Reflections on a Black Friday: 

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Sports versus Team Fandom – A sort of Ode

Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, has become an important commercial holiday, both to those who sell as to those who purchase, although it is also a reflection of the reality that prices have been unjustifiably high, at least in terms of equity and decency, than they ought to have been all year long.  Consumers are easily manipulated but no consumers are more easily manipulated and abused than sports fans, those “fanatics” who shell out trillions of dollars in attendance and viewing costs, memorabilia and incidentals, while the recipients (owners, not players) seem to snicker, and generally, to ignore them.

Being a fan is generally a passionate but passive activity, with frustration the most obvious aspect, especially when one is a team fan and the ownership views the team as business, rather than a hobby.  Consider the current New York Yankees as an excellent illustration.

When father George was at the helm, he was an owner and a fan concurrently, and, although a businessman, the fan aspect was paramount.  Indeed, he treated the massive ongoing investment in the team by the fans as a trust, and it was to the fans that he felt that owed the highest loyalty, although he was also loyal to the players and former players from whom he demanded so much, in so emotional a manner.  Even those he’d mercilessly bullied.

His son Hal, as in almost anything and everything, is a negative of his father whom he does not respect but from whom, everything he has, was inherited: a typical second generation syndrome.  Calm and profit oriented, the Yankees, to Hal, are primarily a vehicle operated for the benefit his creditors and investors, and it is to them, rather than to fans or players, that his loyalty is rendered.  And his chief advisor and operating officer, the aptly named Irishman, Brian Cashman, is his ideal henchmen.  Randy Levine, the Yankees president seems to be a seldom seen illusion, and apparently likes it that way.  While an extreme example, the model is not unique.

Yankees fans, the ideal illustration of “team” rather than “sport” fans, are for the most part, a masochist lot.  Vocal, emotional, passionate and pretty well informed, but kept at bay, carefully, by management trolls who infiltrate their social networks to support management decisions, suggesting that fandom is a permanent state whose prime virtue is loyalty to ownership.  In essence, Team fandom, in the view of ownership and its trolls, involves a sports variant on the “my country right or wrong” slogan that led the Germans to morph from liberal social leaders of the nineteenth century to the obedient masses who watched their values destroyed in the first half of the twentieth.

Team fandom is a strange but effective means of social control, diverting attention away from issues that really impact society and thus permitting a tiny elite, which now includes billionaire owners who also disproportionately exercise control over just about everything, to rule us all just as surely as if they collectively wore Sauron’s one ring.  But it is so addicting, that, notwithstanding acknowledging the foregoing – I’m a passionate Yankees’ and Jets’ fan.

Being a sport fan is quite a bit more rational and hardly masochistic at all.  One does not care who wins, only that the sport is brilliantly played.  It is much less passionate than team fandom and many team fans can enjoy that passive distraction too, when “their” teams (not theirs at all, fandom is not democratic) are not involved.

Fandom, a diversion that lets off steam so that the issues that impact our real lives can be safely obfuscated, manipulated and controlled.  Machiavelli would be proud.  He’d probably approve of Black Friday as well.

Go figure.

Anyway, Happy Black Friday!
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© Guillermo Calvo Mahé; Manizales, 2022; all rights reserved.  Please feel free to share with appropriate attribution.

Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen).  Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales.  He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies).  He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.

Thanksgiving 2022

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My reflections on the national holiday denominated Thanksgiving in the United States.

The concept seems beautiful.  A day on which to give thanks without asking for anything, just a general sense of gratitude directed at both our fellow men and women, and to a sense of the divine.  Unfortunately, it was a hypocritical concept since its inception set in stolen indigenous lands denominated New England by an intolerant and racist religious sect totally at odds with the humanitarian philosophy of the incarnate man, whom they judged divine and claimed to follow.  Of course, they were very much a reflection of the Romanized Jew, Saul of Tarsus, who changed his name to Paul, and who swiped the emergent innovative Hebrew religious variant right from under the noses of its progeny.

