You have to dominate, if you don't dominate you're wasting your time. They're going to run over you. You're going to look like a bunch of jerks. You have to dominate. (Donald Trump, during call to governors, June 1, 2020)It is another in an unceasing series of mind-twisting, soul-crushing events. Time shrinks, and it is incredible to consider the last three months: coronavirus, financial crash, pandemic, lockdown, armed 're-open' protests, record unemployment, a self-medicating president, locusts, murder hornets, a super-cyclone, racially-suspect police brutality and killings, protests against racism and police brutality, looting, more police brutality, more protests against racism and police brutality, loss of autonomy in Hong Kong, a 20,000 ton Arctic oil spill, mass graves, nation-wide memorials and funerals, and (now) executive threats of martial law.
dominate (dŏm′ə-nāt″), intransitive verb. to control, govern, or rule by superior authority or power; to exert a supreme, guiding influence on or over
Less than three months, really.
We arrive at this symbolic nadir after peaceful protesters are driven off by military police using rubber bullets, grenades, and tear gas. Trump stands in front of St John's Church and holds 'a bible' – upside-down. He does not go to a church to pray for the nation's pain; he does not bring a bible to read, or look within it to find words of comfort. Just stands there. Props up 'a bible'. Convenes his cohorts. Shushes the press.
Way to dominate. Definitely don't look like a bunch of jerks. Oh, and happy birthday.
I still intend this blog to act as a memory piece, as much for myself as for others. I may look back on nearly fifteen years, and over twenty on my old web site. But now, I cannot go back three months and process or document all that has happened. Like Prime Minister Trudeau's twenty-one seconds, I am wordless, immobilized – in horror and consternation.
If we could go back, how would we prepare ourselves? Comic writer-actor Julie Nolke posted a parody video of her April-self mocking her January-self, only to need a 'Part 2' video of her June-self mocking her April-self. What will her August-self have to say?
In terms of listening to your future self, a more poignant example is this passionate, inter-generational exchange between African-American men during protests in Charlotte, North Carolina, showing the accumulated heartache from forty-five, to thirty-one, to sixteen years. After decades of fruitless demonstration, including some violent retaliation, Curtis Hayes, Jr, implores those gathered to come up with a better way.
On the pandemic ticker, Portugal is now down to thirtieth place in terms of cases, having been passed by Singapore, South Africa, and Columbia; Egypt may knock Portugal out of the top-thirty next week.
cases: 6,735,174 global • 1,925,267 USA • 33,969 Portugal
deaths: 393,760 global • 110,218 USA • 1,465 Portugal
Curtis Hayes, Jr., 31, and Raymon Curry, 16. (Logan Cyrus)
UPDATE: NBC News caught up with the young man in the Charlotte video, sixteen year-old Raymond Curry. If Trump's favorite Bible quote is the Old Testament's "eye for an eye", it seems Curry may have learned, at that moment, the better verse with that quote from the Sermon on the Mount – offer the other cheek. Let this give us hope that he will, we all will, find a better way.
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