State of My Union

I don't need theater

The “State of the Union” is now nothing but an awards show, it is appropriate it takes place right around the Oscars. Our elected leaders preen as if on the red carpet. The Party in power gloats openly, viscerally, an air of superiority extending around them in all directions. At the height of human phoniness something happens to the face, it freezes in places that steals the very soul from the eyes. The eyes deaden, become leaden and unfocused, they stare out in an odd way. As if the shell still remains while the human has departed. Pretty much everyone in the room has this visage.

It is all theater.

The party out of power sits on their hands, scowls, and looks somber. As if in the middle of one party’s celebration a funeral has just broken out. Craven weak men line the aisle where the President strides, attempting to “draft” on his popularity the way a teammate lines up behind the leader in NASCAR, hoping against hope that somewhere a camera is focused upon him shaking the Presidents hand, as if he is an “insider”, on a first name basis with the most powerful man in the known world. The man prays that somewhere in down state Illinois newspapers will run a photo front page. “Our man” is tight with “The man”.

The lies are pervasive and go on, and on. No claims go challenged. Later, talking heads will refute this statement, or that proclamation, but by then everyone has tuned out. Only the die hard political junkies have hung around by then, and they are all seeking confirmation bias.

If you want to know who the weakest of the entire electorate is, just pick out the most partisan pundits on television, then see what political junkies tune into see them after the big show. These political junkies are the weakest of the weak, the very same ones who elected Mr. weak at the rope line shaking the Big man’s hand, because they are watching to make sure they get the talking points right at work, on Twitter, Facebook, and Tik Tok. The worst thing you can do in the group chat is to have the wrong take on a part of the speech from the top man in your party. You’ll be pilloried, and who wants to be pilloried when all you want to be is “informed” and popular?

We live in a strange world where those that pretend for a living and vie for a little golden statue lust for power, but instead get fame and fortune. Those that vie for power and a big title in Washington, DC have all the power but lust for fame and fortune. How appropriate that both “awards shows” take place at the same time.

Both creatures are kindred spirits. And both are so very great at pretending. One pretends to be someone else on film, while the other pretends to be someone else in real life, someone who actually cares about the American People. No wonder we live in a world where Hollywood and Washington, DC have become conjoined.

Both creatures can live in a world of “frozen face” and pretend to see a soul.

I picked up the phone this morning, I picked up the computer. I didn’t watch the big show last evening as first, I know it is all manure. As the farmer says, “I don’t need a man on TV to tell me it is raining outside my window”.

And second, in returning from Ireland, I got hit with the triple whammy of airplane food poisoning, dysentery, dehydration, combined with being messed up with the time change to the extent I was bedridden right through it all. Pretty much the same feeling I would have had if you had forced me to watch the “manure show”.

But the reality is I know my “State of the Union”. Prices are out-of-control. The grocery bill has become a burden, travel is more expensive than ever if you want to stay anywhere nice, and we are all now forced to make value decisions where we never have before. Around three you think “it’d be nice to get out tonight, get a cocktail, maybe an app”. Then your mind goes to work.

A glass of wine at a bar is now $ 18, a beer is now $ 8. Appetizers are now in the $ 20 range. A couple of apps, two drinks each, a twenty percent tip and wham!, hand over a buck-twenty. For a one hour “happy hour” visit at the local tiki bar.

Hey, look at that, there is an $ 8 pack of ravioli in the fridge and we have a $ 5 jar of sauce. We’ll uncork a cheap bottle of wine from the little wine fridge and stay home for about $ 30. When the economy forces you to make decisions you don’t want to make it builds a resentment. Against whatever party is in power. Inflation is a very real enemy.

I don’t appreciate it when reality tells me I have to eat cheap pasta when I want the lamb chop app and an ice cold Stella or two. And right now that is the “State of My Union”.

And I am betting it is yours too. We are all living parallel lives.

So I am paying no attention to the theater coming out of DC, anymore than I will the Oscars coming out of tinseltown this week. Sorry but I simply cannot take anyone serious who even mentions a movie about a little girl’s toy and speaks about it in some serious tone. These people have allowed themselves to become piffle. Marshmallows have a stronger spine. The great art of motion pictures can speak to the soul, but not in comic book and toy movies.

To achieve meaningful narrative requires gravitas that Hollywood lacks today in the same way Washington, DC lacks a spine.

I live in reality, not in the theater. And I am well aware of my reality, this is no motion picture. No one will show up at my door with any awards.

I didn’t need to watch last night to understand the State of the Union. Reality has made me well aware.