As a “Pauline” rather than “Nazarene” sect, the conduct of the Pilgrims was utterly predictable.  Orthodox hypocrisy followed by virtual genocide.  Still, the thought is beatific and noble even if its implementation by the Pilgrims and Puritans in general fell far from the mark.  But that does not, in any sense, mean we need to do the same.  Or, more accurately, to keep doing the same.  It would be awesome if on this day of thanksgiving we dedicated ourselves, not just to watching football games and stuffing ourselves, but to replacing polarization with empathy and to doing unto others as we would have them do to us; and to insisting on a peaceful world were swords are beaten into plowshares and equity and justice reign and truth is relevant; and if we did so, not tomorrow but today.

I wonder if resolutions need, for some reason, to be limited to the New Year.
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© Guillermo Calvo Mahé; Manizales, 2022; all rights reserved.  Please feel free to share with appropriate attribution.

Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen).  Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales.  He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies).  He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.

Introspections in Purples and Lavenders and Russets and Browns

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I wonder how purple and lavender get along?  One reflecting royal masculinity and the other, tender femininity, or so it seems to me.  Crimson, best friends with scarlet, also seems to get along well with gold.  But gold and yellow, perhaps not as much.  And with green, not at all, although yellow and green are the happiest reflections of nature’s lust.  At least, … so it seems to me.

For some reason, I’ve always insisted on keeping negative information to myself, as if by doing so, I were protecting others dear to me, perhaps hoping that, alone, I’ll manage to make things right. But, perhaps, in a related manner, I generally decline to revel in the positive, instead, keeping it discreet, as if by recognizing it, by giving it too much importance, it would prove illusory, or perhaps, … disperse. 

Not that I don’t experience instances of intense joy, but they are ephemeral, lasting but an instant, and then fading to pastel shades that quickly meld, camouflaged, into the quotidian.  Not really two sides of the same coin but, perhaps, in some sense, complimentary; discretely so.  I wonder how common these reactions are among others?  I wonder if I’ll ever

Russets and browns swaying in autumn winds, then slowly drifting to pool over sylvan toes.  Never wondering why, or worrying as to where they’ll next go.  I wonder what it would be like to be a leaf, enjoying the sun, safely ensconced on a twig, the twig on a branch, the branch on a trunk, a trunk with long, slender fingers twisting below.

I wonder what impact my surface subterfuge has on the chaotic inner me, where nothing is held back, where no masks are allowed.  An inner me I don’t think I’ve ever met.  One perhaps at war with the me that others see.  One where emotions and aspirations roam free of all constraints, where a kernel of the child I may once have been, perhaps, still esoterically runs free.

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© Guillermo Calvo Mahé; Manizales, 2022; all rights reserved.  Please feel free to share with appropriate attribution.

Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen).  Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales.  He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies).  He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.

Inquiries into Consequential Imagery

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If the Abrahamic divinity was infinite and eternal, why would it have attained an image on which to base our forms? 

And if it had an image, wouldn’t it be much more Zoroastrian, as in the myth of the “burning bush?  Were we to peer into a divine mirror, would we see fire’s reflection? 

Is that, perhaps, the nature of our souls, or perhaps our spirits?  And if so, what would we have to fear from the infernal?

Ethereal and ephemeral while concurrently ubiquitous and eternal, a mystery such as those of which religions are so fond.
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© Guillermo Calvo Mahé; Manizales, 2022; all rights reserved.  Please feel free to share with appropriate attribution.

Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen).  Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales.  He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies).  He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.

“Divinimorphic”

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“Divinimorphic”, an interesting hypothesis.  The obverse of anthropomorphic in the quest to contextualize the human-divine relationship, … whether real or fictional. 

It’s a term that should exist in the Abrahamic context if humans were made following a divine template, albeit, obviously, a deliberately imperfect template, which raises questions about what sort of divinity would strive for imperfection.  But the term apparently doesn’t exist, at least not yet.  What does that say about our religious studies programs?

Instead of “divinimorphism”, humans have seemingly anthropomorphized divinity, returning the favor by making our divinities imperfect as well.  A weird sort of symbiosis. 

