Rage, rage against the night

There'll always be a few things, maybe several things
That you're gonna find really difficult to forgive...

We're gonna commandeer the local airwaves
To tell the neighbors what's been going on
They will shake their heads, and wag their boney fingers
in all the wrong directions, and by daybreak, we'll be gone.
--The Mountain Goats, "Up the Wolves"

I really hope you're happy, you 50+ percent who put the same administration in office twice.

Yeah, I know. You don't care. This is a great day for you: now, finally, you can smite the evildoers who dare suggest that all people ARE equal and merit the same treatment from us because who the hell are we to know what's better in the eyes of whatever god may or may not be watching us? (For the record, I'm Catholic and believe in the same God, supposedly, as a lot of people back home. Sure doesn't feel like it most days.) You can kick people out of schools who teach ideas that you find too liberal (sorry, but since when has it been established that something labeled "liberal" suddenly means it can't possibly be correct?) Screw the poor because they should have worked harder in the first place to overcome the insurmountable cycles of poverty and inadequate resources and screwed-up, self-righteous public policies that enable some of us to sit easy in Belltown and Manhattan while others wade through the streets of New Orleans. Enact abortion laws that throw up a dozen hurdles for impoverished moms while retaining all sorts of loopholes for people who can afford to drive to clinics, rent hotel rooms for mandatory 24-hour stays, take time off work. Screw the environment and anyone still willing to wear the "environmentalist" label: what value could Nature have unless we can exploit it? Why preserve a meager shred of frozen "wasteland" that gives us at least some idea of what the world was like before we left our tracks on every last mile? After all, we can turn it into oil! Because an oil-based global economic system clearly makes us free, financially secure, and able to gift our children with a great future.

I can't write anymore. I'm too tired and too angry. Except, I'm not even angry. I'm heartsick. You want to call this a victory? Fine. Have a freaking parade already and rub it in my face a little more. I have news for you: we won't quit. I'm not talking about being a self-righteous martyr. Martyrs don't fight back. Maybe the entire purpose of my existence is to serve as a thorn in the side of those self-aggrandizing people who think they're fooling anyone by preaching about less government oversight while pushing for the same governments to regulate every last, microscopic aspect of our personal lives. So be it. I'll be the sharpest thorn you've ever encountered, and I'll dig down deep until nothing will root me out -- not a Supreme Court appointee, not a presidential win, not a moral majority.

Just try to stop us.