republicans | The Direction of Intention

Call It What It Is [on Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on October 28, 2020 by davidrobinsoncreative

If you are disgusted and surprised by the Republican senators’ hypocritical jamming through of the nomination of Amy Coney Barret to the Supreme Court then it’s a good bet you don’t live in Wisconsin. Life in Wisconsin is basic-training for the stomach-turning antics of modern day Republicans. Governance is nowhere on the agenda. If you lived in Wisconsin you’d be utterly surprised if belief in the democratic process was more than bloviated rhetoric by the party in red.

Consider this: in the midst of a global pandemic, with a national economic melt-down erasing jobs and driving folks from their homes, the Wisconsin Republican-led legislature simply refuses to meet. In 195 days they’ve managed to gavel open a few sessions called by the Democratic governor only to gavel them closed seconds later. They simply refuse to debate, collaborate, or compromise (the tools of governance). They’ve only one lonely tool in their sad little tool box: obstruction. They plug their ears and drown out all other voices. They can and do sue with ease, especially when reasonable minds and public health officials try to protect citizens from a deadly virus. The good-old-boys stop the process every time so it should come as no surprise that the seven day average of new cases in Wisconsin has jumped 405% in the past two months. Obstruction has a price.

The Wisconsin Republicans are famous for their 2011 gerrymandering the legislative map. The maps are so egregiously tipped [rigged] for Republican success that fair representation is nigh-on impossible. It’s their ball and they’ll play when they want to – and they’ll only play if they’re guaranteed a win. The Supreme Court is weighing in. Though, on this day, the Supremes, in a 5-3 decision, just ruled against a voter’s right to have mail-in ballots counted in the days following the election. Our neighborhood is pocked with signs demanding fair elections and fair legislative maps. Wish us luck and don’t hold your breath.

If you lived in Wisconsin you’d not be surprised by the shenanigans of the national Republican party that is gifted at obstruction but resistant to participation. The stack of legislation sitting on Mitch McConnell’s desk is legendary. In these past four years the red party’s enabling of the-pathological-liar-at-the-helm has undermined our system of governance and given us the sad experience of flailing during a pandemic. Who isn’t sickened to hear yet again “rounding the curve” while the numbers of deaths and infections skyrocket? Who isn’t sickened by the guys-in-ties defending the lie and the liar?

MM recently wrote that he is awakening to the reality that this nation, this government is not what he’s always assumed it to be. I suspect he’s not the only person having that revelation. We are routinely lectured by our leaders about ethics, values, the virtues of moral compass, fair play, responsibility to community. As Hamlet said to Polonius, “Words, words, words.”

Politics are ugly but we are no longer in the arena of politics. For that to be true, Republicans would have to once again believe in the democratic process. They would have to stand by their words.

It could happen. But it’s a good bet it won’t start in Wisconsin.

read Kerri’s blog post about DISHONEST PERIODS

Filed under: Flawed Wednesday, Perspective | Tagged: amy coney barrett, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democratic process, gerrymandering, governance, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, pandemic, politics, republicans, supreme court | 2 Comments »

Gag On It [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on May 11, 2020 by davidrobinsoncreative

“I was the only one wearing a mask.” Were you to have read this quote three months ago, you would have assumed I went to a masquerade party and I was the only one who showed up with a mask. Or, you might have guessed that I was about to recount an embarrassing Halloween story, “I mixed up my dates – it was October 30 – and I went to work wearing a costume.”

Three months. Meaning is now made through the pandemic lens. I went to the store. The parking lot was full. I went into the store and stopped as I entered. I was the only one wearing a mask. My cup of assumptions filled to the brim and spilled over. These people do not care.

In the best of times, meaning is made on a layer cake of assumptions. Assumptions are too easily generalized and thrust into the hard ground as fact. Assumptions are a wide net that catches mostly trash – which is to say that they snag very little of substance. They are nothing more than cake though, because they are mistaken for fact, they can be a deadly cake, indeed. A young black man went jogging. Need I say more?

Our current favorite assumption set is political. For instance, Ohio Governor, Mike DeWine, was asked in an interview why the nation is seeing a partisan divide in response to the pandemic. “Generally, Republicans are less inclined to have the government tell them what to do. And that’s generally how I am,” DeWine said.

I’m willing to wager that most Democrats are not fond of the government telling them what to do. The pro-choice movement is decidedly liberal and is essentially resistance to the government telling a woman what she can or cannot do with her body.

Here’s a safe assumption: none of us want the government telling us what to do. That is in the genetic strand of the American identity.

The nation is seeing a partisan divide in response to the pandemic because we are being force-fed oppositional narratives that demonize the other side. “They’re socialists trying to ruin the nation.” Or, “They are lazy and ignorant and cannot see how they’re being swung around by the nose.” Assumptions, assumptions everywhere!

As Horatio has said (and I have repeatedly borrowed) the narrative has always been schizophrenic and the divide goes like this: 1) Every man/woman for him/herself or 2) I am my brother’s/sister’s keeper. Do we care about the others in the populace or do we take care of our own needs? It is a false divide. It is an easy target for propaganda.

And what if taking care of our own needs included taking care of the needs of others. Wouldn’t we all be wearing a mask? Isn’t that the point of the mask? It is not worn to protect me but to protect you from me. What if the assumption – the safe assumption -was that we are all in this together? We are. What if, as I stood in the doorway of the store, the only person wearing a mask, I could have made another assumption? What assumption is it that I could have made?

Three short months and the word “mask” has become a line drawn in the pandemic sand, a symbol of community or is it a marker of our divide? No matter. Through this lens we can only cast a broad net of assumption and gag ourselves on the same giant piece of cake.

read Kerri’s blog post about THE ONLY ONE

jacob wrestling the angel

Filed under: Edges, Identity, Merely A Thought Monday, Perspective, Uncategorized | Tagged: assumption, assumptions, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democrats, divide, division, identity, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, mask, Mike DeWine, narrative, pandemic, propaganda, republicans, social distancing | Leave a comment »

Flawed Cartoon Wednesday

Posted on March 14, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

Your daily dose of chuckles from the melange on this hump day.

I have a symbolic suggestion or perhaps a suggestion on symbols. I think we ought to drop the donkey of the Democrats and the elephant of the Republicans and replace both with a single, more hopeful and less arbitrary symbol: the pushmi-pullyu. One animal, two opposing points of view.

More and more I feel as Doctor Dolittle must have felt. I understand less and less of the contentious conversation playing over the human airwaves. It seems like so much bad theatre. Antagonism for the sake of antagonism. It makes for good ratings, I suppose. It is so much noise!

A good talk with the animals is certain to be more fulfilling. A turn toward nature is always good for clearing the head of made-up-thought-clutter and punching through the madness. Maybe a better symbol, the pushmi-pullyu, would remind the makers-of-law (and the rest of us) that they/we share a single heart, that sometimes it is necessary to be the side to walk backwards if progress is going to be made – and that requires some serious collaboration. I push, you pull. I pull, you push. In either case, collaboration or contention, the reality, regardless of symbol, is that we end up together in the same place.

EYE TO EYE merchandise///I TO I merchandise

society 6 info jpeg copy

[don’t be confused! we had so much fun with this one that Kerri created two different product lines. poke around on society6 and you will find both]