What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
Like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore—
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over—
Like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
Like a heavy load. Or does it explode?
—Langston Hughes
The imagery of the caged hamster, endlessly running round and round on a squeaky spinning wheel going nowhere, is perhaps the most accurate summation of the dangerous and sad state of political affairs that ensnares everyday Black, White, Brown, Red, and Yellow people in this nation.
We have a corporate-stream media that has shamelessly abdicated its responsibility to forthrightly challenge and expose the corporate status quo and its concomitant corporate hegemony. Indeed, how can it challenge this reality when said media is itself part and parcel of the status quo?
We have two major political parties and a judicial system that unceasingly make an utter mockery of there being a genuine everyday people’s democracy in the United States of America. We have charlatans and chameleons, better known as politicians, who are controlled by, and drink from, the same corporate trough of greed and injustice as do the bloated CEO’s of these multi-national corporations themselves. Our institutions, be they financial, government, or ‘educational,’ are based upon an endless stream of mythology and lies rather than truth and reality. We have a political system that is steeped in the pathological theatre of the absurd.
Like the caged hamster endlessly running to oblivion on the spinning wheel, so many have chosen to accept the endless lies of the Democratic and Republican party politicians, even though intuitively they know full well that they are being sold a bill of stinking, rotten, repackaged lies. Yes, this is the pathological theatre of the absurd!
Any politically conscious and sane person knows that the war mongering, corporate surrogate Barack Obama, and his Democrat and Republican corporate cohorts, are simply the latest in a long line of pathological liars. Barack Obama’s recent speech on Afghanistan and the supposed upcoming U.S. troop withdrawal thereto, reeked with so very many lies, but the portion that this writer and others found particularly odious, to the point of almost puking, was when Obama formed his lips to say, “We are a nation that brings our enemies to justice while adhering to the rule of law, and respecting the rights of all our citizens. We protect our own freedom and prosperity by extending it to others. We stand not for empire, but for self-determination.”
How did this predator-drone missile U.S. President Obama adhere to international law by militarily directlyviolating the law with respect to the national sovereignty of various nations, including Pakistan and Libya? And by the way, how in the hell does Obama’s extended, broadened and unconstitutional so-called ‘Patriot Act’ and‘extraordinary rendition’ “extend” alleged “freedom and prosperity” to everyday people in this nation, much less to people in other nations?! Since when has rampant homelessness, home foreclosures, joblessness, and the largest prison population in the world, right here in this nation, become somehow anything akin to “freedom and prosperity?!” Just how stupid does Obama think everyday people are, to believe that the U.S. multi-national corporate/military elite of Lockheed, Boeing, General Electric, Goldman Sachs, Monsanto, Cargill, the pharmaceutical industries, nuclear power industries, bankers, etc., do not make up or stand for “empire?!”
In point of fact, this avaricious elite is the empire! And the only thing Barack Obama is attempting to bloodily “extend” is corporate plutocracy and domination—not a genuine people’s democracy which we in this nation do not even enjoy! What planet does Barack Obama live on, or perhaps more to the point, what planet does he and his corporate Democrat and Republican party cohorts think we everyday people live on?! This is insanity—the pathological theatre of the absurd! The increasing terrible pain that everyday Black, White, Brown, Red, and Yellow people are enduring in this nation and throughout the world will never be remedied by those who brought it about. Never! To suggest otherwise would be both delusional and pathological.
It should be clearly understood that both the so-called “liberals” and their right-wing counterparts are essential key actors in the perpetuation of this pathological theatre of the absurd in this nation. Their roles are symbiotic, and both groups seek to perpetuate the system, albeit in different forms. Both groups are beholden to the corporate trough, and they both maintain the exploitative paradigm of mythology pertaining to the past and present narrative of this nation’s deeds, its political [mis]leaders and its institutions.
Moreover, both groups couch their rhetoric in double-speak, codes, and deception which is closely interwoven with the aforementioned paradigm of mythology of this nation. This is how, for example, in the case of many labor unions, the union leadership [i.e. bureaucracy] so effectively and consistently sells out [i.e. betrays] the legitimate needs and aspirations of union rank and file membership. On the other hand, as in the case of the hard core leadership of the right wing, fear, ignorance, and masked racism, combined with doses of outright disinformation, is effectively utilized to manipulate people against their own collective human interests—all in the name of allegedly doing just the opposite.
The end result of course is that everyday people in these situations usually find themselves effectively played off against each other and even against themselves, without recognizing that the leadership of both so-called “liberals” and of the right wing, irrespective of their color, gender, or differing rhetoric, are employing a perpetual game of manipulation andcontrol. Ironically and necessarily, the leadership and politicos of both the Democratic Party foxes and the Republican Party wolves play an eerily similar game with the lives and livelihoods of everyday people—which serves to keep everyday people, like caged hamsters, perpetually running on a spinning wheel going fundamentally nowhere.
