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“…and in the darkness bind them.”

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The tolling bell you hear is the slowly swinging pendulum sounding the death knell of the Democratic party. I was concerned this outcome would come to pass, and it is coming. I’m no Democrat, but I understand that this government is built on a foundation of two parties in opposition, performing the expected checks and balances on one another. And Democrats seem to have disappeared from the landscape.

When there is only one party, they can turn off the spigot of information, legislate in the dark, and shut down all avenues of debate over government policy. And that’s what the Republicans are doing. Want to complain to Sen. Deb Fischer or Sen. Ben Sasse about the Senate health care bill? Why? You don’t know what’s in it, and neither do they. We have reached the point where, in a room full of citizens and their elected Congressional representatives – who themselves are members of the ruling party –  there is still nobody in the room with the ability to influence government policy.

If no other truism about Americans is reliable anymore, the “winners win” mantra of the pro sports/corporate/suburban/white/government classes remains a bellwether, a rock solid institution of the American psyche that makes us all kin to Alabama football fans. Winners win, and losers lose, and any other value judgment you care to apply is – sorry – irrelevant. This is also one of the very few things the president knows – he knows that by and large, Americans abhor an ethical, morally conscious loser who loses more than they are bothered by the unethical, immoral winner who wins. Trump himself is the poster boy for this American institution. We all know he’s unethical, dishonest, immoral, etc. He knows nothing about government, or frankly anything else. But he was elected president because he projected a winner’s persona and smeared everyone else with his favorite label for everyone who’s not named Trump – loser.

Thus the more Democrats lose, and the more they point impotent fingers at one another for losing, and the more Republicans win on an agenda of intolerance, race hatred, misogyny, corporate greed, xenophobia, white power, and all the rest, the more the idea gets cemented in sparsely-informed American minds that Republicans are on the winning side of these class warfare issues. Trump’s deplorable positions on everything – women’s rights, immigrants, NATO, the “Wall”, free trade, police and government corruption, government transparency and ethics, voting rights, the environment, energy policy, tax policy, health care – these become the winning positions.

I’ve never believed that people in general are “good at heart” – many are, but you only have to study recent history (or just go to a Trump rally) to learn that many are not. Let’s be real – many people are self-centered, vindictive and hateful. Such people see a friend in Trump, who nurtured and shaped their inchoate paranoia and rage into hatred of HIS enemies. History also teaches that good people who find themselves in a society experiencing rising intolerance, fascism, nationalism, widespread corruption – once it gets going they don’t necessarily have the means to stop it from happening. Because the people who are not good at heart (but who ARE in power) quickly render the democratic institutions that could stop their insurgency inert. Meanwhile, they repeatedly bring into question the very nature of law and order, and of facts themselves, until literally everything comes down to a matter of opinion. Sound familiar? Russia provides a great example. We were warned by a number of Russians that they too felt like Putin’s election was just a phase, a hiccup, that the country would “right itself” before he was able to transform a fledgling democracy into a standard-issue dictatorship. They were wrong. (Just last week literally millions of Russians risked their liberty by participating in an illegal Anti-Corruption march. The effect, apart from coverage by the foreign press and many arrests, was absolutely null.) And we are wrong if we think Trump and his eager GOP army of polite, smiling fascists will be kind to our beleaguered republic. Putin did his best to install Trump because he gambled it would help destabilize our delicate democratic balance of power (not because he’s a friend of Trump). Boy did he hit the jackpot.

If you don’t see it now you may one day, when you’re looking down the barrel of an Authorized Unruly Citizen Execution device, thinking “this can’t happen” to white, law-abiding me. But it happens nearly every day, right now, to people of color – just recently in Omaha, in fact, though the murder weapon was a taser rather than a pistol. These people of color – like the Native Americans at Standing Rock, like the people at every anti-Trump protest who find themselves being pummeled with rubber bullets and arrested for “rioting”  – these are the test subjects. Jeff Sessions is in Washington actively encouraging more police departments to engage in such tests by publicly announcing that he is abandoning all Justice Department investigations into civil rights abuses by local police forces (and will initiate no new investigations), while he and Trump quietly remove the legal safeguards of civil rights policy reform enacted over the last eight years. And I believe that eventually, just like the civil rights workers who were wantonly murdered in the American South in the 1960s, white folks who persist in exposing these police murders for what they are in the 2000s are likely to find that same target on their chests.