So, “divinimorphic”, a neologism which ought to catch on.
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© Guillermo Calvo Mahé; Manizales, 2022; all rights reserved.  Please feel free to share with appropriate attribution.

Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen).  Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales.  He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies).  He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.

Here’s Hoping; …. Again

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I wonder at the relationship between black holes and entropy. 

Then I translate that into quotidian social dynamics and finally, perhaps seeking to ground the esoteric with that which by entertaining us, helps subjugate us, … into sports. 

Perhaps that’s because I’m watching Tom Brady, the all-time best performing quarterback who I despised while he was with the New England Patriots (I have been a Jets fan since their birth as the Titans), sort of implode after a few successful seasons with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.  It’s as though the Buc’s loosing tradition has slowly drained the positive energy Brady initially carried with him, leaving him, more or less, a frustrated husk as his teammates accentuate the power of their mediocracy over his talent and charisma.  The Green Bay Packers and Aaron Rogers are a different story.  The team has deteriorated around Rogers, and age has taken its toll on him, but the magic still manages to shine through, at least from time to time.  Which somehow, in a convoluted fashion, brings me to my Jets, or rather, the Jets I share with millions of frustrated fans, waiting for Lucy to once more pull the ball away as Charley Brown tries for the ever-elusive field goal.

Many decades ago, most of us Jets fans, new at the time, it was early 1969, still believing in providence, begged for just one victory, after which, we agreed, we’d understand if we’d never again enjoy the privilege of asking for divine boons, at least in professional American football.  Evidently, if the Divine exists, he, she, it or they have a sense of humor and a close working relationship with a fellow by the name of Murphy.  At least most of us have always assumed it’s a he, but it might well be a she, or perhaps it’s androgynous, or plural.  We got our wish and, in the ensuing fifty-three years, have been paying off that open ended debt. 

Apparently, at least from today’s perspective, we were young and foolish on that January 12 in 1969 at the old Orange Bowl in Miami, Florida.  But then, given our nature, had we to do it all over again, we’d probably make that same deal despite the trail of ensuing tears, curses, lamentations and complaints.  It’s not so bad when our team is just uniformly terrible, it’s when it shows sparks of brilliance and raises our hopes, only to tumble them time after time that Murphy gets his, her, its or their kicks.  Perhaps we should consider drafting a quarterback named Murphy, and perhaps linebackers, cornerbacks and safeties named Murphy. That might at least confuse him, her, it or them, at least for enough time to let us sneak one more super bowl victory in.

Thinks look surprisingly good for our Jets this year and Lucy seems to be promising that she’s reformed, and the Jets do have a few Murphies: there’s Kevin (assistant director of pro personnel) and Tom (vice president, information technology) on the staff, but I know of no others.  So, just like Charley Brown, I and many other Jets fans are hopeful, optimistic, excited this year, … but a bit wary.  But then there’s the issue of black holes and entropy, and unfortunately, a somewhat negative tradition.

Still Joe Namath and company were awesome, and there’s never been a professional football game as important as Super Bowl III, and the AFL may have disappeared after that game, but it’s alive and well in some sort of sports Valhalla that echoes in our hearts.  And this team’s coaches seem different, as do the players, well, at least most of them.

Sooo; anyway:

Here’s hoping; .…

Again.
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© Guillermo Calvo Mahé; Manizales, 2022; all rights reserved.  Please feel free to share with appropriate attribution.

Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen).  Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales.  He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies).  He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.

Day Four Following the 2022 United States Elections: A Mystery Wrapped in an Enigma, … Again

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Editorial cartoon, in another context, from CentralMaine.com.

Many things are possible and few are really certain, unless we ourselves are directly involved; still, there are circumstances that raise doubts, and doubts that may involve probabilities. And the negative probabilities tend to be accurate an unfortunate majority of the time.

As a neutral observer in the sibling political rivalries that engulf the United States (I despise both major political parties) between two groups which, failing to listen to each other, fail to realize how unfortunately alike (for everyone else in the world) they are, the scent of chicanery is overwhelming in the delays involved in the counting of votes in several states during the recent elections, elections which in almost any other part of the world would have concluded on the day they initiated but which, in the western portion of the United States, as they did four years ago, have yet to be decided … now four days later.

