But as Carlin (among many others) has pointed out, *they* are not the problem. The problem is the people who voted for, and continue to vote for them. Having lived in the Mid West these past thirty-odd years, I can attest to the fact that the Senate does reflect the values (such as they are) of the majority. I've recently been reading the last few musings of Trotsky and I agree with Hitchens, that near the end of his life, he'd come to recognize that the October Revolution was based upon a fallacy. The great failure was that the proletariat had not, and could not rise to become a ruling class. They simply cannot be trusted to build a just and fair society. They lack the ability. This is not to say that the Tsars of his day or the plutocratic monied Tsars we've lived with these past 40 years are any better. They are their own brand of evil and I maintain they are still worse. For they, unlike the masses, know better.

This is a nation composed of unimaginably greedy, xenophobic, Luddite bastards and their Senate is composed of people just like them. Or at least composed of people "smart enough" to use them as the useful idiots that are the overwhelming majority.

Maybe its that I lived so long in the Mid West that I'm beginning to give up on humanity. I don't know. From time to time I read the LA Times and am reminded that there is another America. And then I remember Orange County and recall that even the Left Coast has its human cancers.

Into this mess I have assisted in bringing two new humans. I suspect there will come a day when they curse my ashes for doing so.

As Hitchens noted, religion poisons everything. But for Christians, especially Evangelical Christians, I have a special level of contempt. Their imaginary, invisible Jewish friend who died 2,000 years ago wants them not only to have what they have in their pockets, but what's in yours as well. This is just part of their deserved reward for being believers. It disgusts me. My old partner's father was a retired minister and he had some advice for us when we were in business together, "If you're dealing with a Christian, hold on to your wallet with both hands." So, at least one of the "believers" knows the score.

Christianity is a peculiarly greedy religion and has no place in the culture of America in which greed is to be admired and expanded upon at every turn. What makes Middle America "vote against their economic, health and cultural interests" is the idea, prevalent in most of them, that they're different. They deserve more. And one day, it will all be theirs. If not in this life, in the next.

Back in the 1980's I noted that the only common epithet that has no claimed owner is "White Trash." You can talk about White Trash to someone who most would consider to be a member of that group and they think, "Oh, he's not talking about me." We lionize individuality at the whole cost of a sense of community and examples of that are present everywhere. From John Wayne to the CIEFO class who rob the businesses and employees they work for of everything whilst sailing away in their golden parachutes. And the masses say, "One of these days that will be me."

I'm increasingly coming to the conclusion that there is nothing to be done about this.