(In fact, 53 years ago today, on June 21 ,1964, civil rights workers James Earl Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Henry Schwerner were arrested by a Mississippi deputy sheriff for speeding. They were released into the hands of Klansmen who had plotted their murders. They were shot, and their bodies were buried in an earthen dam. Recall that Jeff Sessions has testified much more recently that he was “OK” with the Klan until he learned they used illegal drugs.)

The irony is that true leaders in some of the police forces under investigation (Philadelphia, Chicago) were welcoming of federal guidance and federal prosecution of bad officers. They offered that it’s difficult to change police culture from within or prosecute bad actors locally because of the “old guard” and “blue wall” mentalities that can be generated in tight-knit police departments, not to mention local tax/funding issues quashing internally-driven improvements. But Sessions doesn’t want more humane police. He actually wants them to get “tougher” on us, if that’s even possible given that the police are murdering people every week.

I don’t enjoy reaching these conclusions. But given the facts, I can’t see my way to any other, rosier ones. Back in August – November 2016, I implored every forward-thinking person I know (and even some backward-thinking persons) to stop Trump. Quit complaining about Hillary and the DNC, and STOP TRUMP. Not stopping him, to my mind then, would be a signal to the country and to the world that the man represents what we are, and who we are. Not stopping him is the equivalent of endorsing him. “None of the above” or a protest vote for a candidate whose name you probably won’t even remember in a year is unacceptable. Silence is assent. We have assented, we have met the Trumpers and they are effectively us, and we knew all along that the people to whom we’ve handed this power are not the type to put it to good use for the common betterment of the country and its citizens – because they have never been that type, never served and never contributed to the country. Draft-dodging Trump, tax-dodging Trump, pussy-grabbing Trump and his billionaire cabinet – not to mention Steve Bannon – have demonstrated over the course of their lives that they are interested only in enriching themselves and their families or chosen clans.  They’re in it for the money. We threw out everyone who was in it to do some good.

…And He is Us

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You know how in the thriller movies, you’ll have a disaster situation brewing because of some evil figure secretly plotting the destruction of the Western world?  Like in James Bond you have SPECTER, or with Superman you got your Lex Luthor?

In these movies the “established order” always comes around to save the day, even if it looked shaky or damaged or a little bit corrupt at the start. Because in the movies, even if they focus on a super-hero (or super spy), it’s “human values” that win in the end, even against the most powerful of evil forces. Because in our American mythology, good may suffer setbacks, but eventually – with the faith of its believers – good triumphs over evil.

But those are movies. How does that work when the ones plotting the destruction of America are also in charge of America? Who will be the “forces of good” that come to the rescue when the American people themselves have, by their votes, elected would-be  destroyers of all things good to lead the country?

In this non-movie I call “reality”, every tenet of democracy that Americans hold dear is under attack – the Constitution, the rule of law, equality under the law, civilian control of the military, national security, an independent judiciary and a free press. But those who we would call to action to defend us? Our representatives in Congress? Yeah they are also the ones attacking our freedoms, as you have guessed by now.

But it’s worse than that. The Trump administration “officials” [sic] and their toadies in Congress who are currently going ahead with their vow to “deconstruct the administrative state” also have the support of nearly half the electorate. So even though it’s plain for all to see that this administration (when not lining its pockets with taxpayer cash) is mainly about the destruction of bedrock Western ideals as espoused in the Constitution, the problem for those who see it is that about half the country refuses to look. They are too elated about “winning” – i.e., the fact that the democratic process was undermined and perverted enough in 2016 to allow a DNA sequencing error like Donald Trump and his amoral billionaire “friends” [sic] to be put “in charge” [sic] of the country.  They are too busy enjoying the tears of their vanquished “enemies” (i.e., their fellow Americans) to be concerned about what it is, actually, that their president is up to.

Resist

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Let me be crystal sparkling clear:

I have little use for partisan bickering and the “team sports” of American politics. My observations on the impending destruction of this democratic republic are not “whining” by the losing team (I’m not a Democrat). I have no personal issue with modern Republicans, only my profound disagreement with their Ayn Rand-inspired policies (that particular Russian hypocrite once praised a serial killer’s “strength of will,” you know, but ended up living on Social Security). I also find the lack of civility many in the GOP demonstrate in the political arena to be tawdry, immature, and a barrier to progress (and this goes for some Democrats too).

