Have you ever noticed
how nation-states
and empires in particular
politicize everyday
life, mess with your head?
Believe this, don't
believe that; listen
to what we say; don't
dare investigate
our slimy secrets?
A filthy dictatorship
is good for your soul
because
evil in black and white
rouses
decent people
to righteous resistance.
You know where you stand.
At home, among friends,
in the half light
and the hypocricy,
amid the general confusion
and a childish wish to believe
in Santa, measured
against moderate
disapproval of extremes,
the sleepless
ambitious manipulators
find the room to play
with our illusions,
our good faith,
our laziness,
and so insist
we support them,
even collaborate
in their will to power,
their urge to kill.
War is always
a bad sign: outer-directed
violence soon redirects
upon the home population:
keep a weather eye
on the process of detention
(habeas corpus!!)
as the hardwon rights
of several centuries
melt away
in spite of your careless
sense of safety.
Nobody is safe.
You won't be flying today, ma'am.
Excuse me? Why not?
I'm not allowed to tell you.
Sooner or later
we can anticipate
prosecution
for political opposition,
perhaps even
spine-tingling
judicial executions.
Never, never happen here!!!!!
Don't be stupid.
Check out the real history
of so-called
"national emergencies"
starting with
The Civil War.
The government
doesn't need a legal basis
to come after you.
It will when it wants to.
The Molly Maguires,
the Spanish-American war,
the Wobblies (International Workers of the World),
Eugene Debs,
the First World War,
the Red Scare of 1919,
World War Two,
the McCarthy hearings,
Vietnam,
Daniel Ellsberg,
and now ....
direct from Washington
brought to your own living room --
The Global (boom)
War (boom)
on Terror!!! (cymbals, boom).
Here we go
Here we go
(again).
