd better write a letter to my Gramma, or give some money to the poor, or send my sister some wedding cash, or do something nice in complete anonymity for somebody else today. I'm gonna try to give someone a precious stone. I think that's what the signs are telling me.

And here's the Hershey's Kiss experiment post.

Toxic Positivity

"Toxic positivity." 

 I love that! I will use that term. I've been calling it the "Well-at-least" mentality. Teaching ESL in Korea it goes something like this: They take your benefits-Well at least I have my pay. They cut your pay-well at least I am not overworked. They double your workload-well at least class sizes are small. They triple class size-well at least they don't micromanage. They micromanage-well at least I still have a job. The school burns down or Covid 19 hits-well at least I can teach from home. You have to learn dozens of new technical skills and programs for no extra pay-well at least my hours will go down. Your hours go UP-well at least I have partial autonomy. They need you to account for every minute of class time or they don't get government funding-well at least I still have partial autonomy. They don't like your minute-to-minute account and change it completely-well at least I still have a job. They tell you online teaching isn't effective-well at least I can still teach with a mask on. You catch Covid anyway-well at least I can teach from my hospital bed. You die-well at least I had decent medical coverage. You didn't have decent medical coverage-well at least I'm dead and don't have to worry about it any more. They bring you back from the dead because they finally realize how desperately needed good teachers are-well at least NOW they'll surely give me a raise! They don't give you a raise because as a zombie teacher you don't have good union representation, although neither do the human teachers, let's face it-well at least I had a good dirt nap and I still get my base salary. You have to take a 25% pay cut... same reason: no zombie union-well at least the cost of brains is reasonable. The cost of brains rises as more teachers are resurrected and your pay is not indexed accordingly-well at least I can still pull in a paycheck here in Korea. The Korean government enacts a long list of zombiphobic and costly conditions, certificates and government dox needed to keep working-well at LEAST I'm not teaching ESL IN CANADA!

Some people are incorrigibly positive. But sometimes their positivity can be toxic like a positive diagnosis of Covid. So if you have any "friends" who test positive for positivity that is positively toxic, you might want to let them know. They aren't helping anyone by accentuating the positive and eliminating the negative MENTALLY. That doesn't make the negative go away. I can't tell you how many Facebook posts I've seen about how we should all just eliminate negative people and negativity from our lives. Pretend it's not there. Act as if. This is exactly the attitude the bad people of the world who create all the bad problems WANT us to adopt. Imagine Superman going to his fortress of solitude every time somebody mentioned Lex Luthor. If we're all forcing ourselves to be positive in the face of overwhelming negativity, the bad guys win.

I'd go a step further and submit that negativity is something that is not much danger to the wicked, but a good man is easily undone by just the hint of negativity. I couldn't help but notice the fly on Mike Pence's head during the vice presidential debate. It reminded me of a verse from the book he and his master, in the WH, DJ Trump are fond of holding up as their guide. Of course I'm talking about the Bible, and the Wuhan House, and Dumb Jagov Trump. 

Now, I'm not going to tell you that I'm a Bible scholar and that the verse Ecclesiastes 10:1 jumped immediately to mind. But have you ever heard the saying, "A fly in the ointment?" This verse is where that saying comes from. I think. 

An ointment or perfume or, as I found out first hand while trying to make beer with my friend Mike, a batch of home brew can be completely ruined by a tiny fly. And so can the reputation of a man that is known for wisdom and honour. These words were spoken by Solomon, a man known for wisdom and honour. He oughta know. I found some online commentary that went as follows...