What I am now radicalized to fight against—yes, fight—is not “Republicans” but the white nationalist insurgency that hijacked that damaged and fractious political party in order to install a neophyte authoritarian narcissist bigot in the White House. What I am against is this same group’s acceptance—even encouragement—of a hostile foreign power inserting itself into what is supposed to be a free and fair democratic election. No matter Putin’s exact level of involvement or success, the mere fact of this blatant incursion by a global adversary, a former totalitarian state (and now a plutocracy/kleptocracy) run by an ex-KGB dictator who despises Western democracy—my God, this should be a blaring siren to highly placed officials who are entrusted to protect this society from those who seek to damage or co-opt it. But what do these incoming “leaders” and their admirers in Congress do instead? They dismiss the facts, they obfuscate, they lie, they deny, and they wait.

They are waiting for the last honorable person to leave Washington in disgust—to leave the keys of the capital city’s vault of treasures unguarded and all of us peasants unprotected by the rule of law.

What I also deplore is the normalization of bigotry, patriarchal misogyny, hate-based polices, and plutocracy run amok.

My position has nothing to do with “politics” and everything to do with fairness, freedom, truth, and honor. All of these principles are on the table now, because just enough Americans (nowhere near a majority or even a plurality, but enough) voted against them in November.

I just want to be honest about this. Clear lines are now drawn, and they have nothing to do with politics, personalities or political parties. I don’t want rebuttals or explanations or anything else from those who support lies, dishonor and infamy. I don’t want to hear from tiresome relativist cynics and closet anarchists about how politicians are “all the same” or “there’s nothing anyone can do” or any such self-deluding “I know the secret truth about the world” nonsense. I read widely and a lot, so I’ve heard it. Whatever a Sophist might say, the facts have emerged and are clearly plain to see. They are staring us in the face, with a sick and twisted grimace that openly mocks the good that’s left in this world. We see it because for now, large portions of our free press are still free, and still working. It will be a free press that helps us find our way—or at least those of us who value that freedom. And all the others.

Fishing for Renewal

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fish

So I’ve also been thinking a lot about civilizations. The idea is that we form a society in order to protect ourselves – from enemies and barbarians without, from famine, from disorder and violence as realized in nature. City States, the advent of Western civilization as first realized in Assyria and across the Fertile Crescent, all had one common feature: walls. And let’s face it: Nature, as well as its products, is violent – dog eat dog, as it were (or lion eat zebra, or bee rape flower, if you like). Nature cares not for the individual, only the continuance of life. In our societies, it was not so long ago that parents could expect half or more of their children to die, either immediately or by age five, from the various deadly agents that infect our bodies. (They too want to live and reproduce.) Women giving birth died too, in great numbers. Go back farther, and whole populations would regularly die from starvation during times of famine. Whole populations would be wiped out by diseases borne by unseen critters we knew nothing about. There is evidence that the great plague of Europe in the 14th Century arrived after wiping out practically the entire population of China. This is still conjecture, but it makes sense. Nearly half of Europe was wiped out, after all. In total, perhaps 100 million people were killed. By bugs.

Most of these bugs are still around, thankfully reaping souls on a smaller scale. Back then, we chalked it up to Provenance. God’s will. Today, we know it’s simply the uncanny ability of the world’s smallest creatures to continuously mutate into newer, more slippery forms – at a rate much faster than we can evolve our science to nab them.

Now, we have conquered so many of these nemeses – hunger is rampant, but starvation (in America at least) is pretty much unheard of. America can grow enough to feed the world, and we do when we can (logistics remain a challenge). Science has made great strides in conquering our most pestilent friends, who in past times would visit us with grim regularity, decimating unwitting populations in a repeating pattern defined by opportunity (mainly folks huddled together for warmth in the colder months).

One conspicuous outlier is war, the penchant for men to kill one another over their squabbles for power and territory. A sort of smallish “club” of willing warriors – fighting for honor, man to man – in the past, modern war claims many, many more civilian lives than military ones. World War 1? World War 2? They were not “wars” – they were massacres, killing millions with violence and even more (in the case of WW1) with disease. They are the shame of the 20th century and the shame of modern “civilization.”

Amid all of this “progress,” though, Western society has maintained a curious fascination with the concept of its own fragility and impermanence. Our myths and legends – the most enduring ones – can be collectively characterized as “destructive/regenerative.” As the pioneering social anthropologist Sir James Frazer demonstrated in his landmark work, “The Golden Bough”, we have been fascinated with the connection between the fitness of our leaders and the health of our societies since we began forming societies.

