dennis – Dennis C Merritt

An Arab Point of View

This letter was published in the Greenfield Recorder, a wonderful forum for community opinions. It’s not meant to endorse any actions on either side of the current Middle East situation, but merely understand at least one Arab’s point of view.

(Note — Salmon Falls is at the center of Shelburne Falls and was a place for Mohawk and Penobscott Native Americans to hunt salmon in peace.)

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I read that many think anti-semitism is behind a lot of the Palestinian aggression. I believe this is a mistake, caused by our own experience with anti-semitism in this country. It is a pervasive, nasty undercurrent in a lot of our society. A real estate agent once told me a good reason to buy in a certain Boston suburb was “there is no temple, if you know what I mean.” Another time, in a different suburb, after having bought a house from a Jewish family, we were told by the neighbors how glad they were to see Christmas lights again.

Whether, in fact, one is themself an anti-semitic, or offended by anti-semitism, it is easy to look at the Arabs attacking Israel and nod in understanding.

It probably goes to our religious heritage, with a strong European Christian component bearing prejudice against those of a more middle-Eastern Jewish heritage. In fact, there is European and US prejudice against many middle Eastern cultures. The Holocaust also wiped out most of the Roma in Europe, and today, anger at Muslims is high in both Europe and our country.

Maybe Jews and Muslims have more in common, with their middle Eastern roots, than Jews and Euro-centric Christians. Maybe something else is going on there that we don’t relate to.

I was talking with an Arab friend once about the Middle East, and curious about his views on Jews and Israel. It turns out he had a profound respect for both Jews and Judaism. He expressed a deep understanding of their religious beliefs and the life style they live based on those beliefs. This was a respect that I had never heard in this country, even from my Jewish friends.

I’m thinking he saw the similarities between those of each faith who live by an understanding of the way God/Allah works in one’s life. Both Judaism and Islam are peaceful religions, emphasizing an individual’s relationship with their God.

But my Arab friend continued, “no, I have no issue with Jews, it’s Zionism I hate.”

The problem, for him, was that land was granted to Jews for a Jewish state, and that Arabs were displaced from that land to make it possible.

I think we can understand this sort of feeling with issues in our own country. Take affirmative action. These programs were put in effect to help correct our history of racial injustice, to give Blacks better access to, say, college. Now, take a white family trying to get their kid in college. They might be upset that they are the ones being asked to make a sacrifice, in a lowered chance for their kid, to correct racial injustice. It doesn’t mean that they’re racist (although they might be), it means they’re mad that some government decision said that they’re ones who should have to sacrifice to fix racial injustice.

The same can be seen with the ACA mandate. People were being forced to buy insurance that they didn’t want to buy, in order for the insurance companies to make enough money to provide cheaper insurance for those less fortunate. The issue, again, is that they didn’t see why they should be the ones to have pay the price of fixing a societal injustice.

For many of us in this country, knowing of the history of persecution of the Jews, we think, yes, fantastic, there should be a Jewish homeland. The problem is the Arabs who lost their land to make that happen are upset that they’re the ones being asked to sacrifice to remedy years of Jewish persecution.

I know many non-native Americans are bothered by how we treated the Native Americans, but I can’t say as I know of anyone who has offered to give their home, their small bit of land, back to a Native American family. I don’t think those of us in Shelburne Falls would be particularly happy if the government, a thousand miles away, decided we had to move out in order to give Salmon Falls and our village back to descendants of the Mohawks and Penobscotts.

Dennis Merritt
Shelburne Falls

Pencil and Paper

The Economist columnist, Johnson, recently wrote about the advantages of pencil and paper over computers for writing and note taking. I totally agreed, and wrote this letter to him/her.

Dear Johnson,

There are four sections I read without fail in the Economist. The Obituary, the bottom right letter to the editor, Lexington, and your column, Johnson.

You recently wrote about the advantages of pencil and paper over a computer. I’m writing to tell you how much I agree, and share some of my experiences.

First, let me say that, I might be reading too much into this, the column you hand wrote on the subject was—I don’t want to say better, the columns are always excellent—but it had a smoother feel to it. It flowed and the words, the turns of phrase, had a gentler more organic? touch.

Crosswords

We (my wife and I) do the New York Times crosswords, but we don’t do them online like many do. We find it much more satisfying to fill in the boxes with a pencil. Now, here is something you might want to note. Pencils are very cheaply made these days, and it’s worth investing in good pencils. I highly recommend Mirado Black Warrior #2 pencils and an electric pencil sharpener. I also put artist quality erasers on the ends to make the writing of answers, and the subsequent erasing of the wrong ones, a pure joy.

For some perverse reason, I save the pencils when they get too short to use. I enclose a picture of our retired pencils and a puzzle.

Accounting

My father was an accountant and one of the things passed on to me on his passing, along with old check stubs and the like, was accounting paper. When (my wife and I) started our own small business, I did all the accounting using a pointy pencil and my dad’s accounting paper. Eventually she said we needed to move to a computerized product, which we did, but it wasn’t the same.

I found I had a much better feel of the business when hand writing in the expenses and the sales, adding up the columns, creating the balance sheets, etc. Something felt disconnected when we had the computer generate those numbers.

Software Development

Software was, back in the day, designed on paper, with boxes and lines and arrows and whatever, and multiple sheets with the different sections spread out across the desk. I was working for a software company that was a pioneer in the development of computerized software design tools. I remember the head of development talking about the work and holding up a pad of paper and a pencil, saying that was the competition.

