Every son of a bitch in America now
walks around carrying invisible halo lighting
like a low-budget televangelist
broadcasting live from the clearance aisle at Kohl’s.
Nobody’s just wrong anymore.
Wrong implies humanity.
Now everybody’s evil.
Corrupt.
Toxic.
Dangerous to democracy.
A threat to civilization itself.
We turned political disagreement
into exorcism.
Every conversation now sounds like
two raccoons fighting over fentanyl
inside a burning church basement.
And every politician...
every last one of these grinning swamp gargoyles...
stands atop the rubble
pretending they alone
have been chosen by history
to guide the ignorant peasants toward salvation.
The Democrats think they’re defending democracy
like exhausted substitute teachers
trying to stop a cafeteria food fight
with recycled NPR slogans and tote bags.
The Republicans think they’re the final Spartan warriors
guarding Western civilization
from rainbow flags,
electric cars,
and oat milk.
Both sides stare into television cameras
with the same rehearsed expression:
that weird wounded-parent face
people use right before they try selling you
war, inflation, censorship,
or another Patriot Act wrapped in Bible verses.
Nobody governs anymore.
They testify.
Every press conference feels like
a sermon delivered by a man
who absolutely should not be trusted
around your medicine cabinet.
And the followers eat it up.
Because moral superiority
is cheaper than self-awareness.
You can be broke,
divorced,
half-drunk,
spiritually constipated,
living in a collapsing duplex
with a lawn mower sitting on cinder blocks...
but if you can point across the digital battlefield
and scream:
“THOSE people are the real problem...”
well hell...
for fifteen beautiful seconds
you get to feel righteous.
That’s the drug now.
Not cocaine.
Not booze.
Not sex.
Certainty.
People inject certainty
straight into their bloodstream
through podcasts,
TikTok prophets,
YouTube grifters,
cable-news goblins,
and Facebook memes made by retired dentists
who somehow became constitutional scholars
during the pandemic.
Everybody thinks they’re standing on sacred ground.
Meanwhile the whole damn country
looks like a Golden Corral
five minutes after a tornado warning.
You ever notice
how nobody with actual moral clarity
needs to announce it every thirty seconds?
Real decency moves quietly.
It helps old ladies carry groceries.
It shuts up and listens sometimes.
It knows human beings are complicated,
broken,
contradictory little meat-machines
dragging childhood trauma
through late-stage capitalism
while trying not to lose the house.
But modern politics?
Jesus Christ...
modern politics turned morality
into professional wrestling.
Cheap heat.
Fake outrage.
Entrance music.
Merchandise.
Catchphrases.
Villains.
Heroes.
All performed beneath corporate sponsorships
while pharmaceutical ads whisper softly in the background
about possible anal leakage.
And the politicians themselves...
sweet merciful God...
these people talk like history books
written by interns on Adderall.
Every speech sounds like:
“We stand at a crossroads.”
“This is the most important election of our lifetime.”
“The soul of America hangs in the balance.”
Buddy...
you said that six elections ago.
At some point
the apocalypse starts sounding seasonal.
Like pumpkin spice.
And still...
the regular people keep falling for it.
Because believing your tribe occupies
the moral high ground
means you never gotta examine yourself.
Never gotta ask:
“Am I full of shit?”
“Have I become cruel?”
“Do I actually know anything?”
“Would I talk this way face-to-face
without Wi-Fi protection?”
That silence scares people more than death.
So they keep climbing higher
onto imaginary mountains of virtue
built from reposted slogans,
yard signs,
bumper stickers,
and emotional dishonesty.
Everybody screaming:
“I AM THE GOOD GUY.”
Meanwhile the roads rot.
Families fracture.
Kids stare into screens like laboratory monkeys.
Old people die alone.
Factories disappear.
Nobody trusts anybody.
Everything costs too much.
Everybody’s exhausted.
But thank God
some senator in a $4,000 suit
finally informed us
which side of history we’re supposed to stand on.
Real heroic stuff there.
The truth?
Most politicians don’t want moral progress.
They want permanent emotional warfare.
A frightened population
is easier to herd.
A divided population
is easier to rob.
A self-righteous population
never notices both parties
keep attending the same donor dinners
after pretending to hate each other on television.
That’s the dirtiest joke in America.
The people screaming loudest
about morality
usually cash the biggest checks
while the rest of the country
argues itself into cardiac arrest
inside Applebee’s parking lots.
And somewhere underneath all this noise...
beneath the hashtags,
the outrage,
the sermonizing,
the algorithmic crusades...
there’s still a tired old republic
sitting on the back porch at midnight,
smoking quietly,
wondering when everybody forgot
that being human
means being wrong sometimes.
But humility doesn’t trend.
Moral superiority does.
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