This occurred in the Republic of Colombia (where I now reside, although I am a citizen of the United States) in 1972, and it involved a stolen election which led to a long and bitter insurgency, one in which, ironically, Colombia’s current president was a participant. During the electoral delays involved, vast quantities of mysterious votes kept appearing after the votes should have been counted, votes which appeared to turn the tide, and which, in fact, proved decisive. Perhaps that history makes me understand the lack of faith which many participants in United States elections have in the veracity of their own results. Even more, the refusal of authorities in all branches of government to seriously investigate the delays and the ensuing reversals of fortune, instead of putting the matter to rest, unfortunately lend credibility to allegations of electoral fraud, despite a massive, ongoing media campaign to cast “election deniers” as dangerous and eccentric lunatics, probably violent, but in any case, too deranged to ever be permitted to vote again and certainly not fit to run for political office.

Not that fraud (or at least more fraud than is traditional) was actually involved, or that improprieties, if any, were enough to impact the results; but the appearance of the possibility of electoral improprieties answered only by slandering and ridiculing of those aggrieved shakes the faith essential for a functioning democracy, and in fact, encourages those who feel that they’ve been denied justice to either mimic the tactics they believe were practiced against them, or at least as bad, to resort to violence, as occurred in Colombia in 1972.

The United States has, during the entirety of this millennium, alleged that elections elsewhere were fraudulent. I’ll use the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela as an example. Notwithstanding international observers and prompt electoral counts as well as unexpected victories by those internally alleging fraud, “election denial” in that resource rich but impoverished country, elections there have been “certified” as fraudulent by the United States and its allies, without the benefit of any sort of due process, and what’s more, in the total absence of jurisdiction. Those denials of legitimacy have in fact been used by the United States and its allies as pretexts to steal that country’s gold reserves, cash, oil, and large corporate assets. Given the foregoing, why is it virtually impossible to understand the feelings of those citizens of the United States who earnestly believe that United States elections lack legitimacy, that the government currently in place lacks validity, and that it is their political duty, especially if they’ve taken oaths to uphold the United States Constitution, to take steps to correct that situation? They may well be wrong, but is their conduct really criminal? Doesn’t the freedom of expression guaranteed in the 1st Amendment to that Constitution also protect a right to believe what you will? Even if you’re wrong? Especially in a scheme of things filled by as much duplicity and manipulation as are United States elections.

No wonder United States citizens are utterly polarized, confused and dissatisfied, almost always immediately regretting their own voting decisions, in elections where campaign pledges are acknowledged to merely involve poorly written and poorly thought-out creative fiction. Were it not for the overwhelming imbalance of paramilitary power enjoyed by the state within a state that actually governs the United States, I would fear the likelihood of a new civil war. But I don’t. It would be short and utterly futile.

Perhaps it’s better that democracy in the United States is a fallacy. Elections seem meaningless anyway, fraud or no fraud (as Donald Trump ought to know by now but refuses to acknowledge). So, … what does a bit of “necessary” electoral chicanery matter, … if it in fact exists.

Ineptitude all too frequently smells just like corruption, while corruption finds excellent camouflage in apparent ineptitude.

The American West, what a fascinating place. Apparently as wild and wooly as ever. 
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© Guillermo Calvo Mahé; Manizales, 2022; all rights reserved.  Please feel free to share with appropriate attribution.

Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen).  Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales.  He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies).  He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.

Perversion of the Electoral System and Electoral Deniers, Now an American Tradition

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Donald Trump is, as the old phrase goes, “a riddle wrapped in an enigma”, but a very boisterous, pompous and unpleasant riddle.  However, he is not the criminal his enemies portray, whether in politics or the press.  And he was far from administratively inept, in fact, his instincts for demilitarization (except on behalf Israel, admittedly) and for avoiding international military conflict and for redirecting “defense” related expenditures towards social programs and infrastructure were down right progressive.  Much more progressive than the performance of those who purported progressives managed to ensconce in his place.  As in the case of Richard Millhouse Nixon, history is unlikely to be kind to Donald Trump, which says much more concerning the lack of veracity and ethics among historians and journalist than it will say about Mr. Trump.

