Allusion (ə-ˈlü-zhən):[1] A reference/representation of/to a well-known person, place, event, literary work, or work of art . . . “a brief reference, explicit or indirect, to a person, place or event, or to another literary work or passage”. It is left to the reader or hearer to make the connection . . . ; an overt allusion is a misnomer for what is simply a reference.[2]
Lincoln was on a roll. No, he wasn’t playing dice. He wasn’t sitting on a hot cross bun. He wasn’t at an amusement park riding the roller coaster. He wasn’t rolling along, singing a song, He wasn’t in New Jersey eating pork roll. He couldn’t do any of these things because he’s dead and buried somewhere in Illinois (I think). The one roll he can do is metaphorical: he can roll over in his grave, and that means that things have fallen so far out of synch with its founding ethic, his Republican Party has been hit by a shockwave like the electrical impulse that brought Frankenstein to life: that’s what it takes to get Lincoln to roll over in his grave: a million-watt shock switched on by Donald Trump. But who cares if he’s rolling over in his grave? It does not matter—it’s the Republican Party, not the Lincoln Party, tangled up by Gettysburg or Ford’s Theatre.
What does it mean to call the Republican Party the GOP? GOP: back in the day: Grand Old Party. Now: Goosestepping Old Pricks. See? Things change. But they change because people want them to, and change isn’t inherently good or bad, it just makes things different, for better and for worse. So, while Lincoln is rolling over, the Republican Party is having a makeover: with the promiscuous flow of firearms, the banning of abortions, increasing open hostility toward so-called “transsexual” people, climate change denial, and more. You have to ask: What does the bearer of these beliefs look like? Maybe, a gun in one hand and a tiki torch in the other, sending an unwanted baby to a state-run facility with the hope for adoption by a decent family not named Manson, demanding that people pull down their pants on demand for inspection, and asking “Who the hell needs Polar Bears anyway?”
That’s a Republican!
The Goosestepping Old Pricks are slowly extinguishing the fires of love, peace, and happiness that have warmed the US since the 60s. The Vietnam war was a breaking point. While Trump sat home and played with his fantasy bone spurs, the rest of us took to the streets, or actually fought in the war.
I can see nothing in the Republican party’s agenda that I take favorably or seriously. The Republican Party was hijacked by Nixon, revolutionized by Reagan, sent to war by Bush1, sent to war by Bush 2, and destroyed by Trump. Listen carefully to the Republican Platform. If it resonates with your perceived interests, don’t consider yourself a good person. You are a bad person—you want to inflict undeserved pain and suffering.
1. Phonetic transcription courtesy of Miriam-Webster’s On-Line Dictionary: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/allusion <3/6/08>.
2. Definition courtesy of Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allusion <3/6/08>.
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