"Solomon seems in these words to be prosecuting what he had said in the last clause of the preceding chapter; showing how much good one foolish action may destroy, what evil may result from it, and how a man, otherwise famed for wisdom, may thereby lose his reputation. So most interpreters understand the verse. “The wiser or better,” says Bishop Patrick, “any man is, so much the more cautious ought he to be in all his words and actions, if he mean to preserve that credit, esteem, and authority in the world, which give him great advantages for doing good. For, as dead flies, though very small creatures, falling into a pot of ointment,” and abiding and being putrified in it, “corrupt that precious composition, and turn the perfume into a stink; so doth a small error or miscarriage blemish him who was highly valued for his discretion and virtue.” And this comes to pass, partly, because all the actions, and consequently the follies of such men are most diligently observed, whereas the actions and follies of persons known to be ignorant and weak are generally disregarded; and, partly, because of that envious and malicious disposition which is in the minds of too many, and makes them quick- sighted to discover, and glad to hear, and forward to declare, the faults of such as, by their greater eminence, outshone and obscured them."

I don't need to tell anyone that people enjoy finding fault in good people. It's practically a sport for some. It has carried many a talk show from radio to TV and now to the internet. The second phenomenon is what I'd like to concentrate on and it was why this particular verse and saying came to mind for me. "The actions and follies of persons known to be ignorant and weak are generally disregarded." Again, I'll go further and say that the disregard is directly proportionate to the ignorance and weakness. 

Which brings us back to his infectious eminence Donald Trump. "I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn't lose any voters." I believe he could. His colossal ignorance and weakness has led to the spread of Covid 19 throughout the country and throughout the Whitehouse and here's the triumphant video Trumpsplaining THAT:

Believe it or not, that video above had 900 likes and 300 DISlikes when I accessed it! This is what I'm talking about, folks. The description of the "ever-upbeat" medical team, a team that seemed to have been infected with Trump's disease themselves - not the Covid, the compulsive lying, as they hyperpositively described his condition to the media; all the vigilant Trumpsters posting thumbs downs for anything on Youtube that includes negativity about their hero, true or untrue; the rally-goers and Whitehouse staff who obediently go maskless at his behest; the people who have caught Covid, possibly from HIM, distorting facts about their acquisition of Covid 19 and their condition in hopes of protecting the presidud; and most tiresome of all, the proselytizers trying to get clear-thinking people to drink the Kool-Aid they can't undrink themselves. 

This phenomenon has puzzled me among others for almost 4 years now, but I think I'm getting to the bottom of it. As mentioned before in this blog, I believe overinvestment coupled with severely unchecked and tragic pride won't allow people to admit they're wrong about Trump once they've gotten too far into the pitfalls of supporting him. I have actually said that perhaps the only exit strategy for these poor souls infected with Trump-induced hubris would be if he caught Coronavirus and died. And not long after I said that, wouldn't you know it, Trump caught the Covid! 

Now I knew there would be one of two outcomes: He'd die and open up said exit strategy for the many people entranced by his hypnotic powers, or he'd survive and convince the Trumplings to disregard the blatant stupidity which brought it on, but acknowledge the awesome power of one who could overcome the terrible virus, what, with helicopter-to-hospital service and top of the line healthcare that they are paying for, thus becoming a douchebag of epic proportion. And you know, I am starting to think it actually worked!

By far the most fascinating part of this whole anthropological spectacle is the mind-bending concept that the Trumpists exhibit when confronted with all of this. They believe, they actually believe or have bargained themselves into believing, many of them KNOWING who this shitheel of a man is, that he is the good man in the Bible verse, the ointment who can be ruined by the fly! THIS, my friends is toxic positivity on another level, and it's all around us. 

Think of the monumental task that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have on their hands. They have to overcome this! That is, they have to get people who are trapped by their own self-love, to vote for them. In other words, they have to convince these Trump tweakers to love them more than themselves! In a way it's good that America is still too scared of the word Socialism to allow Bernie Sanders to be president because if it WERE him up against Trump, Bernie, an actual GOOD person, all it would take is a little fly to ruin his campaign and Trump would win again. As it is, I don't see the ointment purity in the Democratic opposition, so it'll take a lotta flies to send forth a stinking savour. 