The ruthlessness and perversion of the Deep State’s minions in the Democratic Party and the corporate media have converted the populist threat posed by Mr. Trump into a useful electoral tool, as the article published in Fox News (admittedly a non-objective right wing organization) on November 10, 2022 (this morning as I write) entitled “CLEAN SWEEP: Democratic meddling in GOP primaries paid off in a big way on Election Day” makes clear.  Truth and accuracy being irrelevant and engaging in that of which one accuses others as a preemptive defense against criticism is a powerful offensive weapon, and, well, … sort of fun.  Dishonesty has become standard policy in politics, especially from the Deep State, erroneously self-identified as the left, or as liberal or as progressive.  No tactic is unacceptable as long as it works and fooling the electorate has become an art form, and again, sort of fun as well.

Frustrated victims smell the broad spectrum of electoral fraud to which they’ve been subjected but, given the Deep State’s control of the judicial system and the administrative bureaucracy, complaints are as futile as is resistance to the fictional Borg.  In fact, it will only result in being labeled an “election denier”, a new pejorative catch phrase that denoted stupidity coupled with malevolence and fascist proclivities.  In many cases it is possible that some of those so labeled fit that description, or are very wrong in their beliefs, but being wrong is not the same as lying, and the saying “the lady doth protest too much” would seem to apply, not to them, but to those in politics and in the media who label them as such, making it see, at least likely, that there is indeed something to hide, something sinister and inappropriate, something unethical and immoral.

As an academic and political analyst I recently participated in an international forum on the nature of corruption, sponsored by the Facultad Interamericana de Litigación A.C., Barra Interamericana de Abogados A.C., which included speakers from Argentina, Paraguay, Peru, México, Guatemala, Ecuador, Venezuela, Colombia, Uruguay, Spain, Brazil, Nicaragua, Cuba, El Salvador, Honduras, Panamá and Costa Rica.  I was one of five speakers representing Colombia.  Thus I have some knowledge concerning the nature of corruption and the tactics used to implement and obfuscate corrupt practices.  Practices one can frequently almost smell, but which are difficult to “prove”, especially when those responsible for preventing them are either inept or actively collisional.  And unfortunately, the latter is the usual case in all aspects of corruption.  But never more so than when corruption involves politics.  As another saying goes, “something smells rotten in Denmark”, and it’s not the cheese, but then again, it’s not emanating from Denmark.

In my experience when it comes to corruption, apparent ineptitude, disorganization and confusion are actually the signs of very clever dishonesty, usually successful.  Then again, sometimes it really is ineptitude, disorganization and confusion, which is what makes them so useful as camouflage.  As I write this I imagine the fictional Vinnie Barbarino from the old program, “Welcome Back Kotter”, uttering his catch phrase, … “I’m so confused”!  Many good United States citizens are confused today but also angry at the ineptitude of those charged with safeguarding the integrity of elections, and the appearance of possible improprieties they generate, especially, today, in the State of Arizona where results of elections held on November 8 are not yet available.  Especially given the ethical improprieties disclosed in the above cited Fox News article.  That such activities are unethical, immoral but not illegal says a great deal about the United States political system.