While some “liberals” can see through the coded rhetoric of the right-wing, they utterly fail to recognize the convoluted and misleading rhetoric of their own “liberal” leadership. They repeatedly buy into the ‘lesser of the evils’ mythology, which in turn, fosters the continuation and perpetuation of systemic control and manipulation by both the Democratic and Republican parties [i.e. the Republicrats]. This too, is pathological.
The women, children, and men being murdered internationally by Barack Obama’s predator-drone missiles are just as dead as a result of Obama’s militarism as they would be by that of any of his predecessors. The economic pain [i.e. joblessness, home foreclosures, homelessness, corporate hegemony, and no universal health care etc.] being experienced by everyday people here in this nation under the auspices of Barack Obama is just as horrible and devastating as it would be under any of his predecessors. In fact, now the U.S. militaristic bloodshed abroad and the economic pain and abrogation of constitutional and human rights at home is far worse under Obama than any of his predecessors.
However, the reality is that it would not matter one iota whether or not it was a Barack Obama brand or some other systemic politician. Unless or until the system itself is fundamentally changed, which would include rejecting both corporate Democratic and Republican parties [i.e. the Republicrats], everyday people will continue to be like caged hamsters frantically running on an endlessly spinning wheel.
We must stop being liked caged hamsters on the spinning wheel. This means we everyday people must make some serious and hard choices. Either we will continue down the road of pathology to ultimate and certain oblivion, or we will demand, and organize for an end to corporate domination and militarism. In this matter, there is no middle ground. We cannot have it both ways simultaneously. We must do this, in the words of Malcolm X [el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz], “By any means necessary.” And we must do this urgently, creatively, and collectively.
It is time to bring down the curtain on the pathological theatre of the absurd in this nation. It is time to stop being like caged hamsters running nowhere on the squeaky wheel of insanity.
Mother Earth and humanity beckon us! Onward then, my sisters and brothers! Onward!
BlackCommentator.comEditorial Board Member, Larry Pinkney, is a veteran of the Black Panther Party, the former Minister of Interior of the Republic of New Africa, a former political prisoner and the only American to have successfully self-authored his civil/political rights case to the United Nations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. In connection with his political organizing activities in opposition to voter suppression, etc., Pinkney was interviewed in 1988 on the nationally televised PBS News Hour, formerly known as The MacNeil / Lehrer News Hour. For more about Larry Pinkney see the book, Saying No to Power: Autobiography of a 20th Century Activist and Thinker, by William Mandel [Introduction by Howard Zinn]. (Click here to read excerpts from the book.) Click here to contact Mr. Pinkney.
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Theatre of the Absurd: We have to stop being caged hamsters!
Posted on July 7, 2011 by Larry Pinkney
What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
Like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore—
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over—
Like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
Like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
—Langston Hughes
The imagery of the caged hamster, endlessly running round and round on a squeaky spinning wheel going nowhere, is perhaps the most accurate summation of the dangerous and sad state of political affairs that ensnares everyday Black, White, Brown, Red, and Yellow people in this nation.
We have a corporate-stream media that has shamelessly abdicated its responsibility to forthrightly challenge and expose the corporate status quo and its concomitant corporate hegemony. Indeed, how can it challenge this reality when said media is itself part and parcel of the status quo?
We have two major political parties and a judicial system that unceasingly make an utter mockery of there being a genuine everyday people’s democracy in the United States of America. We have charlatans and chameleons, better known as politicians, who are controlled by, and drink from, the same corporate trough of greed and injustice as do the bloated CEO’s of these multi-national corporations themselves. Our institutions, be they financial, government, or ‘educational,’ are based upon an endless stream of mythology and lies rather than truth and reality. We have a political system that is steeped in the pathological theatre of the absurd.
Like the caged hamster endlessly running to oblivion on the spinning wheel, so many have chosen to accept the endless lies of the Democratic and Republican party politicians, even though intuitively they know full well that they are being sold a bill of stinking, rotten, repackaged lies. Yes, this is the pathological theatre of the absurd!
Any politically conscious and sane person knows that the war mongering, corporate surrogate Barack Obama, and his Democrat and Republican corporate cohorts, are simply the latest in a long line of pathological liars. Barack Obama’s recent speech on Afghanistan and the supposed upcoming U.S. troop withdrawal thereto, reeked with so very many lies, but the portion that this writer and others found particularly odious, to the point of almost puking, was when Obama formed his lips to say, “We are a nation that brings our enemies to justice while adhering to the rule of law, and respecting the rights of all our citizens. We protect our own freedom and prosperity by extending it to others. We stand not for empire, but for self-determination.”
How did this predator-drone missile U.S. President Obama adhere to international law by militarily directly violating the law with respect to the national sovereignty of various nations, including Pakistan and Libya? And by the way, how in the hell does Obama’s extended, broadened and unconstitutional so-called ‘Patriot Act’ and ‘extraordinary rendition’ “extend” alleged “freedom and prosperity” to everyday people in this nation, much less to people in other nations?! Since when has rampant homelessness, home foreclosures, joblessness, and the largest prison population in the world, right here in this nation, become somehow anything akin to “freedom and prosperity?!” Just how stupid does Obama think everyday people are, to believe that the U.S. multi-national corporate/military elite of Lockheed, Boeing, General Electric, Goldman Sachs, Monsanto, Cargill, the pharmaceutical industries, nuclear power industries, bankers, etc., do not make up or stand for “empire?!”