They may have caught a break in the debate between Trump and Biden, however. And they may have caught ANOTHER break in Trump getting hopped up on Amaze-adrill or whatever that drug is and blathering on about how great a leader he is and how the Covid was a gift from God. Regeneron. The only drug known to be promoted by a president. Oh, wait, other than hydroxychloroquine. But whether he is a drug pusher, an addict, or a snake-oil salesman, it only ADDS to his ignorance and weakness, and in turn, the general disregard for his ignorance and weakness. All Trump would have to do, as a sort of foil to the whole frequency pass, is just once say he was wrong, or weak or stupid. Then he would get an INfrequency pass! We saw signs of that when talk show slaggers and political opponents started cranking out words of support, prayers and wishes for a speedy return to good health when Trump recalcitrantly stumbled his way into a poetic case of Coronavirus. Maybe he's saving humility for a last, last, last resort? Nah, not our Trump!

If Boris Johnson were to drop an F-bomb, would it be a big deal? Really? Did any of you hear about this when it happened? But if the QUEEN were to suddenly say, "Boris Johnson is a spectacularly ignorant FUCK!"... can you imagine? There'd be books written about it! The tabloids would have a heyday! There would be collector plates sold on the Home Shopping Network and spoons immediately forged at the Royal Mint to commemorate the occasion! 

Are you understanding this? The more indecent a person is, the less we think of their indecency. It's almost like a frequency pass. I will share a particularly salient anecdote from my youth. In grade six, I went to John Knox Memorial Christian School. It was the one year I lived with my grandparents, so it was the only year of private school I ever attended. It was no better than public school, but I imagine it was more expensive. At any rate, my teacher was Mr. Koehne, pronounced Koona. You KNOW this is a true story because I could NEVER make up such a name! A name that so fantastically befit his personality and teaching style. Mr. Koehne was a disciplinarian. Mr. Koehne had coffee breath and a silver chalk holder. Mr. Koehne always wore a shirt with sweaty armpits and a tie. Mr. Koehne loved the Lord. 

The school was reputed for being strict. I remember the entrance interview I went to with my Grandmother during which the principal, I forget his name, warned, "We run a tight ship here." Probably his way of making my Grandmother think there was a chance in hell (or heaven) they'd turn down her money and not allow me to go there. That was the first time I'd ever heard that phrase. They asked if I knew what it meant and I said I did, but didn't learn until I started attending the school. 

Mr. Koehne would write your name on the board if you did anything wrong. ANYthing. Every name or number was a detention at lunch. Lunchtime was hockey time otherwise I doubt the gravitas of the ritual would have been so great. Especially in winter when we had an actual outdoor hockey rink in the school parking lot! If you did something else wrong, he'd put a number beside your name. I loved hockey so much that I don't think more than one or two times I ever had a number beside my name and even then it was never more than a two or three. But there was a guy in my class, again with the names, Jim Duck, who was a notorious bad boy. He was always at the top of the list of names on the board. Usually his offence was doing something funny, which was against the rules and presumably the will of God. I can clearly recall his number being over 50 at one point. Yet, every time he was told by Mr. Koehne that the number after his name was going to be increased by one, Jim would utter a loud, "WHAT?!" Always. One day he was doing something wrong and Mr. Koehne said, "Jim, I'm putting your name on the board." Inevitably there came a loud, "WHAT?!" Mr. Koehne increased the number by one. "WHAT?!" Another increase of one. "WHAT?!" even louder. An increase of one even larger and darker on the board. "WHAAAT?!" Mr. Koehne carved a digit on the board so vehemently that the chalk broke, but rather than bending over to pick it up, he simply depressed the top of his chalk holder and another length of chalk emerged. "WHAT?!" The faces of the other students in class were showing the pain Jim should have been feeling. Mr. Koehne added TWO to Jim's total!!! Then, one of the funniest things I think I've ever seen happened. Jim did something that elevated him to a place up at the top of the comedic hall of fame in my mind with the likes of George Carlin, Jonathan Swift, Matt Groening, David Letterman, Tom Robbins, and the Coen brothers. He silently, but with the skillful replication of a Shakespearian thespian, mouthed the word, "WHAT?!" 

