Taking a Deep (Cleansing) Breath

I was a bit depressed last night, after having checked in on the three local newscasts to see what they had to say about Bannon's creep into South Carolina last night.  It is not so much what they said, but the fact that he was here, infecting our air and our youth, that had me down.  There was a great peaceful protest, and it was well-covered by the media.  But still.

And then I woke up.  The sun was shining bright and the air was crisper than I like it, and clear.  And I realized what had been wrong about my assessment of last night's events.

Bannon wasn't talking about taking back the country anymore, so much as taking back the republican party.  It was young, naive republicans that had invited him to speak.  In light of the Women's Movement, Indivisible, and Tuesday's election results, they are worried.  They are worried about their identity and their place.  They are so worried that they are turning to the loudest voice in the room for the answer.  We should be glad about that.

Remember Karl Rove?  Otherwise known as "Bush's Brain?"  Wasn't so long ago that he had us cowering in fear of his power.  True, they did horrible things to our democracy while in power, but these days we are seeing Bush as a softer, gentler version of Trump, someone who could be stupid but laugh at himself as well.  And Rove?  Rove is one of the vocal anti-Trumpers.  And Bush junior and senior supported Hillary.  Who could have seen that coming?

So we all need to calm down.  If one of Bannon's goals is to scare the shit out of his -- and I do mean "his" -- opponents, he is doing it in an attempt to ward off failure, not merely to assure success.  More than Rove to Bush, Bannon is Trump's alter ego, the guy in control that has a brain.  But, as did Rove, he has become so entangled in the need for his own victory that he is going to fail to see what will turn Americans against him.  He is going to make faulty assumptions about his infallibility, and he is going to assume that Americans care more about him than about ourselves, our families, and the future of our democracy.

He is going to assume that we are all stupid, and willing to be led.  But he is wrong.

In the light of day, it is indeed comical to reflect on the republican patsies who are running for governor showing up last night for the purpose of seeking his favor.  It was sad to see our young republicans looking to him for solutions.  But make no mistake:  if they do buy Bannon's sales pitch, they may in fact take back the republican party, but Americans will walk away, in droves.

Tuesdays victories across the country proved that the majority of Americans reject hate.  We are not so terrified of change that we will sign on to harm innocents because they are different than us.

The Women's March said it all.  We are all in this together, and united we do not need to be afraid.  We come together for each of us, and coming together we will defend American values.

The counter-protesters in Charlottesville tell that story as well.  There are more of us than there are of Bannon's paranoid haters.  We will show up.  And our power will be in our numbers, and our message.  Eight weeks after the initial rally, there was a second rally.  Forty white nationalists showed up, stayed for ten minutes, and went home.

So let us all be proud of our power, and our purpose.  Keep showing up.  And continue to stand together.

Education - Corporate America's Biggest Victory

Ted Cruz is coming to town tomorrow.  He's going to be speaking at the 8th Annual Free Enterprise Foundation Dinner.  If that's not enough to get you to drop what you're doing and head out to the Citadel, Rick Santorum is also going to be there.  And Nikki Haley will be smiling her Miss Right-Wing South Carolina smile, soaking in the publicity.

To my astonishment, the Free Enterprise Foundation is tax-deductible.  As far as I can tell, they get away with this by pretending they are educational, as opposed to indoctrinational.  And I'm not just saying that based on the number of times they use the word "freedom."  Although if you click on the button called "Freedomville" on their website, it offers to take you to their "Financial Literacy Curriculum."

Except that when I tried to get to Freedomville I got an error message.

And more mysterious, there is no Free Enterprise Foundation listed on Wikipedia.

If not for the Washington Post article about tomorrow's big dinner, I would have no idea that they are brought to us by Americans for Prosperity and Citizens United.  Now, Americans for Prosperity calls itself an "organization of grassroots leaders," the leader of which is that old grassroots guy, David Koch, seen not too long ago on the board of Boston's PBS station, WGBH.  Apparently, if you can't kill public broadcasting, you just buy a position on the board.

This bizarre situation that finds David Koch running PBS, is I suppose the other reason these folks are allowed to be considered non-partisan, tax-exempt, and grassroots --  because they claim to be educational.  In fact, this Free Enterprise Foundation is not only based at The Citadel, but:

We have a close working relationship with faculty at the Citadel, the College of Charleston, and the Medical University of South Carolina.

Are we outraged yet?  Where are those liberal attorneys who can pore through reams of legal documents and confront these partisan corporate critters?  Are we so under the thumb of the Kochs and groups like this and the American Enterprise Institute that we will let them lay claim to Charleston's proud educational institutions?

Close working relationship with faculty???

Well, that does it.  You won't find me at the fundraiser tomorrow night.  I'll just be here at home crying into a beer and wondering how we in Charleston have so easily sold out our institutions of learning.