Fuck the Poor

I've known for years that it's pointless to try to turn somebody's head around about poor people; but that's not gonna stop me from trying. I also know that I'm not necessarily in the minority; most folks in this country have been indoctrinated by religion, so they're predisposed to have compassion for the poor. It's only an unfortunate few that have been indoctrinated by Ayn Rand, and thus have contempt for the poor. Notice I don't preclude myself from the ranks of the indoctrinated; we are all indoctrinated into one set of assumptions or another. The real point is how you behave in your everyday life; in other words, what kind of human are you?

Yes, the real point is how you act. "By their acts shall ye know them", or so says Scripture. I am extremely agnostic, personally, and something of a commie besides (thanks, Mom!); but I still find it useful to borrow the conceits of religion, in that they are so pithy and descriptive. Even as committed an atheist as Sartre makes the same point- the challenge, he said, was to be good without God. And I agree! I have great hopes for the future because I think we as a race are beginning to throw off the shackles of religion and learn how to treat each other as human.

Which brings me to this utter bullshit that's flying around in the "political" sphere. I'm quite sickened by the haters on the airwaves; Blush/Reck, teabaggers, O'Rly, etc. But they are to be expected any time the culture breaks new ground. What chaps my hide even more are friends of mine that have swallowed the logic-free and inhumanly stupid rhetoric of Palin/Rand/etc., just so they can feel superior to people with nothing. I've been having a debate with old Marine Corps buddies, and a couple of them are having a grand old time trashing ACORN in the wake of the Bleck "expose". They try to defend their position as consistent with Randian "values", and say that they have no real obligation to help the poor. This makes me physically ill. It just blows my mind that a middle class person would think it o.k. to steal from those with less. My bud The Crack Emcee can safely be ignored in this debate, as his blog is nothing more than a rant against his ex-wife and the regurgitation of Republican talking points (an analysis of his site shows a ratio of about eighty percent links/quotes to twenty percent actual writing). And sadly, the comments of President Carter are also irrelevant; as John Legend just mentioned on Anderson Cooper's show, the accusation of racism may be accurate but it is a distraction. The teabaggers are desperate people that have been duped into being tools for the corporations. They've been duped into agitating against themselves, against their own best interests! "Government out of Medicare", indeed!