Listics

Some of my best friends are Mormons… okay, that’s a lie. Some of my best friends are “Jack Mormons?” Perhaps not even that. Jack Mormons are friendly to Mormonism, Mormons themselves who have perhaps fallen away. Since the Mormon branch of quasi fundie Xtianity is closer to Scientology than most of us care to admit and even those who were raised in Mormon territory and have relatives in thrall to that particular flavor of irrationality find it harder and harder to tolerate a cult-like organization that requires young people to hit the streets in hinky looking shirts and ties, feet blistering in uncomfortable scuffed black leather lace-up shoes with toe caps from the JC Penney Florsheim collection, bothering people by knocking on their doors at odd hours on a Saturday.

Intolerant? Yes. I think it’s time to cease tolerating jack-ass assertions of moral rectitude from public figures whose common denominator is bizarre religious fundamentalism, greed, fear, and nailing Mexicans at the border. Big media, in the pay of the fundamentalist corporate axis has waterboarded the country for decades on this religious tolerance issue. Our country has been submerged in a pervasive, all encompassing emulation of the Asch Conformity Experiment to the end of short circuiting reason around issues of fundamentalism and religious tolerance.

But it’s not just about god and some brazen grandson of a polygamous Mexican Mormon exile’s desire to embrace stem cell research if the First Presidency and the Twelve Apostles give their, umm… blessing. Abortion, stem cells, homosexual marriage, illegal aliens… these are the freebie issues, the big ticket items that draw in the fundie conformists and won’t cost a dime. Bigotry and hatred cost nothing. But Romney is a subtle fuck. Operating from the premise that Americans have been roped into the free market myths, that all is forgiven from the good old days when the Pinkertons shot up the workers and the Peabody coal company buried the union men alive, believing somehow that all of us have forgotten the reasons behind the union movement, the anti-trust legislation, the fear of monopoly, American BigCos are running this Romney dude as the stealth candidate.

On the war, on health care, on national security, on climate change, on energy programs Romney is more nuanced than his opponents and, as an individual, arguably less greedy rapacious and downright evil. Nevertheless, his reliance on the good old invisible hand to achieve postive outcomes when the wizards of corporate finance have long since had that puppet dancing on their string makes him appear either credulous and naive, an absurd optimist, or a bald-faced liar. I tend toward the “optimistic doofus” scenario, where Romney is a candidate who is being played by Rio Tinto and Peabody Energy, by the oil cartel, and by the rest of the global corporate apparatus.

Romney addresses the health care crisis through block grants, deregulation, capping malpractice liability, and applying “free market principles present elsewhere in our economy [to] help to drive the same innovation, quality, and efficiency that we enjoy in our other products and services.” He says this without a hint of irony. I might vote for him if he came out against smokers and fat people.