One of the earliest and most widespread of such legends that Frazer discovered involves the Vegetable King. Early societies were, of course, agrarian. They depended on regular rains – but not too much – to drench their fields. They required predictable seasons, temperatures, winds, etc. And for the most part these elements could be counted on to be friendly. But when they weren’t? When the massive floods or the arid drought years came? Whole cities could perish from starvation within weeks. The idea evolved that when such calamities happened, it was because the gods of the earth responsible for bringing regular rains, moderate temperatures, etc., were not pleased. Not at all. (If you are thinking of Noah and his ark right now, you follow me.) And since tribal leaders of these times (and some in modern times) are thought to be a direct link to the deities, it followed that it was some deficiency in the leader – some weakness, or often simply the infirmities and weakness of age – that displeased them. From a more mystical point of view, villagers could see the weakening of the leader as a direct corollary – a cause/effect result – corresponding to the weakening and death of their crops. The deific king and his realm were entwined in a mystical, symbiotic relationship of mutual good health – or mutual death.

What to do? An infirm king might hang on for months, years. But the land needs healing NOW.

The solution would seem pretty straightforward to one who is steeped in this agrarian/deific tradition of the king as intrinsically linked to the fate of the land he rules, and vice versa. We must have a new king, one strong and vital enough to renew the land through his symbiosis with the environment-controlling deities and therefore the environment – the world – itself. But new king can’t just walk up and take the job, of course. Kings like being king. And there can’t be two kings. Thus the tradition became one of renewal through the death – and rebirth – of the king and, gods willing, the land.

It wasn’t necessary to the theology that the king be “murdered” by his successor. It was simply necessary for him to either heal or die so that renewal of the land might accompany renewal of the king. But events – especially catastrophic ones – can move quickly, so it’s not hard to see why the ambitious successor might be encouraged by the populace to “hurry things along.”

The story might sound familiar if you’re a scholar of the Arthurian legends. Among the connected quests of Chretian de Troyes’ “Morte d’Arthur” (as also told by Malory) is the quest of Percival (aka Parsifal for you Wagner fans). In some versions Percival travels to the “waste land”, where the infirm Fisher King – keeper of the Holy Grail – lay incapable of movement in his castle as his realm steadily declines into an infertile waste. He can do nothing but “fish” from his castle walls, waiting for someone to come and heal him – and his land. There are many tellings of the tale, but in the earliest  Percival “heals” the king of a wound in his “thigh” or “groin” – probably euphemistic for his genitals, symbolizing fertility. The waste land is renewed by Percival’s gesture.

The most famous manifestation of the legend of the Fisher King is, of course, the story of Jesus Christ. The barbarism and inhumanity of the Roman world, so painfully felt among the occupied populations of Palestine/Israel, was due to a rejection of the God of the Talmud. To these conquered Jews, the world itself was a dying place, a barren “wasteland” in terms of obeisance to God’s will, a world run by pagans. These conditions, as the recently discovered scriptures contained in the Dead Sea Scrolls tell us, gave rise to a plethora of “messiahs”, or messengers bringing word of God’s displeasure with this world along with a message of guidance to the next – guidance that must be heeded lest one perish and spend eternity in “hell” – which was then often understood to be to dwell forever in “the absence of God’s presence”.

As an aside, the Christian use of the “fish” symbol can be traced back to centuries before Christ, and could very likely have its origins in these early theologies of fertility. (A fish symbol, or Ichthys, also symbolizes fecundity or plenty. In pagan beliefs, Ichthys was the offspring of the ancient sea goddess Atargatis). Among early, non-dogmatic Christians, the Ichthys could have served as a powerful hearkening to their earlier theologies (much in the way that Easter was originally a pagan goddess of fertility, hence the occasion of Easter in the springtime). Practicing Christians will recall a host of fish symbolism throughout the New Testament.

But of course among all those messiahs, Jesus is the messiah we remember, for reasons I won’t try to divine here. Yet the one aspect of the New Testament Jesus that separates him from the messianic crowd, that hits the legendary Vegetable King nail right on the head (as it were), is his bloody crucifixion and death.  His death was “necessary” for the redemption of Man. For the rebirth of grace. For the restoration of men’s souls. His “restoration” – which created a schism in the early church among those who would deify Jesus and those who refused to “require” his resurrection and deification in order to follow his teachings (the latter group lost) –  symbolizes the restoration of man through Jesus’ suffering and death.

So what am I getting at?

