Suck it Progressives: Billionaires Won!!

From: The Intercept

With the nomination of Biden, a billionaire toadie, and Trump, a faux billionaire and billionaire lackey, the billionaires will rule the White House for four more years, regardless of who wins, Biden or Trump. Billionaires already control the media, the Congress, and the Supreme Court. How dare Bernie Bros try to destroy this beautiful symmetry and take the White House for THEM plebes, not US rich folks. We bankers, Wall Street investors, hedge fund managers, resource tycoons, and tech giants have bought this election; how dare Sanders and his ilk try to steal it from us! How dare these commies suggest that the wealth created by workers go to…workers. That surplus value from labor is much better spend on tax cuts for the rich, and Trump made it happen!

From Forbes.

After Biden won on Super Tuesday, health insurance stocks rose $40 billion dollars. And when the stock market goes up, that helps everyone, because I said so. Billionaires thank you for you continued support of our chosen candidates. Don’t worry, a vote for Biden or Trump means profits will eventually trickle down on workers from billionaires. Just vote for Biden, or Trump, and you will feel the trickle. Just be patient. Just wait for your reward. Besides, who else are you going to vote for, Republicans? Democracy means never having to make choices.

Thanks to god, the corporate media, and most of all, billionaires, the U.S. won’t have to live under the threat of universal healthcare in the near future. While it may be true that the cost of Medicare for All is less than our current health care plan, universal healthcare will hurt health insurers, pharmaceutical companies, medical device manufacturers, and so many people that it’s not worth saving average people money and providing healthcare to the undeserving masses. Just think of the profits to the 1% that would be lost if healthcare was available to everyone, especially during a pandemic.

Moreover, with Trump or Biden, banks holding student debt won’t have to worry about losing interest payments and control over college graduates living under the threat of bankruptcy. Wages will remain stagnant with elites running our government and that will help the bottom line of billionaires who had to sweat it out thinking they would have to part with even a dime in new taxes and giveaways, i.e. raises to workers!

Thanks to the patriotic billionaires who refuse to kowtow to the needs of homeless vets, the uninsured who die without healthcare, the needs of the planet (hell, the rich will be the LAST to die due to catastrophic climate change), our slide into feudalism will continue unabated.

Here’s why progressives lose:

1. They underestimate the selfishness of the U.S. voters. Granted, less than 30% percent of the people voted in primaries in 2016, and those high information voters are seduced to side with their oppressors to believe the messages in the corporate media outlets. In 2020, even fewer people are voting in primaries. These voters decide things for the rest of us. “The best democracy is the democracy decided by the powerful few,” said one connected lobbyist in the US Chamber of Commerce.
2. Progressives don’t vote out of fear, that’s why their candidates lose. If you vote for a better tomorrow, you will only be disappointed.
3. Caring for others and not just looking out for yourselves is a major pitfall of progressives. When you care for others, you assault billionaires with your share the wealth, everyone deserves not to starve, end homelessness, and stop death due to curable diseases dogma. Making the rich pay their share of the benefits they receive from U.S. infrastructure, educated workers, and military protection is down-right unpatriotic!

There you have it. Keep voting, because the choices billionaires give you have been vetted and they have nothing to lose.

Peace,
Tex Shelters

P.S. Coronavirus update: How dare Sanders continue to run in a time of the corona virus? Why does he hate America! It’s time to call the primaries for Biden and in fact, call the general for Trump. And this virus gives us an excuse to bail out companies with trillions in cash! Yes!

P.S.S. You want hope? Watch this Obama 2008 ad.

The Gaze of a Woman: Portrait of a Lady on Fire

Image from http://www.folketsbio.se

The film Portrait of a Lady on Fire harkens back to a time when marriages for women of means in Europe were arranged to better the economic and social status of their families. Women (but not poor women) were pawned off to wealthy men so the women’s families would be better off. Young women had no say in who they married in a vast majority of the cases, unless you joined the nunnery. Even queens were subject to marriage pressures, and only the strongest stood against it.

Some might label this film a romance, and it is a lovely one at that, but there is more at play here. The major theme is the oppression of women due to circumstances beyond their control. There are also questions of what it means to be authentic, and what is the true purpose of art. In the film, art is subverted to oppress the female subject of a portrait.

The two leads are as talented at acting as they are stunning to look at. The characters could have easily been maudlin, over wrought, or stilted. Thanks to the writing and acting, they were authentic from the start. The romance in this film makes sense, unlike other romances of this kind, such as Brokeback Mountain. The main characters’ back stories in Portrait are revealed and their needs are clear. Their relationship develops in steps that are logical. And frankly, the acting is far superior in this film to so many other stories of forbidden love. Yes Napoleon, the French can act!

While the film is slow, the details revealed about the characters lives and the tension between them, along with the fact that Portrait is amazing to look at, make this film work. Every shot is a visual masterwork full of lovely vignettes that mix light, land, air, and sea with the visage of the two main characters. The setting, an ancient mansion on an island near France in the 18th century, is part of the back drop, and it adds to the beauty and mystery of the film.

Rating: Pay Full Price. 
I like art, I like great visuals, I like dialogue with multiple connotations and meanings, and I like movies featuring people struggling with their natural desires against an oppressive society.

Peace,
Tex Shelters