I catch no Ubers, and I hope to remain disease-free of the other, too.

Instead most days I make a quick short drive of a couple miles. Here is what struck me during today’s.

Gas prices are flailing wildly. I went and filled at a historic low of $1.49 the gallon the other day, although many supposedly cheap places were still charging thirty or forty cents more, a few blocks off. The pair of buck fortynine places (and these are dependable national or regional brands, not some watery discount joints) had jumped up again by a quarter tonight.

People are getting worse and worse about masks. Some viscous old lady without one was coughing up a lung in the grocery store ten feet away from me. Facing away, but Jesus, people. I felt glad that it was only a quick ATM stop today, and I’ll have to be going back there early in the day to avoid the stupid crowds next time.

On the radio, NPR was visited by a “fascism expert” who was either dumb as fuck or shilling. He started out by defining Fascism as “a personality cult”, and this was clearly a prelude to being able to label Trump as a fascist.

Fascism isn’t anything like, you posing maroon. Rather, like capitalism or communism, it is a particular arrangement of social and economic policy and practice.

Here’s how the guy who founded the first real-world fascist regime (1925) defined it:

“Fascism should more appropriately be called Corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power.”
― Benito Mussolini

Any politician who owes their vote, soul, and mcmansion to the pharmaceutical lobby, to Wall Street, to insurance goons or the credit card companies or Silicon Valley, is therefore complicit in moving the nation closer to actual fascism. Whatever else you want to say, good or bad, about Joe Biden, he is by this simple metric at least as fascistic as Donald Trump. And the (D)ianne Feinsteins in Congress are off the charts.

The bumbling orange one is definitely a narcissist, and he says a lot of white supremacist things. So on that basis, it’s fair to compare and contrast him with Hitler. But then you have to also admit that whereas the Hitlers and Mussolinis and Francos of the world just loved themselves a good war, Trump is the first president in ages to start no new ones. At least … not on foreign soil … and …

Maybe he is a fascist and maybe not, but he’s really bad at whatever he is, either way. Guiliani is a mindfucked buffoon, not a Goebbels.

Twisting the facts to try and paint Tinyhands as an F-word is quite the preoccupation these days among the punditocracy, on NPR and elsewhere. I’m sure they have their reasons, but I doubt the reasons have much to do with the spirit of free inquiry, or the facts. I would suspect that it has much more to do with which corporations are buttering their bread, and with trying to scare people into not supporting him–and while 25% of the population will never be convinced he’s a bad guy, the preaching lets the other 75% feel like they have the moral high ground, because at least they aren’t Jew-gassers like the Donald.

We’re doomed.

But on the bright side, we’ve got Joe and we’ve got Ro, and we’ve got Promises, Promises, as detailed in yesterday’s post.

All that really matters to me now politically is whether they’re kept, or not.

I really want to believe Ro and his friend Michael Moore. Really, desperately, fiscally.

Somewhere in between them and the grenade-launching Jimmy Dore, we have the cool omen-sorting of Kyle Kulinski. Sitting where he’s sitting, where I’m sitting, there is–let’s call it … cause for concern. For example:

Biden’s Cabinet A Who’s Who Of Corrupt Corporate Lobbyists

Pretty bad … perfectly expected … god damn it … but what about the money, Kyle?

Joe Biden Gives Shaky Answer On Student Loan Debt

Right. Christ …

The takeaway on this one is that Biden is already hedging, and even worse, setting himself up for shrugging explanations of why it was impossible for him to do all those pretty-sounding nice things he promised, or half-promised, or that Ro promised for him. Like his former boss, who swore to close Guantanamo, and yet somehow in eight years as commander-in-chief, just found it implausbily impossible to deliver.

Look.

I still have my fingers crossed. I’m still burning incense. I’m still praying to fat gods in cheap suits, and my prayer is that we don’t have to watch the Empire put the sword to too many more lost sheep.

Since we’re all Leviticously Deuteronomous anyway, let me pray to Joe too. Joe. Hallowed be thy dirty name. Do what you said. Kill the fatted calf. No excuses. Frack all you want. Veto Medicare for all, all you want. Fascist it up with your corporate buddies, all you want, seriously. But don’t fucking lie to me about the cash, or I will never trust you or your shitty party with my vote, ever again, even if Benito himself rises from the grave with his neck still stretched like taffy and runs at the top of the Republican ticket …

In Jebus’ name, amen.