Today I was at a retail store and something I’ve never seen before happened. Mind you, I’ve seen riots in the 60’s. Killings. Protesters shooting it out with the police and holding a courthouse under seige for a week until the National Guard came in. But I’ve not seen a lynch mob spontaneously erupt until today. Someone mentioned the catastrophe in the Gulf. Someone else said that the BP Oil Execs should all be killed. Over 2 dozen people in that store all stopped what they were doing and began to agree. Someone said that if the government won’t kill them, the people of the United States should rise up and do it themselves. This got a lot of suddenly riled up people who only 30 seconds ago were quietly shopping to agree quite loudly and vocally. “Yeah! We should go down there and kill every goddamned one of them!” someone shouted and everyone agreed.
There was an 80 year old man agreeing. So were a couple of little old ladies. Young people and old, people from all walks of life were suddenly gathered around the checkout stand and they were all talking about the Gulf Catastrophe and what it meant and how they not only had had enough of the government kowtowing to the corporations but “goddamnit if the Government won’t execute them, we Americans should!”
This wasn’t in the middle of rural teabag country, this was in a Seattle suburb and I was surrounded by mostly left leaning, ordinary American citizens who had suddenly found that everyone else felt the same way they did and everyone in that store was PISSED.
No, Pissed doesn’t do their mood justice. They were outraged and FURIOUS and THEY WANTED BLOOD. They wanted the BP executives DEAD.
I thought to myself: so this is what a lynch mob looks like.
Now normally, I’d be aghast. But I remembered what Ghandi said. He said that his non-violent methods would have never worked against the fascists. He was right then and it’s still true today. Peace and Love are NOT going to save our planet from these monsters, these psychopaths who have risen to the top of the corporate world because mega-corporations themselves are psychopaths and only a psychopath could possibly run one successfully. So I found myself agreeing with them wholeheartedly. These creeps deserve to die for what they did and the government better damned well do it.
I wonder if this scene has repeated itself elsewhere in the nation? Is this nation on the edge of exploding in rage at our politicians and the corporate masters who own them?
I think America might be reaching its breaking point.
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At Supermarket yesterday in Columbia County, NY (25 mi sw of Albany, on Massachusetts border) in seafood department. Customers discussing shrimp, crab, fish. One, who in no respect was a T-bagger or DFH, said, “You know, BP has destroyed the Gulf and all these creatures are dying. They should be shot.” Nods all around. “Yeah,” somebody else said, “it’s disgraceful.” I think at this point it’s the universal sentiment.
Personally, I’d like to see them arrested, perp walked, indicted, tried, convicted, and sentenced to prison. I’m still opposed to the death penalty for all crimes, as I have been for decades. But I can see that as this continues, others are going to be severely tested.
Corporate executives will keep doing what they do until somebody stops them. The government will not and, btw, simply cannot.
Still, such feeling come and go. In the end Americans go back to their jobs and shuffle their feet and bow their heads. We’ve become a nation of sheep willing to be slaughtered as long as the system offers us comforting and tittilating fantasies and/or drugs.
We have lost the fierce independent and fearless character that once was occasionally seen in this country. We’re mainly cowards–big talk, no action. It might happen on the right though–the only people left with courage I suspect. I’m deeply ashamed of the left.