Full circle, I am getting at the idea – as old as humanity – that when we feel our society, our world, has been corrupted and becomes a land of “waste” – our society offensive in its detachment from the land or the spirit of the land or the ‘original purpose’ of society – we seem to get the idea that we need to destroy it in order to “renew” it. Lately, we see so much apocalyptic cultural touchstones – the zombie craze, the “end of times” Christian books, the Bush “holy wars”, endless movies about the destruction of the earth from space objects or space aliens, etc. – but it’s not new. It happens at regular intervals, and always has. Just as in the year 2000, the year 1000 (such a tidy number) saw hordes of people putting bags over their heads to await the apocalypse. The very idea of the apocalypse was invented well after the death of Jesus, by an obscure cloistered Greek monk who had a “vision” of the Second Coming and wrote the story of “Revelations” (by far the most popular of the Bible’s New Testament stories, or perhaps second after Christmas). Why is Revelations in the New Testament at all? It has nothing to do with Jesus’ life. (It does provide a tidy ending to the whole thing.) Other sects “decide” arbitrarily that the world is “ending” from time to time – such as when a large comet arrives or the planets align a particular way. On a more concrete level, many during World War 2 thought the overwhelming amount of death and destruction happening around them must surely harken the end of everything – especially the Jews in Europe, who were in fact on a path to eradication.

So I guess that’s why all this has come to mind. Journalists, pundits, pollsters – none of them foresaw  our Nov. 9 disaster – our American political “Ground Zero,” our unprecedented act of self-destruction via the voting booth. We put the nuclear codes in the hands of a reactionary, thin-skinned narcissist when we could have chosen “business as usual”. Why? The press says now (should we believe them?) that they “missed it”, and that “it” was a subterranean desire for “change” at any cost. Because society is “ruined” by the current regime’s “corruption” and faithlessness.

Change they did want – and possibly, also renewal.

Pete Ricketts Comes Clean

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“I want to thank the distinguished ladies and gentlemen of the Nebraska legislature – and you too, Kintner – for inviting me to speak today. It is, as always, a great honor.

Today I’m here to speak about the progress of our state under my administration. As it happens, though, I accidentally took a double dose of Ambien last night, and boy am I feeling it. It’s like this drug physically compels me to tell the truth.

So here goes.

We could talk particulars, right? We could talk about my blockade of Medicaid expansion for the poor, how all those studies commissioned by you good citizen legislators showed that expanding Medicaid would not only greatly improve the health of our poorest and most vulnerable citizens, it would also benefit the state economically and create thousands of jobs in the field. I saw that related report last year – that our rural hospital network is in danger of collapsing without expanded access to care for the self-employed folks in our rural counties, not to mention the federal subsidies – that’s dollars – that come with the newly insured, some of which will go to Nebraska insurance firms.

And it’s not like we’re saving any taxpayers any money by blocking the expansion. The federal dollars flow to the states that claim it, and those that don’t, well, they are watching from the sidelines.

So, sure, yeah, I’m aware of all that.

Then there’s Obamacare in general. I’m sure you all saw the article last week from Tribune Services, how  they examined all the states where insurance companies are bailing out of the exchanges, leaving the self-insured with fewer choices and less competition and higher premiums, how they were all red states led by GOP governors and legislatures intent on blocking the implementation – and by extension the success – of the president’s key health care initiative. Yes, I know, I stood in the way of Obamacare at every opportunity, with my Republican predecessor paving the way by refusing to provide even the slightest amount of input or any effort at  building a state exchange that would work for our needs, in fact rebuffing and insulting the entire program. I remember his “mantra” for the press: “We won’t need an exchange, because Mitt Romney’s going to win in November 2012 and we’ll abolish the whole thing.”

Of course we never built one, we had no intention of building an exchange. So the state’s poor have suffered greatly as a result, needless suffering, and coverage is extremely thin here in Nebraska as a result. All news I am acutely aware of.

Meanwhile, states like California and New York are doing great with their exchanges, enjoying efficient state management and plenty of insurers and plan options for folks looking to get covered.  Highly competitive. They really have it going on!

Just ask yourself one question: if we had cooperated, if we had expanded Medicare,  and if it did result in massive savings and job growth in Nebraska as well as the protection of our rural hospital network – who do you think gets the credit for that? Me? Pete Ricketts? No – the president gets it. That’s who.

Enough said. I mean, c’mon.

Then there’s the death penalty. Hoo boy, what a joke that is. No executions in, what, 20 years? Something like that? Fourteen million a year to feed a broken system, according to Goss’s report. And no approved method for execution, even with my illegal drug buys from India  that violated federal drug laws and ignored the stated policy of the manufacturer not to supply the drug to executioners. (And thanks again John Gale, top law enforcement official in Nebraska, for your help on that buy.) Feds stopped the drugs at the border, but how could I have known they would do that? I’m not one to think deeply about these things. I just wanted my drugs so I could kill my prisoners.