In the Republic of Colombia, where I currently reside (although I am a United States citizen), I have worked alongside several organizations dedicated to rooting out and minimizing electoral corruption.  Minimizing rather than eliminating it because we are aware that corruption, including political and electoral corruption, is ubiquitous.  The one certainty is that those who claim there was absolutely no electoral fraud in any large scale election in the United States are either incredibly naïve or collusive in obscuring it.  Because we want to minimize corruption in Colombia, we take fairly simple safeguards akin to protecting chains of evidence in penal proceedings.  Ballots are only available at polling places at the time set for voting and are provided only to the voters themselves, subject to their providing officially issued picture identification, which also includes fingerprints and signatures, and requires that the voter acknowledge receipt of the ballot by signing for it, and that he or she promptly return the executed ballot prior to departing from the polling station.  All of the foregoing is deemed essential in order to avoid a market in votes through the purchase and sale of ballots, and the use of counterfeit ballots.  Since 2016, the United States has taken a very different path, purportedly in the name of “democracy”.  Ballots are now often mailed out in mass and collected anonymously in “drop boxes.  To us in much of the world, that seems either amazingly naïve or cleverly facilitative of corruption.  Thus we can understand how electoral results may seem suspect to normally intelligent decent citizens in the United States.  Those lambasted and publicly shamed there by the corporate media as “election deniers”.

In Colombia and in almost the entire world, outside of the United States, electoral results are tabulated, posted and certified a few hours after elections.  And delays are viewed with a great deal of suspicion.  Such suspicion is deemed not only healthy but essential to protect the integrity of electoral processes.  In the United States, criticism of electoral delays and irregularity is deemed almost akin to treason.  Very, very strange.  But then again, the financing of campaigns to sabotage the candidate selection process is not deemed here (and elsewhere) as merely, “boys and girls will be boys and girls and they’re just having fun”, though fun it may seem.  Such activities here would be deemed criminal.

Something on which to reflect as the United States awaits electoral results, several days late, from Maricopa County, Arizona.
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© Guillermo Calvo Mahé; Manizales, 2022; all rights reserved.  Please feel free to share with appropriate attribution.

Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen).  Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales.  He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies).  He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.

Post-Election Hangover, 2022

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It’s the morning of November 9, 2022.  I feel as though I have a hangover although I’ve not indulged in any intoxicants recently, I rarely do.  But I watched last night’s election returns and that is undoubtedly the cause.

I watched them primarily on CNN International, switching periodically to Fox News, both available where I currently reside, in the Republic of Colombia.  My email to the Marion County Florida Board of Elections advising that I had not received my promised mail in ballot, purportedly mailed to me on September 23, went unanswered so, like other United States citizens here who I know (and probably elsewhere), our duty to vote went unexercised, although the dearth of adequate candidates might well have made that right irrelevant, if not meaningless.  That adds to my suspicions about the efficacy and integrity of United States elections, at least as compared to elections elsewhere.  For example, Colombia and its neighbors have reliable electoral results available in hours, through a process that requires official voter identification and the collection of ballots only from voters, and in official polling places.  We still experience some electoral fraud, and vote selling and buying is still difficult to stamp out, but it is minimized.  In the United States, how can anyone know?  It’s somewhat of a mystery to us here. 

Post electoral exit polls indicated deep displeasure with the status quo and the Biden administration, but apparently, fear of Donald Trump, who was not a candidate, and a desperate need to protect the “right” of women to abort unwanted progeny proved more important than concerns about inflation, the economy or an impending nuclear holocaust.  While that may seem incoherent, United States voters have their priorities and are as gullible and short sighted as ever, although perhaps that criticism needs to be tampered with an acknowledgement that the corporate media fulfilled its duty to assure that almost no one was aware that third party and independent candidate options were available, except perhaps for voters in the States of Georgia and Oregon, where available options were beaten down.  Both major political parties have claimed victory, actual and symbolic, but for the electorate, at least from my perspective, all such victories are utterly Pyrrhic. 

I primarily watched the results on CNN because the analysis seemed better and more timely, albeit utterly lacking in objectivity, with insults and taunts pretty much the rule.  Fox news was more civil, but not any more objective.  I wonder what MSNBC was like?  I can’ get it here.  While pundits and purported journalists claim that the results are not yet clear, the reality is otherwise.  As is almost always the case in the modern era (post Second World War), the Deep State won and belligerency and lack of respect for international law will continue to be the rule, regardless of the consequences to common men, women and children in the United States and abroad, all in the name of generating profits for the very few.  Costs to others is no concern.  And of course, the Deep State’s most potent weapon, polarization was as effective as ever.  No empathy wanted here!!!!

