William Holman Hunt: The Triumph of the Innocents (1870-1903)

"They will fail, but they sure enjoy being cruel."

I believe evangelism constitutes a much greater sin than paganism, but then I do not believe paganism qualifies as sin. I believe the separation of church and state has always been a moral issue, as linking church and state constitutes an immoral act. Prayer breakfasts exist so hypocrites can enjoy debasing themselves at public expense. Prayer in schools seems roughly equivalent to enforcing public pooping since it demands public performance of the properly private. I believe the urge to punish debases the punisher much more than it punishes the perpetrator. When I was fifteen years old, I held an after-school job that paid me the equivalent of $21/hour in today's currency. I was able to pay for my books and tuition when I attended university with a small Pell grant and the proceeds of my after-school jobs. I graduated debt-free.

I grieve for a world I failed to appreciate fully, before genuine pieces of shit took office and overran the Republican Party. Before Reagan, who extended permission for the members of his administration to ignore precedent and the law and commit self-serving felonies without remorse. He encouraged people to think less of themselves and their government so that his cronies could take mean advantage of them, primarily by stealing their wages and pensions. We now inhabit a broken world, one where billionaires are deathly scared of taxes they never pay, anyway, and rank-and-file people are increasingly certain they will never get ahead or even manage to get even. I grieve for the good old days before I knew how good I had it. I grieve for the goddamned Age of Aquarius.

The pieces of shit that now constitute the majority in both houses of Congress disgust me. The incumbent stands so far beneath contempt that his crimes seem insignificant in comparison to his ethics, or their absence. He evangelizes immorality, and his followers swallow his incoherent incantations, each more illegal than their predecessor. They will have to build a whole new wing in Hell to house whatever's left of his soul once he arrives. The devil's got his signature on a contract he signed when he was about nine. He's lived a life exceptional for the fact that he's fucked up everything he's ever touched. He's much more than merely touched in the head, and much, much less.

I am of an age now where my primary occupation has become disengaging. My irrelevance has been growing exponentially and appears to be extending ad nauseum. I grieve for a world that welcomed inquiry, though never all that comfortably. I grieve for a world that still strived for equality and justice for all, though forever falling short of fully realizing its aspirations. At least it still aspired to be greater than it had been, rather than mouthing oaths made meaningless through mindless repetition. I grieve for the times that self-professed conservatives cannot seem to remember, times that actually existed rather than fictional ones conveniently created to justify tyranny.

The MAGAs are the new Tories, people fearful of liberty and in desperate need of a king. They fear thinking for themselves, but they fear more that others will think for themselves. They worship a free market and do everything they can to manipulate it. They revere the Second Amendment and abhor every other sentence in our Constitution. They pray for emoluments. They believe we possess infinite resources. They firmly believe that Jesus is in the wings and will return in their lifetime, just like every previous charlatan in history so far. They believe in predestination, that people deserve whatever fate befalls them, especially the poor and displaced, who should feel ashamed for being so irresponsible as to get themselves born poor or of color. They believe in the separation of morality and action, so that they can do whatever they damned well please because they think they've already been saved. They're damned and headed to a Hell of their own making, bound and determined to drag everything holy down that hole with them. They will fail, but they sure enjoy being cruel.

©2025 by David A. Schmaltz - all rights reserved

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