Political Irony

The police are a reflection of a society. They’re not a rogue alien organization that came down to torment the black community. They’re enforcing segregation. Segregation is legally over, but it never ended. The police are, in some respects, a border patrol, and they patrol the border between the two Americas. We have that so that the rest of us don’t have to deal with it. Then that situation erupts, and we express our shock and indignation. But if we don’t address the anguish of a people, the pain of being a people who built this country through forced labor — people say, ‘I’m tired of everything being about race.’ Well, imagine how [expletive] exhausting it is to live that.

– Jon Stewart, from an extensive interview in the NY Times. Also quoted in Rolling Stone (if you can’t get through the Times paywall). But read the Times article if you can.

This isn’t just true for black people. America largely equates “rich” with “good”. And conversely, poor people are frequently blamed for their misfortune, because in America, anyone can succeed if they try hard enough (so, logically, if you are poor, it must be your fault). Winning is everything, so greed rules.

Some of you may know that Jon Stewart’s The Daily Show was one of the main things that inspired me to start this blog. I couldn’t find a political blog that combined humor in the ways that Stewart did on a TV show, and I wondered if it could be done. Of course, the blog that really put me to shame at doing that was Margaret and Helen.