I saw a very negative reaction to last night’s elections in a right-wing publication (ReTalk Newsletter, November 9, 2022, available at https://retalk.com/c/us-politics/election-4?utm_source=email&utm_campaign=topposts&utm_medium=email&rtmid=20c439ff35ac1637522d0d598c125137), a post from someone deeply offended by the results, who wrote “This should have been a blowout by republicans. We have experienced 2 years of disastrous policies and yet ugly pieces of shit like fetterman [sic] are elected. There is something terribly wrong with the democrats. Either they are truly insane and want to see this country destroyed or they are just plain ignorant morons. To all the fucking morons out there who voted for any democrat I hope enjoy your reduced standard of living you stupid bastards!!!”

I replied to that post noting that insults and ridicule rarely if ever change minds and hearts, and that that’s what was needed.  That a fundamental paradigm shift was essential towards respect and a quest for accuracy, with a willingness to change perspectives based on re-evaluating those that have proved ineffective; all seasoned with plenty of empathy, something apparently totally lacking.  I of course doubt that my reply will be taken into account, other than perhaps through some sort of ridicule.  Other perspectives, while diametrically opposed, were virtually identical in tenor if not in substance, indicating that somehow the election had saved United States democracy from traitorous “election deniers”, ignoring the reality that United States democracy exists only as a delusional illusion but that liberty gives everyone the right to opine on critical public issues, whether they are right or wrong in their observations.  Again, insults and ridicule were the preferred means of communication.  Which is exactly what the Deep State favors, “polarization and hate uber alles”, perhaps seasoned with a bit of violence which can then be manipulated, distorted and decried in a flood of crocodile tears.  In essence, it appears that traditional Republicans and all Democrats agree that the electoral results were shaped by former president Donald Trump somehow, and that the GOP needs to comply with Deep State demands to prevent him, not only from running for public office, but even from expressing himself, … for everyone’s good.  Such is the concept of civil rights and liberty now sweeping the airwaves, a message very likely to be endlessly repeated, at least during the following two years.  Hopefully (according to them), the “Biden Justice Department and attorneys general in New York and Georgia, will soon see to that.

As Yakov Smirnoff noted decades ago “America!  What a country!”

Is it any wonder that I woke feeling hung over?  I’m pretty sure that hangovers are a pandemic this morning, and one without any cure in sight.
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© Guillermo Calvo Mahé; Manizales, 2022; all rights reserved.  Please feel free to share with appropriate attribution.

Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen).  Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales.  He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies).  He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.

Some Thoughts on November 8, 2022

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It’s November 7, 2022, a Monday, and I’m wondering what I’ll be thinking two days from now.  What I might write.  How I might reflect on what happened and why.  How free I’ll feel about sharing it, considering where Julian Assange languishes, … and why.  But, this is how I feel today.

As I am not currently in the United States, I vote through absentee ballot after having fulfilled all requirements therefor in Marion County, Florida, my last place of residence in the United States.  I’ve voted this way for over a decade and have not had a problem, until now.  This year, for whatever reason, my absentee ballot did not arrive.  I’m hoping someone else doesn’t have it and if they’ve somehow acquired it, that they won’t be turning it in.  That is a frequent phenomenon in many parts of the world, Colombia (where I currently reside) included.  But we spend a great deal of effort seeking to insure electoral integrity and minimization of electoral corruption and fraud.  Not an easy task, but we try.  In the United States today, … not so much.  Voting in the United States has become something of a crapshoot lately but apparently, nothing can be done about that, at least not now.  And United States midterm elections are tomorrow.

As usual, polarization and fear seem to be the main tools being used to drive voters to the polls.  It’s all about the monsters, bigots and racists who make up half of our population; not about issues (other than abortion and gun rights, the old standbys) … or performance.  “Please, leave memory and logic safely locked away in the basement or attic, or somewhere else you don’t frequent.  Do not, for any reason, use them when making electoral decisions”.  Trust your emotions, those that have been manipulated by the corporate media and through armies of internet trolls for the last decade, and through the thousands of direct email appeals made to you by earnest candidates seeking just a few more of your hard earned dollars, in order to “save democracy”.

