Abused By Illusions

This is a reprint of Arol Zendik's Thoughts on why we shouldn't vote in the coming election. I'm gonna follow it with her response to the critics of this original post. Arol and the folks at Zendik arts have impressed me over and over again since I met one of their Road Warrior crews at last years Midtown Music Feastival last year. In fact I haven't been able to get them out of my mind since. If I wasn't such a broke down old man I think I would have joined in with them in their active quest long ago.

What impresses me so much about them is they are not all talk as most of what you read on the net is. I like to say sometimes when talking to friends that when something becomes "a movement" that for some reason all postive physical activity seems to cease. This is not the case with Zendik Arts these guys live their philosophy! If only more people would follow their example perhaps we might begin to escape the slavery and death that our current, to borrow a Zendik saying, Death Kulture offers. I highly recommend checking them out at their site. Zendik.org

Okay, here it is coming up on November 2004, a new president of my country is going to be elected and once again I'm thinking about the voting process. When I was young growing up in New York City, everyone knew politicians were crooked. It was not maybe, or might be, but a true fact. I don't know how George Washington and the Cherry Tree myth worked. Maybe we accepted that story cause he didn't live with us in New York, or maybe in the old days people were honest--I don't know. But we knew every politician in our city was crooked or he wouldn't be elected. That was my introduction to American or at least New York politics.

Later, as I studied history, I realized that nothing had changed since Grecian times, that nothing had been learned politically and reading Greek history, especially the "Peloponnesian War" by Thucydides was to me, a child of the "cold war", the same as reading about Russia and the USA, nothing had changed--so vote--no thank you, not I. I was not even interested and remained that way for many years.

My hope surfaced again when Castro won Cuba--I knew many Americans, especially artists and musicians who had gone to help him fight--I was mad for Castro and Guevara, even going to the Hotel Theresa in Harlem to meet them--I was 18 or so at the time. Then word came he was lining people up against the wall after imprisoning them and shooting them wholesale. Broken-hearted, I gave up on revolutionaries and their killing. They had been hunted & killed and then, when they won, did the same, learning nothing.

Then sometime when Clinton was running for presidential office, friends, college students, fans all wrote or called or when they saw me, urged me to vote for Clinton otherwise Bush Sr. would stay in. But the more I looked at Clinton and his wife the less I could, in good conscience, vote for him.

I didn't trust him so I didn't vote. Later I saw a photo of him in the newspapers coming out of church with his wife smiling and both hypocrites feeling good about themselves, you know, holy. Next to that picture was a story about his ordering the bombing of Iraq and a photo of a man crying over the casket of his baby son, killed by one of the "smart" bombs Mr. Clinton ordered that Sunday morning. I knew I was right not to vote for him. If voting meant anything to me, which it would if it was real, if there was someone to vote for, if it meant anything, I would cherish it and because I do believe in a pure democracy not the taxational fascism we have now, yes I would vote.

Well, anyway, back to now--same scenario: I'm being told my vote counts and that I must vote for anyone other than Bush. Ok, really, you want me to vote for anyone other than Bush? John Kerry you tell me, "we don't really want him but it's a vote against Bush." My response is, oh really? I don't trust Kerry any more than Bush. Yes, Bush is a moronic "bad boy"--can't do a damn thing, never worked a day in his life--we know who he is. Kerry? With that face? That closed liar face of a professional politician, which means he's never done anything real either. He brings to my mind the same N.Y.C. crooks of my youth. Watch out for him my friends--this guy is crafty enough and sneaky enough to start some such travesty as the draft. Watch out for him--you don't want him but you don't want Bush worse--that's not a cause to vote--that's a cause to rebel, defy, deny--to start a revolution before making that kind of deadly compromise. Bush and Cheney the old guard and Kerry and Edwards the old guard pretending to be new. Yeah, I'd vote for Nader if I thought it would do any good, not because I agree with everything Nader stands for, but at least I know the guy's sincere--of course I also know anybody sincere as president would either be shot, or the Congress will make sure he's totally impotent. That crowd of corrupt phonies in D.C. has to go away if we're ever to get anywhere--if we're ever to fulfill the promise of this country--the great generous spirit of Americans.

So, no, my friends, I ain't voting again. There's no one to vote for. Stay home, don't vote and be the cause of a revolution!

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