Riding into work via taxi the other morning and the driver was listening to a radio program discussing with some experts Canada’s contracts with the Saudi’s, and what the next moves would be, should be, and so forth. It drew me in because the whole conversation seemed so alien at first and actually completely missed what they were actually saying since I was so struck by how rational it all sounded, how thoughtful, a sober and serious look, not merely knee-jerk reactionary tweets.

This was a real discussion on how this will affect, well, jobs and the companies that rely on the various wars taking place throughout the Middle East. How Canada will look if we should decide to stand on our high moral ground, and what that will really accomplish versus who it will hurt. There is a humanitarian element, that values element, the protection of institutions and not letting a rogue leader benefit from murder element, not just ifs but how, and what the options are.

What I guess hit me is I don’t hear any of this often enough, this sort of sober conversation.

This is not the sort of stuff you find on social media platforms or on corporately funded news stations blasting out Breaking News, and a reminder to me how important reading and listening to these types of dialogues really is, how as useful a tool some of those platforms are for spreading a message quickly, it is just not designed for considered opinions on complex issues nor commentary with context and support from experts in the field, hearing from those with concrete experience behind them to back up their words, offering ideas, new points of view, new concerns, new realities, or old well-worn ideas past their expiration date finally laid to rest.

This morning as I was rolling my eyes again at some Canadian rumpTus supporter defending that madman in chief from down yonder south of us, and I noticed that the only time you really ever see one of his defenders actually happy is when they are reacting to some comment a libtard makes they don’t agree with, you know? 😆 I mean, otherwise, they seem to just revel in this hate-filled state, enthralled and chanting like a cult follower.

Not a whole lot of that ol’Christian charity and compassion to be found, as they just give lip service to that book they say they abide by, with of course links to some questionable alt-right rag they’ve found that feeds them all the news and views without messy complexities, no challenges to their pre-conceived notions, from a place they don’t have to be worried about bumping into any actual facts quantified by, well, any particular expert from any prestigious peer-reviewed article or research not being funded by some self-interested corporation or of course the NRA.

I really wonder how many will be left in his ever-shrinking hateful kool-aide crowd by 2020.

Maybe I’m not looking in the right places but I do know I don’t generally find these hatemongers engaged in any useful dialogue. And they miss I guess that he had a perfectly good and clean bill that everyone could agree on, with words like “border security” that he was all set to agree to, but no 5 billion for some farce, some dog whistle wall.

This concrete fence even his own administration admits was left to the dustbin months ago as they recognized it is completely unfeasible, makes no sense, its usefulness questionable and generally a huge waste of taxpayers money. Oh, but then a couple of his enablers turn on him when they find out about it and, well, well, well, what do we have here? So, the United States government employees are being held hostage by some fable this idiot won’t let go of and we also learn that he takes his marching orders from talk show hosts rather than generals with 40 years experience with securing borders and countries around the world? Really? Do I have this right?

Rationality isn’t the dude’s expertise, nor is useful dialogue, and do not expect any from this lunatic. And, in a few days, the Dems take back the house and all hell’s going to break loose.

I mean lately it is just like everyone is just ranting to the choir, some raving, stuck in the comfort of their POV, one side setting aside their lofty ideals for hypocrisy and racism, with the left leaning smugly against their elite undeniable scientifically proven truths, and neither side is really even listening anymore to what the other side has to say, its tribal.

I’m just as guilty of that myself. Well, generally because I cannot take listening to that man spew his lies and cherry-picked BS for longer than a snippet and have even turned off a news vid because the snippet ran too long and I felt that rising bile of anger in my throat. Certainly don’t often click over to any of their rags online, that just about has me lose faith in humanity. I mean, the only time I have any idea what that faction has to say is if it runs on CNN or MSNBC. The things that come out of the mealy mouths of his enablers is just astounding to me sometimes, and not just the white nationalist rants, or the arse kissers on fox and friends, but that they delight in their outright lies, and this hateful dispassionate response to their hero with his cruelty and corruption, his chaotic governing, the many respected men and women abandoning his house of horrors are generally ignored, and their delight in the libtards hatred of their MAGA Man, their bully in chief.

I mean, this guy is every bullies wet dream, to say every brain-dead thing that comes into one’s head, trash talk your enemies, ignore reason, diplomacy, just pander to the lowest common denominator, revelling in the loyalist bowing down at one’s feet, in awe of your greatness, your wealth, your lack of any morality, grab them by the blah, blah blah.

That man is good at rhetoric, not so good at reality. I’m sure it sounds good in his head, and of course, his base eats it all up, but it means nothing without the men and women who make it so, he doesn’t care though. Cuts their pay even, lies to his own military about their pay packet, crazy stuff that is easy to fact check, but they don’t care.

It just feels so topsy-turvy upside down and backwards more and more every day, and the angry trolls everywhere, even in Canada. I mean, it does still shock me when I read their hate-filled comments in the footer of some link to Macleans or whichever news feed that scrolls past my eyeballs on Facebook.

And sometimes just beyond me what they see in him, and all the things you thought you knew were wrong, hero-worshipping this man who stomps and rages from his bully pulpit a shower of lies and half-truths, and they lap it up like the gospel of Paul. Crazy times, crazy crazy times.

Nothing gets solved when everyone is turned away, staring at a rectangular screen scrolling through bits and bobs of ideas and opinions, haters and helpers, lovers and foes, fashionistas and selfies.

Any dialogue, any bipartisan agreements, any compromises, and any listening, anything that I recognize as governing, any respect for that office he holds is long gone when he goes and makes two dead children into some kind of, I don’t know, a weapon I guess.

So, one thing I did last month, and something I’ve wanted to do for a while – subscribe to the New York Times – so I clicked that little button that pops up when you can’t read the article. I wanted more of those moments, to have my own cherished notions challenged, my own values shook up, find out I’m wrong, an introduction to a person, place or thing I knew nothing about. Now maybe I’m just a light in the dark, even if a very very small light in a sometimes very unjust world, a place I don’t understand anymore, that pisses me off more than I’d like to admit.

Sometimes all you have is that light to see by, or we can just watch the shadows it makes on the walls of our cave instead, ignore reality over rhetoric, and just give in to scrolling pithy pieces of propaganda and pompacity.