An Apt Metaphor
Burnin' down the house
As any homeowner knows, any visible issues with a house are symptomatic of a half-dozen underlying problems. Add to that Mrs. FarSide’s penchant for saying, “Since we’re doing that, why not…,” and well, you might as well just back up the dump truck full of cash.
It all started with a rotted out piece of fascia on the eaves in the back of the house. Mrs. FarSide is from the Indonesian school of thought that it’s better to spend $10, 20 times to make something look functional. I’m from the Project Management school of thought that it’s better to spend $100 up front and be done with it.
Well, tearing off the fascia revealed a water leak, which traced back to the peak of the roof, and which had invited termites, which in turn drew an infestation of giant cyanide-spitting millipedes, whose dried out carcasses were piling up around electrical junctions, causing a fire hazard.
After fixing the leak and cleaning up the insect issues, I decided to replace all the eaves with PVC fascia instead of wood. Well, Mrs. FarSide liked the look and practicality of that solution, so that we just had to replace the fascia on the ceiling of the car port and over the porch, which led to rewiring several exterior lights that were originally slap-dashed Indo style, and gee, wouldn’t they look better repositioned over here?
And while we’re at it, let’s put in a custom-made iron stair so the grounds keeper can access the back garden when we’re not here. And since we have the welding rig out, how about fixing those damn Chinese-made lawn chairs that keep collapsing when I sit on them?
Well, a three-day home repair project ballooned into a two-week odyssey that included repainting a significant portion of the street-facing side of the house.
In the meantime, my laptop had decided all of a sudden to turn off the F and Z keys, and blue-screen me if I typed more than three words per minute. As a touch-typist with the ability to run at 100 wpm on a bad day, this compounded my misery, as I watched email and text messages pile up, trying to maintain my twice-per-week publication schedule, all the while listening to Mrs. FarSide come up with yet more “little” projects for the house.
Naturally, all this made me think of the recent US elections.
The results of the election clearly indicate that Merkins are ready for some home-owner repairs, and they hired Donald Trump to “git ‘er done”. Now imagine a 250-year-old house that has been endlessly repaired with bubblegum and baling wire, with half the country just wanting it to look good, and the other half saying it needed some profound tinkering to make it right.
I think the vast majority of Merkins are unaware of just what is in store for them. Tearing off the fascia will reveal deeper issues, which in turn will lead to significant problems that need to be addressed, or the same issues will keep coming up. Folks generally get used to things functioning a certain way, even if it could be greatly improved, rather than biting the bullet and ripping the guts out to get at the core of the problem.
Repair jobs never look quite as complicated as they turn out to be.
In the Texan dialect, we have a peculiar way of expressing the Future Simple aspect of the verb “to prepare”. We like to say “fixin’ tuh,” using the Present Continuous of “to fix,” to imply future intent.
The late great columnist Leon Hale theorized that in the early days of the Republic, when the economy was non-existant and they didn’t have three competing space programs, folks had to repair one thing in order to do another.
Thus, “Ah’m fixin’ tuhgo tooda stoe. Yo’nt sump’n?” This translates as, “I’ve got to reshoe the horse in order to go into town to pick up some supplies. Since I’m going to all this effort, should I fetch something for you while I’m there?” A beautiful economy of words.
Anyway, back to the elections.
There are literally a thousand little things that need to be done to repair the US feral gummint. Two and a half centuries of superficial repairs have created a legendary empire out of bubblegum and baling wire, but the entire ediface is a risk of complete collapse. A little PVC and a lick of a paint ain’t gonna make this plow mare into a quarter horse.
There are badly needed Constitutional amendments that must be installed or repealed. Millions of useless bureaucrats need to be cut from the “work” force. Dozens of anachronistic departments and agencies need to be shut down. The corrupt Military-Industrial Complex needs to be excised. State autonomy needs to be restored. And all of this hinges on solving an insanely out-of-control national debt and financial system.
The Trump team may very well succeed in slapping a little fascia on the rotted-out areas, and getting a lick of paint up on the things visible from the street. Heck, they might even fix a leak or two, and clean up some of the infestation. I doubt seriously, however, that one lifetime — much less one term — is enough to repair the creaking, teetering ediface.
No, this repair job is a multi-generational project that begins with cleaning up the “education” system. Get back to the classics, the McGuffey readers, and real maths, and throw some civics in there for good measure. Oh, and don’t forget art history and music theory for well-rounded minds. Turn it all back to the States and let schools compete on quality over quantity again.
Gut the Federal Reserve system and find some way to give folks control over their money again. Don’t forget that whatever you do, it will ripple through the entire global economy, and not everyone is going to be happy with it.
Most importantly, ban lawyers from holding political office. Write laws in plain English and appoint someone to read every law out loud on C-SPAN before it can be voted on. If a public school “graduate” cannot summarize a law in a sentence or two, throw it out. This should put a stop to all the laws pre-written by lobbyists seeking to stuff their pockets with the public fisc.
Yup, there’s some serious work ahead. Once you start ripping off that old fascia, you’ll find a number of other repairs underneath. And Mrs. Trump will likely come up with a few beautification projects to compound the fun.
And let’s use oil-based semi-gloss instead of the flat latex exterior paint, and don’t forget to bleach the surface before repainting, so trapped mold doesn’t cause the paint to bubble up and flake off, and…and…and…
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Today’s cultural learnings for make great the Japan is House (Hausu) (1977), a cult classic over-the-top Japanese horror flick about seven school girls trapped in a remote haunted house. I’m betting that even if you don’t like the horror genre, you’ll find this one weirdly compelling if for no other reason than the visual mastery.
Fixin’ tuh see y’all on the Far Side:
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You have again misspelt bureau rats.
Tariffs are taxes that Americans pay. Taxation is theft.
Regulation is theft.
Inflation is theft.
Eminent domain is theft.
Civil asset forfeiture is theft.
I do not consent.
Without unanimous consent it is not "government" it is coercion. Coercion is evil.
They have abdicated government, placed us out of their protection and make war on the American people. I don't care who they are. I will not comply.
Very, very good.
And defund the police. There cain't be no tyrant if there ain't no police to back his ass up! (What we need is community 601s.)
~ D-FensDogG