Do you remember when I was talking about the feeling of …hopelessness following the end of the Olympics? I kind of feel the same now that the election is over: it’s like waking up in the morning and forcing yourself to look for real news-- other things that will captivate your interest, that can fill this wide gap--in other words, the new situation has the potential to unsettle us completely and for sure it has done it to me!
For the last two years we knew what the main topic was; we even knew how to rewrap the same “arguments” and sell them as something new: people would brook no serious questions (unless it had to do with the wrapping paper…). We could also have those …idyllic moments while talking with friends of the opposite party, when everybody supposedly agreed on the things that need to be done for the good of the country and after not too long, the conversation would naturally drift to sports (and women) and everybody would leave the table or living room satisfied and proud to be American!
And I’m sure this feeling of emptiness is shared by all “mainstream,” commercially-oriented TV “pundits” who in their sprint towards the finishing line of this past election exhausted the limits of what could be said within the safety that the condom of our political correctness …amply provides. They could talk for months on end without saying anything, or anything different for that matter, and feel great about themselves and their service to the country, which happily coupled with the service to their pockets, making the experience fulfilling in more than one ways!
Yes, they feel the same, as I feel, although for entirely different reasons. I expected nothing serious to come out of the whole thing, so I have come to appreciate mainly the artistic aspect of the process: the theatre, the drama and yes, the precious comedy that you can extract from the most solemn moments of this bisexual--bipartisan I meant to say--play. The understanding which ensures that no matters of utmost importance will be touched and if they do, it will be by mistake or by default, is what guarantees the theatricality of this magnificently staged operation. In other words, you know it’s a play and a dull one, but you hope for a surprise every now and then.
In the “pundits’” case, the feeling of void in their midst is due to the fact that they rightly sense their raison d’etre missing: it’s sort of an existential problem which cannot be solved through the mind-boggling exercises in philosophy or even religion beliefs. Besides, it takes really intelligent people to be able to torture themselves that way and yet be sober when dealing with life’s mundane things as if nothing had happened. Those are the exceptional, maybe, the rest is just the …exception!
So, in order for these “pundits” to be able to live in the post election period they had to come up with a stratagem that would allow them and the rest of the country to be on a permanent election alert! (It’s somehow the same concept of terrorism alert Bush employed so effectively for almost eight years). After all, maybe this is the new idea of democracy in the making so that it keeps herself alive - but no kicking - even if that means through life-support devices which in this case are the media. So the army of experts and commentators have already started talking about the 2016 contest and thrown possible candidates left and right, winking and nodding with the air of somebody who has inside information and gives the public a great service by sharing it.
Listening to those people, you come to believe that 2016 is already here, which doesn’t excite me to the least, in fact it makes me feel much older already and there are so many things that I haven’t done! And even worse for my state of mental health, the main thing that takes me out of this trance is looking at my bills, which clearly state what date they need to be paid! It’s such a relief! It makes me feel grateful to my debtors, in fact I even thought of paying them something extra for this therapeutic service, they certainly deserve it! Our bills make sure we stay real and in the present course of things, otherwise the future that will absorb us is some kind of an invisible vacuum the only way out of which will be rejection in a eschatological or excremental way! If you don’t believe me, take a look at Rush Limbaugh…
Speaking of shit, let me explain that the modern Greek word of excrement, “skata”, derives from the word “eschatology” which itself signifies the very end of a process. I’m not giving you this explanation as a metaphorical take of mine on the result of this artificially prolonged election extravaganza. In fact, it’s the best outcome our state of democracy could produce, in my humble opinion, given the abuse on processed arguments from both sides of the aisle that have left her (our Democracy, I mean) in a permanent state of indigestion.
What I want to say is that our experts and specialists have exhausted the humanly-possible limits of talking about the very, narrowly-scoped same things, and as a result they can only come up with …eschatology and by that shit is to be understood! They can’t offer anything else at this point, whatever nutrients were there have been absorbed long time ago so what’s left is …skata!
This is what they are serving us abundantly and this is what we are asked to consume with renewed interest, pretending it’s fresh cake just out of the oven. And it is up to us, once more, to lift the …gauntlet and either keep playing this game by pretending that shit is food for thought or wipe our ass with it and throw it back as a counter argument! Which lead us to another problem: our shit will be called as it is by them, while theirs will still be offered as political wisdom! And since they are the de facto arbitrators of what is and what is not, we are going to loose the battle of shit, besides their capacity to shit on us, is unlimited!
Once more I realize that there is no way out of my line of arguments, and at this point, when the post election void-trauma is still fresh, I’d rather keep it low and get ready for the …Holidays! Thanksgiving is in the offing and before you notice it so is Christmas. And the moment New Year’s is over, you know Easter is approaching fast. Indeed, there are other things in life besides the election and unlike the latter, they really occur on a yearly basis!
P.S. I don't know if I should appreciate it or be pissed about it, but it's amazing that people with whom I haven't talked for a long time, even for years, found a way to reach me and ask about my well being after the hurricane Sandy. What's worse? It took me years and consistent effort to fool myself into believing they didn't exist!!!
DEMETRIOS RHOMPOTIS
