Daniel Aegan

Sometimes you have to ask yourself the hard questions. Why did I leave the dog in charge? Why did I think it was a good idea to lead my ex to believe I wanted to get together? Why did I think it was funny to teach my kid all those swears?

But I think the most poignant question people aren’t asking themselves is: “Why?“

I haven’t updated this blog in a long time. Sure, I’ve gone long stretches of time without posting anything in the past, but there’s a reason for it this time. It’s not laziness. God knows I have the time. I know anything I try to say will turn into a full-on rant about the state of everything and how the tower is ready to burn and topple, leaving only fading embers and warm ashes in its wake.

See…. That’s the kind of shit I’m talking about.

We’re living through some crazy shit right now. There’s a threat to humanity, and its got America trapped in its rabid maw. There’s no escaping it. We’re trapped, slaves to its will. Unable to help ourselves or each other.

I’m speaking, of course, about stupidity.

Bear with me, if you will… I have weeks worth of anxieties and frustrations boiling inside me. Sure, Twitter’s a good outlet for some of this, but it fails to allow me to put all my bullshit into one place. Besides, I usually get the ding dongs trying to force-feed me my own point before I can finish making it.

The ignorance in our country has reached critical mass. It takes a special kind of moron to protest measures put into place. Viruses don’t have political affiliation, and anyone who believes Covid-19 is a democratic conspiracy really needs their head examined. And I’m not talking about seeing a shrink. I’m talking a full lobotomy with an option for electro-shock treatment.

But it’s no surprise people are acting like this. As it takes a special kind of moron to protest in order to get a haircut: It takes a superior asshole to rally said morons like a cult of extraordinary walking dildos. That superior asshole is unfortunately our current President.

Yes, I’m going there. The fact of the matter is no one who needs to read this post will read it. I know how small my reach really is. This will get a handful of hits from those who likely already agree with what I’m trying to say. This isn’t an “Orange Man Bad” post, and it’s not meant to be taken that way. I’m realistic about people, and I can read them well. I know what kind of human President Donny is by watching him and seeing the stuff he dumps on twitter, and I wholeheartedly believe he barely qualifies as anything resembling a human being.

That being said, I really wished he’d hurry up and prove me wrong. I said this back in 2016 when he was elected. I couldn’t foresee a time and place where he’d be a decent leader, and all I asked is that he somehow proved me wrong.

Spoiler alert: He hasn’t.

It goes without saying that it just keeps getting worse. I can understand why people wanted him. I don’t agree with it, but I understand. At this point, though, I can’t fathom how and why they keep up with their MAGA bullshit when there more than enough evidence that he didn’t make us “great again”. No fact, the opposite has happened.

And I’m ranting, which I promised I wouldn’t do. But it’s all setup to where we are now. Our president, our commander in chief, is urging us to ignore the experts and doctors saying that we’re not out of the woods yet. He’s telling people to “liberate” themselves from the stay-at-home orders. That’s not a leader. That’s a damn sociopath.

He calls Covid-19 “the invisible enemy”. He tries like crazy to place the blame elsewhere. It’s China, it’s Obama, it’s the World Heath Organization. It’s never his fault. For someone who’s not a fascist, he sure is taking a lot from their playbook. It’s all about having someone to blame. It’s never about fixing the problem. He spent well over a month ignoring or downplaying the threat, which led to this widespread infection we’re now facing. But it wasn’t his fault. He’ll tell you himself he won’t take any responsibility.

Like a good cult (or a bad one depending on your meaning), the followers obeyed. Karen complained to the virus’s manager, and all her husbands waved flags from their pickup trucks. Some states are bending, easing the lockdown rules in light of these people who feel they’re being oppressed.

They’re saying it’s no big deal. People die all the time. Cull the weak and let the herd immunity take over. But keep in mind New York alone lost more people in a week from Covid-19 than on 9/11, and we called the latter a national tragedy. We didn’t shrug and say: “Well, everyone dies of something. Might as well be this. We don’t want to hurt the precious economy.”

And don’t you dare tell me this is all fake and the victims of Coronavirus are crisis actors. Have had enough of that bullshit following Sandy Hook to last me a lifetime, and I have no use for anyone who feels that way. I know people who have been sick, and I know those who have lost loved ones to this virus. If you’re a coronavirus denier, we don’t need to be in each others’ lives. Bye.

This whole situation sucks. I get the anger and want to lash out. I know way too many people out of work who are having trouble making ends meet. I don’t get the luxury to choose. I’m super essential. I fall somewhere between retail and healthcare career-wise. I had to go from Connecticut to Maine back to Connecticut then to New York and finally back home to Connecticut over the span of two weeks. I’m putting people at risk if I refuse to isolate now that I’m home again.

This wasn’t by choice. There were emergency situations, and I was required to work. I wouldn’t, no matter how bad my hair looked, go fight in order to make my state lift the quarantine rules. This isn’t martial law. This isn’t oppression. It’s a matter of keeping people safe.

The protestors and the Trumpist cult followers are lashing out in the worst of ways.

The rhetoric the hobgoblins on biased news networks that people are willing to die to save the economy is dangerous, and that’s no exaggeration. They’re not willing to die, but they’re willing to sacrifice you and your loved ones so they can go out to dinner again and appease the corporate overlords who control the politicians.

And I’m not even going to touch the real “fake news” and propaganda bullshit that’s spread on social media that may or may not be from Russian sources. That’s a whole other issue, and I don’t want to go off on another tangent.

Make no mistake. Trump is only a puppet of something so huge we can’t even see it.

And that’s where I’ll leave this. I’m ok the edge of moving a rant into something else entirely. Let me end this by urging everyone to stay safe and keep yourself home if at all possible. I know it’s hard to do, but we owe it to yourselves and those around us to stop the spread. Those of us with enough common sense to do it are going to have to make up for the morons helping it spread by “liberating” themselves from it.

Remember: God helps those who help themselves. That means he’ll let you die if your stupid enough to get yourself sick.

-Daniel Aegan

4/23/20