“Totalitarianism in power invariably replaces all first-rate talents, regardless of their sympathies, with those crackpots and fools whose lack of intelligence and creativity is still the best guarantee of their loyalty.”
― Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism
A late start this morning, after spending a couple hours on an early call, going through emails, and scanning vast piles of paper for Peg. Welcome to my world.
I have an old friend who's consumed the MAGA Kool Aid, and to make matters worse has gone from a thoughtful Roman Catholic to a megachurch evangelical zealot. He keeps trying to save my soul with videos of crackpot pastors who lack any basis skills in scriptural exegesis, explaining to me how Jeebus and his Daddy would approve of this moment of national insanity. It's all right there in the Bible, after all. There's no Aquinas, no Augustine, no Hooker, no subtle liberties in the translation of the Greek. Just some Bible college dumbshit blathering on Reels or TikTok about his personal revelation regarding the meaning of writings that have challenged serious thinkers for two millennia.
It's all so depressing. I can't go to squadron reunions anymore, can't go to my old social haunts that weren't destroyed in the hurricane. I haven't left this house in five days. The country's full of crazies now. Better to retreat into the tower and wait out the plague.
They've donned the tin foil hat, most all of them. And like most MAGA voters, they'll ironically bear the consequences of electing an economic moron, as the price of the aluminum in that hat explodes due to tariffs.
This morning I reviewed an essay online that hit the nail on the head about how this moment feels, the damage done to all these relationships by their decision to elect someone whose legacy will be only to destroy, not to create or improve. To preserve those relationships, there's a deep urge to give them a pass, to find a way to keep the peace with those we've loved over the course of our lives. Maybe we should. I just can't.
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