This is another election for voting against something amorphous (a greater evil) instead of something in which we believe, and above all, for ignoring facts.  Facts such as: war in the Ukraine and attempts to stoke war with China by leaders who disdain military service for themselves and their families; economic sanctions imposed by our government against others that hurt us as much as the targets (unless they’re much weaker than we are, then, who cares about suffering by the people, weapons sales are what count).  And what about healthcare for all, a guaranteed minimum income, free education, infrastructure repair?  Remember those issues from two years ago?  Sorry, the money for that has been sent to the Ukraine so it can buy weapons from our “defense” industry.  Nuclear war?  Is it really worth the risk just so our wealthiest can get wealthier?  Apparently so.  And how about liberty at home, the right to make personal decisions about what we put in our bodies, or the right to opine freely (free of censorship), how’s that going?  And the economy and inflation, and how the world perceives the United States?

I find it amazing how lightly we heed Albert Einstein’s observation concerning insanity, you know “continuing to do the same thing but anticipating different results”. Lemmings are apparently our heroes.  Perhaps this time those currently in control of our federal government (those we elect but also those who run “our” all-powerful unelected bureaucracy) really do have our best interests at heart and are not, like Lucy in the comic strip Peanuts (when acting as a football placeholder for Linus), just waiting to fool us again.  Of course, if one believes the foregoing, then (a), there are several bridges for sale at bargain prices one might invest in; and, (b), there are Arab billionaires so grateful for the understanding of United States’ citizens in keeping them in power, who, if you will just send them your banking data and passwords, will deposit a million or so dollars in your account.

We have different opinions concerning policies that we believe will best attain sociopolitical goals that best suit our priorities, but for the most part, we share common goals, no matter how political leaders seek to polarize and manipulate us.  We want to be personally and economically secure; we want to live in a world at peace where different societies are free to make their own decisions, free of meddling and especially free of invasion and occupation; we want to avoid violence at all levels; we want access to fair and equitable systems of conflict resolution that respect our legal rights; we want to be free to express our opinions, even if we’re wrong; and we want to be free of intrusive government interference with our lives.  Our political institutions, which supposedly combine democracy with liberty and minority rights (three incompatible concepts), are supposedly operated based on our electoral decisions, although in reality, our electoral options are limited by a rigid, albeit informal, two party dictatorship, which, with the essential assistance of the corporate media, limits who our choices as candidates will be.  That frustrates us, but apparently, not enough to do anything about it, thus, rendering us insane, at least according to Einstein.  That’s because we have been brainwashed into believing that we can’t change the system.  If we can’ fight city hall”, how much less powerful are we with respect to the federal government.  Just ask Donald Trump or Tulsi Gabbard or Dennis Kucinich?

But here’s something to consider today, in light of tomorrow’s elections, and if it seems reasonable to you, to implement tomorrow: If you can’t vote for either the current batch of self-serving, corrupt autocrats or for the major party opposition to the current batch of self-serving, corrupt autocrats (i.e., the Democrats or the GOP), then consider third parties and independents.  There are plenty of great candidates there.  Don’t become an accessary to the misery those currently in power are generating for people everywhere; or to the hate and polarization they’re causing, dividing us by race and gender and sexual orientation and nationality and attitudes towards religion, while they claim it’s their opponents who are responsible for all the foregoing.

Don’t waste your votes again.  Misusing them is even worse than not using them.

This is a message I’ve been sharing every electoral cycle for decades which, in my naïve optimism, may mean that I’m as crazy as those who keep voting for the same rascals hoping that, this time, they’ve changed their spots for stripes, or vice versa.

Something to ponder as today morphs into tomorrow, and with which you’ll have to live long after tomorrow’s elections are history, or perhaps just literary fiction.
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© Guillermo Calvo Mahé; Manizales, 2022; all rights reserved.  Please feel free to share with appropriate attribution.  Oh hell, plagiarize it if you want!!!

Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen).  Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales.  He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies).  He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.