In point of fact, this avaricious elite is the empire! And the only thing Barack Obama is attempting to bloodily “extend” is corporate plutocracy and domination—not a genuine people’s democracy which we in this nation do not even enjoy! What planet does Barack Obama live on, or perhaps more to the point, what planet does he and his corporate Democrat and Republican party cohorts think we everyday people live on?! This is insanity—the pathological theatre of the absurd! The increasing terrible pain that everyday Black, White, Brown, Red, and Yellow people are enduring in this nation and throughout the world will never be remedied by those who brought it about. Never! To suggest otherwise would be both delusional and pathological.
It should be clearly understood that both the so-called “liberals” and their right-wing counterparts are essential key actors in the perpetuation of this pathological theatre of the absurd in this nation. Their roles are symbiotic, and both groups seek to perpetuate the system, albeit in different forms. Both groups are beholden to the corporate trough, and they both maintain the exploitative paradigm of mythology pertaining to the past and present narrative of this nation’s deeds, its political [mis]leaders and its institutions.
Moreover, both groups couch their rhetoric in double-speak, codes, and deception which is closely interwoven with the aforementioned paradigm of mythology of this nation. This is how, for example, in the case of many labor unions, the union leadership [i.e. bureaucracy] so effectively and consistently sells out [i.e. betrays] the legitimate needs and aspirations of union rank and file membership. On the other hand, as in the case of the hard core leadership of the right wing, fear, ignorance, and masked racism, combined with doses of outright disinformation, is effectively utilized to manipulate people against their own collective human interests—all in the name of allegedly doing just the opposite.
The end result of course is that everyday people in these situations usually find themselves effectively played off against each other and even against themselves, without recognizing that the leadership of both so-called “liberals” and of the right wing, irrespective of their color, gender, or differing rhetoric, are employing a perpetual game of manipulation and control. Ironically and necessarily, the leadership and politicos of both the Democratic Party foxes and the Republican Party wolves play an eerily similar game with the lives and livelihoods of everyday people—which serves to keep everyday people, like caged hamsters, perpetually running on a spinning wheel going fundamentally nowhere.
While some “liberals” can see through the coded rhetoric of the right-wing, they utterly fail to recognize the convoluted and misleading rhetoric of their own “liberal” leadership. They repeatedly buy into the ‘lesser of the evils’ mythology, which in turn, fosters the continuation and perpetuation of systemic control and manipulation by both the Democratic and Republican parties [i.e. the Republicrats]. This too, is pathological.
The women, children, and men being murdered internationally by Barack Obama’s predator-drone missiles are just as dead as a result of Obama’s militarism as they would be by that of any of his predecessors. The economic pain [i.e. joblessness, home foreclosures, homelessness, corporate hegemony, and no universal health care etc.] being experienced by everyday people here in this nation under the auspices of Barack Obama is just as horrible and devastating as it would be under any of his predecessors. In fact, now the U.S. militaristic bloodshed abroad and the economic pain and abrogation of constitutional and human rights at home is far worse under Obama than any of his predecessors.
However, the reality is that it would not matter one iota whether or not it was a Barack Obama brand or some other systemic politician. Unless or until the system itself is fundamentally changed, which would include rejecting both corporate Democratic and Republican parties [i.e. the Republicrats], everyday people will continue to be like caged hamsters frantically running on an endlessly spinning wheel.
We must stop being liked caged hamsters on the spinning wheel. This means we everyday people must make some serious and hard choices. Either we will continue down the road of pathology to ultimate and certain oblivion, or we will demand, and organize for an end to corporate domination and militarism. In this matter, there is no middle ground. We cannot have it both ways simultaneously. We must do this, in the words of Malcolm X [el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz], “By any means necessary.” And we must do this urgently, creatively, and collectively.
It is time to bring down the curtain on the pathological theatre of the absurd in this nation. It is time to stop being like caged hamsters running nowhere on the squeaky wheel of insanity.
Mother Earth and humanity beckon us! Onward then, my sisters and brothers! Onward!
BlackCommentator.com Editorial Board Member, Larry Pinkney, is a veteran of the Black Panther Party, the former Minister of Interior of the Republic of New Africa, a former political prisoner and the only American to have successfully self-authored his civil/political rights case to the United Nations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. In connection with his political organizing activities in opposition to voter suppression, etc., Pinkney was interviewed in 1988 on the nationally televised PBS News Hour, formerly known as The MacNeil / Lehrer News Hour. For more about Larry Pinkney see the book, Saying No to Power: Autobiography of a 20th Century Activist and Thinker, by William Mandel [Introduction by Howard Zinn]. (Click here to read excerpts from the book.) Click here to contact Mr. Pinkney.