Well the whole class went crazy! This encouraged Jim Duck and he threw a few MORE silent WHATS at Mr. Koehne each more hilarious than the last. Soon Mr. Koehne was writing OTHER students' names on the board for laughing at Jim Duck. I wasn't laughing, I was crying! This was one of the times I got a number beside my name and by the time the laughter and chalk dust had settled, this was also the time Jim Duck's 50 was reached. A record I doubt has yet been broken even if Mr. Koehne is still teaching at John Knox Memorial Christian School.  

I can't tell you what became of Jim Duck. I hope he's a highly paid comedian. The point of this salient anecdote was that the Friday of that week I saw Mr. Koehne talking with Jim Duck privately. The next Monday, Jim Duck's name wasn't even on the board never mind his FIFTY! The shitter was that every other student's names AND numbers remained unchanged! Jim Duck got a frequency pass and the rest of us got jack shit! In fact, the better behaved students were the ones who tended to be more closely watched and would get their names on the board for lesser offenses that Jim would get away with. I see a lot of Jim Duck in president Trump. The difference is, Trump doesn't make me laugh.

Trump pays more for sex than he does in taxes. No biggie. He spreads a new virus that he knows is deadly and has been recorded as saying as much. Ah, we'll let it slide. He has made mockeries of conflicts of interest and emoluments clauses. Well, he's special. He encourages Americans to break laws, he threatens to break presidential rules and protocol, he has an ever-growing list of associates in legal entanglements, he has committed crimes he'd be indicted for if not a sitting president and acts that he'd be impeached for... if he were not the president (ask Bill Barr about THAT masterpiece of spiralspeak!), and he's exhibited the cretinous, numbskullery that rivals the lowest of his supporters while disparaging OTHERS as "low IQ individuals." The guy has built up the biggest fudge factor, frequency pass, call it what you will, that I have EVER seen! If he publicly revealed the launch codes and locations of all the nuclear weapons in the US, or, God forbid, launched any of them, about a quarter of the population would be spinning clever webs of deceitful forgiveness at the moment we are all vapourized. Can there BE a more highly toxic positivity?

Compare all of that to Obama's tan suit. And Bernie Sanders scareword socialism. There are people who are more concerned about both of these than the Biblical plague of flies in the indefunkable Trump ointment! It's one of the most incredible things I've ever seen!

However, there IS another exit strategy for the poor fools who are enabling the presidential positivity. And we all know what that is. Although he has threatened NOT to honour the results of the election, a sort of heads I win, tails you lose strategy that his fatuous followers are sure to believe is as savvy as his business strategies of borrowing money and not repaying it, or just not paying taxes, if he loses, he's gone. He doesn't have the power to squat in the Whitehouse, he only THINKS he does. With the adulation of so many contributing to his already titanic ego, he believes he deserves not just 4 but 8 or 12 or 16 more years as president! As long as it keeps him from being Leona Helmsleyed. 

If you are an American reading this post, break the toxic positivity. Vote NO for Trump. A vote for Biden is not a YES vote. Let's not kid ourselves. Biden will not fix the US. He won't even unfuck what Trump has fucked. This is the state of affairs in the US. But he WILL be better than 4 more years of the toxic positivity presidency. And maybe Trump WILL be out of the picture in 4 years and the chance of avoiding one of his spawn from oozing into the Whitehouse will be eliminated too. Maybe after 4 years of Biden/Harris, the US will be in a position to right itself. If you've ever heard the fable of the scorpion and the frog, it will help you understand Trump. He's a scorpion. The scorpion stings the frog HALF WAY across the water killing both him and the frog. With Trump you'll just have to go down with the sinking ship. But as you do, you can bet you'll be told that it's a good thing! Or Trump will go on TV and say, "Well, it is what it is."