Friday, November 04, 2016

The Donald and John Frum: Ruminations on the Modern Cargo Cult.



Didja ever hear about cargo cults? It's an interesting story that has implications for the present political campaigns in general and the candidacy of Herr Drumpf, the Gauleiter of Atlantic City.
The phenomenon was first observed in fairly primitive societies in New Guinea, when American and Anzac troops arrived during world war 2. The Americans had great silver birds that dropped from the sky, disgorging all sorts of goodies unlike folks had ever seen before.

One of the most remarkable things they saw was white boxes, that when opened produced bottles of ice cold beer. Of course these were kerosene powered refrigerators like Maw had down on the farm but nevermind. It was magic.

Well. The Japanese war machine got smashed into very tiny bits of rubble along with a few cities, and they (the Japanese) decided that this whole project of world domination and the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere as they called it was a big mistake.

The Americans and Anzacs left as well, and all of a sudden there were no more silver birds disgorging goodies and white painted boxes dispensing bottles of cold beer. What were the people of Vanuatu to do?
Why, they hand cut airstrips in the jungle and made boxes and painted them white in the belief that the great silver birds and free beer would reappear and make Vanuatu great again.

Of course it didn't happen and a lot of people thought that was a failure of faith and a matter of sin so they'd have to pray harder and run the heretics off. Finger pointing was the order of the day.

Of such material are the true believers in Trumpism. He's told them, "elect me, and I will make those horrible brown people go somewhere, you'll all be getting your $30 an hour jobs back in the coal mines that will appear like magic, women will be admitted to the party based only on tits and ass, no homos need apply, and you can take your AR15 to church if you like. Don't forget to drive your monster truck over some negroes on the way."

It's a cargo cult.

None of Trump's promised things will happen. There will be no great silver birds, refrigerators full of cold beer, or wall paid for by Mexicans. Hilary Clinton will not get so much as a $25 fine for her emails.

The Donald has already preloaded the scenario that will perpetuate his cargo cult by saying that the election is pre-rigged against him and his followers, before it is even held.

They already believe it, just as the residents of Vanuatu are convinced that one day the Americans will arrive once again in their great silver birds disgorging cases of ice cold beer, and they will believe it long after the Clinton administration is a vague memory of something unpleasant that happened long ago that they can't remember, and that John Frum will return most any time now.

1 Comments:

At 7:37 PM, Blogger Robert Luedeman semi retired attorney and amp mechanic said...

Boy, was I ever wrong about this.

 

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