Blog # 118 THE CHOSEN

It was in the early hours of a weekday morning, on the upper east side of Manhattan, close to a crosstown street. At that corner, there is a large electronics store and there appeared, despite the early hour and frigid weather, exacerbated by an icy wind, a rather substantial line of people (a few with strollers with little children) waiting in a line that stretched back around the block. Upon inquiry, I was advised that a new “game player” was going on sale that morning and that these people were waiting for the store to open. Fortunately, for me my bus arrived shortly thereafter and we made our escape from the cold, but with a feeling of real consternation.

A great deal of energy, creative thought and money are presently being expended, in the search for some rational explanation for the unprecedented and highly unpredictable result of the recent Presidential election. Among the proposed culprits is an untimely letter from the U.S Attorney General, comrade Putin, the Russian hacking, and the personality of the losing candidate; the fact (and this is laughable) that she did not visit Ohio and Wisconsin often enough (the latter reason is typical of the limited circumspection of our political pundits). Everyone is nonplussed by the result, even the winning candidate, who had been, in apparent expectation of losing, busily engaged in the creation of a false scenario, as is his customary inclination, this time of a “rigged election.”

It is eternally frustrating to us that the “experts” are fluent solely in the customary pundit jargon and, based upon their consistent, predictable inclinations, do not realize that the fundamental and operative reason is essentially to be found in that early cold morning queue awaiting access to a new game player.

Since the available concepts in the media’s tool box are limited by a priori predilection and outworn assumptions, it usually relies on tangible items such as the letter, Putin and other, easily digestible phenomena. We need yet again, to refer to the sage credo of President Thomas Jefferson (which we have cited in many of our earlier writings) to the effect that, for a democracy to be successful what is essentially required is a  “ literate” and “well informed” citizenry.

The long, dedicated crowd of people, referred to, predictably would not have braved the early morning cold and discomfort, to wait in line at any of our fine museums, lecture halls or theaters. If this is the “coastal intelligencia,” referred to by these savvy professional commentators, one wonders what they wait on long uncomfortable lines for in Biloxi or Texarkana.

No rational cohort of “informed and “literate” citizens would have, in the exercise of even a modicum of reason and concern for country, have chosen this candidate, who has publicly demonstrated himself to be incapable of the office of President and, as well, an arrogant, impulsive and ignorant person. Apparently, It was his “bull in the china shop” persona that appealed to the game players, and the reality show, low information voters; the vital question and concern is, essentially, how they got so numerous.

-p.