I edit photos, shoot videos with cakes and write about forlorn hermit crabs.
Look, I’m not an expert, nor a doctor. I edit photos, shoot videos with cakes and write about forlorn hermit crabs. But I’ve watched an awful lot of neurological exams given to someone with a TBI, which is precisely what HRC’s physician administered while she was barely conscious and propped up against that bollard today, awaiting the arrival of her motorcade. Sure, she may indeed have overheated and have pneumonia, but neither require the use of Zeiss Z1 sunglass lenses, which she was wearing.
I am disgusted, genuinely disgusted that we have reached this point, and frankly don’t care if I lose friends over this—done. Trump is a con artist, incompetent nutcase, and anyone who supports him should have his head examined. But so should anyone who supports Clinton. Her economic policies are to the right of Reagan’s, and her base of support isn’t the 1%, it’s the 1/10 of the 1%. The Comey hearing was as chilling as watching the Iran/Contra hearings: both of which I actually watched live (how many people can say that?). Anyone who dismisses her cavalier attitude towards digital security has no conception of what is happening in the world. Every criticism leveled against her is from the Alt-right? Please watch today’s video and say that with a straight face.
She was the best, most qualified candidate the party could possibly nominate? Or was she the undeniable choice, made by a corrupt party years before the primaries: the DNC, who were inconveniently proven to have intentionally disenfranchised their own party members by sabotaging the unbelievably successful campaign of the most improbable of candidates?
I am sick to death of hearing that this is somehow anti-feminist. How disgusting. As a woman, I have to mindlessly support every woman in every endeavor, whether or not she’s qualified? Oh, no of course that’s not what anyone’s suggesting, right? Or…are you?
Fear is a horrible motivator. I am also afraid of Trump. In a just world, the man would have been imprisoned for his outrageously fraudulent business practices. He has, in my mind, committed an act of treason (?!) while on the campaign trail. He preys on society’s basest fears, inciting those suffering from genuine economic disparity and imagined loss of “culture.” He speaks to those who cling to the notion that the old way was good, despite having landing the world in the Anthropocene. He’s too extreme for the GOP, which is really saying something.
Fear. Today is a day to ponder that gut-wrenching emotion. We allowed the implementation of the Patriot Act, a blight on the Constitution and Bill of Rights, out of fear. We merely grumbled as Congress declared war against a country clearly not responsible for the attack 15 years ago, out of fear. We turned a collective blind eye to notions of “extraordinary rendition” and “black box prisons”; we sat idly by discussing the merits of waterboarding while Guantanamo remained open; we shrugged off the use of drone warfare; we provided military surplus equipment to local law enforcement agencies, who recruited ex-military and private contractors accustomed to brutal conditions, and encouraged their departments to openly shift policies from “protect and serve” to “if you pull your weapon, shoot to kill.” Fear got the best of us.
I will not vote for her out of fear that he will be elected in her stead. Her choice of VP was insulting. Had it been Bernie (the natural choice, but anathema to her and the party) or Elizabeth Warren (one of the many qualified women whom I would have been thrilled to elect), I would have begrudgingly cast my vote, comforted in the knowledge that it would provide either a modicum of authority. Today’s events further reinforce my concern that we will be left with a truly uninspiring VP, thrust into power.
Hillary is, and has been, a sophisticated thinker, capable of enormous intellectual feats. She has also suffered a traumatic brain injury, is on epilepsy medication, is losing consciousness in public, and has admitted under oath that she was incapable of remembering certain procedures regarding data security and clearance classification due to her concussion and subsequent blood clot.
To this day, I am appalled that the world holds Reagan in high esteem. Leaving aside the illegality, ludicrous economic policies and sheer callousness of his administration—anyone who has known someone with Alzheimer’s or dementia can understand that he was fundamentally incapable of running the country during his second term. Back then, his illness was the butt of jokes. Even as a kid, I didn’t find it funny.
Sure, FDR ran the country while in the grips of polio. She’s no FDR. She’s no Eleanor (who would have made a stellar Pres). If Hillary remains the candidate, I will be unable to vote this year. My mom would no doubt have disapproved of my decision; for her, waving one’s civic rights and duties was out of the question. I can, however, take some solace that she never had to be disappointed in her adopted country, never had to live through that day 15 years ago, and never saw it all end up here.
Rant by Liz Kohl