I know, I know, our death penalty is outmoded, ineffectual, crazy expensive — if you described it as a “government program” it would be roundly despised by Republicans, wouldn’t it? Ha ha, yeah we would hate that boondoggle. But seriously, dad and I decided that the will of the people, as expressed through their elected representatives, was just not what we wanted to do. So we dropped a few bucks (what, about $300,000? My last bike cost more than that) on the referendum, got John and other state officials and luminaries like Hal to jump on, called in some favors, you know. And here it is back on the ballot – just because I wanted it! It’s hilarious – here we are, “Put our ineffective, massively expensive, completely backward-looking priority on the ballot! Screw the people, and screw their representatives!” That’s us. We want it our way. And you know what? I think we’ll get it. There really is one born every minute, folks.

Anyway, I’m kind of woozy from the Ambien, but I hope you’re following the pattern here. There’s progress, there’s common sense, there’s the will of the people as expressed through their representatives in the legislature.

And then there’s us. My dad and me. And all the toadies who suck up to our money.

We don’t care about any of that.

It should be abundantly clear what we care about. Look out, to other horizons. Look over at Wisconsin, where an incompetent governor made a national name for himself, who got a run at the nomination, by crushing public unions and public universities. That state is a mess. Look to Kansas, where they have untaxed their state into an unholy cluster of bankrupt government and failing schools, not to mention an eroding business climate. But you know the name Brownback, don’t you. You know it. Do I even need to mention Jindal? Complete idiot, and he was in the running for 2016 too. Because he screwed his state over like nobody’s business.

So what are we about? Anybody wanna guess? No? Really, it’s very simple (just like me).

It’s power.

Power is what we want. The power to decide who succeeds, and who does not. Who gets a driver’s license and who doesn’t. Who gets health care and who doesn’t. Who goes to prison (Hint: not our friends or their kids, at least not for long) and who dies there – at our hands.

Heck, we’re even suing the state of Colorado for their liberal pot laws. Why? Well, I’ll tell you – it’s an arbitrary thing. After all – ha ha – I buy illegal drugs myself! And try to smuggle them in the country! To deny “free people” (ha ha – sorry that always gets me) the right to grow and use a native plant for their own purposes that involve no offense to any other citizen, let alone the “state”– it’s the most arbitrary of power plays, with no reasoning behind it, just like the power to kill my prisoners. Hell, we won’t even let them have their no-THC cannabis oil for the sick kids. Why? Why forbid proven relief for these epileptic kids, beating their own brains out every day? Because we said so, that’s why. I want that power BECAUSE it’s arbitrary. I want it so that I have it – and you, dearest citizens – you don’t. And it’s important that you KNOW it, that you know it’s an arbitrary thing. A nonsensical, arbitrary demonstration of power you can do nothing about except write letters to me, or to your newspaper. Letters I don’t read.

This is the political dynamic we are fighting so hard to keep alive, for our kind and our descendents. Good governance is for suckers. We’re here to build a power base and to get recognized for it on the national political stage.

It really is as simple as that. Like Walker, or Brownback, or Jindal, if I prove I can wield arbitrary, nonsensical power over an entire state – if I can, with clumsy, empty rhetoric devoid of logic or pragmatism and a cadre of powerful toadies in official positions (not to mention tons of money) effect a reversal of fortunes for all of the people in my state who don’ t share my European heritage, skin tone, background, religion, income level – you know what I mean here – If I can pull that off, as dad has explained to me, I have put myself in the running for the White House in 2020. It’s a natural continuation of the path I’m on. It’s the next step for dad and me.

So yes, of course, you – all of you, from the lowliest immigrant to the loftiest official not in my dad’s pocket – all of you are expendable. Your state is expendable. Your aquifer is expendable. Your efficient public utilities are expendable. Your health and your lives are expendable in pursuit of my one overriding goal. Heck, remember my knee surgery? I went home to Chicago. I’m not letting you backwater hicks  touch my leg.

You are to me, Nebraska, a big flat stepping stone.

And as I’ve demonstrated in my first years in office, with nearly every initiative, I’m more than willing to step on you and step on you and step on you until I reach my goals, as told to me by dad.

Thank you. I would take questions, but I’m really very sleepy. And bald. Hm? Oh, ha, I didn’t mean to say that last part, did I. Or, heck, any of this. Dad’s gonna be pissed. Ha ha. G’night.”