Using the computer for design work, he pointed out, would be like designing software with blinders on. It’s as if you had a mask held over the desk that would only let you see part of one piece of paper at a time.

Writing

I do some writing as well, and use both paper and pencil and software. Here is a paragraph from the acknowledgements I wrote in my book, “Jazz Chords for Baritone Ukulele”:

“I’d like to acknowledge two excellent software tools I used. Sketch for making it easy to create all the diagrams in the book, and Scrivener for providing beginning-to-end tools for organizing, editing and compiling the manuscript. (However, for working out early ideas and organization, no software tool can compete with 1/4 sized sheets of colored paper and Mirado Black Warrior pencils.)”

And the back cover picture in the book:

Best Regards,

Dennis Merritt

Shelburne Falls, MA, USA

Russell

My cousin, Russell Merritt, recently passed away. I was asked to talk at his memorial for a family perspective. The other nine speakers were all people from his various walks of life presenting a wonderful overview of the lives he touched. Here are my comments.

We had a small family. I was an only child as was my mother. My dad had a brother, my Uncle Dan who, with Aunt Joyce, had my cousins Russell and Carole. They were a little older than me, and Carole always remembers them enjoying me coming to visit as she and Russell would argue over who would get to play with me. I don’t remember that too much, but I do remember enjoying seeing how they interacted, the connection between them. The laughter, the in jokes, the twinkle in their eyes.

Carole’s Stories

Carole said she thought growing up with Russell was just how siblings were. She had no idea how special it was, with Russell coming up with all sorts of ideas for adventures and games for them to play. The ideas weren’t simple. Like the time Russell thought they should play disc jockey. Well you couldn’t just do that. First the the room had to be cleaned and set up like a studio, then the playlists had to be worked out, and the commercials, and everything just so for putting on a disc jockey show.

They had secrets as kids, hiding from their mother. Like one hide out was behind the “whistling” door, which turns out to have been a cabinet with a squeaky door that little kids could crawl behind and read their comic books with flashlights. Carole suspects their mother knew…

I wonder how much of Russell’s development was fueled by his willing partner, Carole, in those early childhood adventures.

Carole was not the student Russell was and she always marveled at how different they were. I remember when Russell was finely getting ready to start teaching and Carole said, “Fail a few for me Russ” and Russell said he would.

Sherlock Holmes & Wilbur

Of course Russell is remembered for his love of all things Sherlockian. He’d explained to me that that was started by our grandfather, Wilbur. Apparently something was lost one day, and Wilbur told Russell he’d help him solve the mystery of the missing item, but, he said, it will require careful logical thought. We need to think like Sherlock Holmes. Russell was hooked.

It probably wasn’t much after that that we started hearing stories of Russell’s exploits and I remember he had built this detailed scale model of 221b Baker St.

Puzzle

Here’s a family puzzle requiring Sherlockian analysis. Wilbur and Mary were married and were grandpa and grandma to Russell, Carole and me. Mary was our mutual biological grandmother. Wilbur, however, was not Russell’s or Carole’s biological grandfather, but he was mine. There was nothing illegitimate, everyone rightfully married, or remarried, so how could that be? Contact me if you think you know the answer, or want to know. It’s classic Holmes, “When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”

A clue… From left to right: my Uncle Dan, Grandma Mary, my mom (Aunt Peg), me, Russell, my Aunt Joyce, Grandpa Wilbur, Carole. Photo by my father (Uncle Ralph).

MWA in New York

One of Russell’s story of growing up involved him getting involved with the Mystery Writers of America chapter in New York City. It was easy to take a train from where they lived in N.J. so Russell found them and hooked up with them. They made a deal with him. If he cut school and came into the city and spent his morning working on his writing, then they would help him make letters of excuse for missing school, and he could spend the afternoon exploring the city.

It was a great deal, but the problem was, these being mystery writers, all the excuses involved a death in the family.

This went on for awhile, but eventually the school got suspicious. What I loved was Russell telling me the story, laughing as he told it. “My mother was furious, but not at what I’d done. What she was really mad at was that I had only killed off relatives on her side of the family. I didn’t kill you, or Aunt Peg, or Uncle Ralph…”

Christmas Goose

Growing up there was one Christmas where Russell made a show of dinner. He was in high school and got it in his head he wanted to make a full Dickens Christmas with a roast goose and all the trimmings. Who does something like that in high school?

That Christmas Carole and I got more playing time together and I don’t think either of us at the time appreciated or understood what an amazing thing he was doing. The grownups were all impressed though, and I am now.

Wedding

My biggest regret was when Russell and Karen got married. My dad went, but he recommended I pass as weddings were boring. I guess he didn’t know Russell that well… I suspect many here were part of that spectacle. What a show it must have been.

Reunions

Time passed and our parents were dying. We hadn’t seen each other for years, but there we were at the funeral of some parent, just standing there, and someone said something funny and we all just started to laugh and laugh until we cried. We said we need to get together more often cause we’re running out of parents.

Then it was Aunt Martha, don’t ask, who died and second? cousin Al and his wife Linda and we started having the family reunions. I put a question mark there because our family history those few generations back was pretty confusing. Like Aunt Martha was an aunt of our fathers except not really much older than them.

Who steered our way through that history? Russell. He had all the players and their comings and going and could explain why we were all related to the first post mistress of the Panama Canal Zone, and at each reunion we would go through it again and laugh at our confusion and write it all down so next time…

One character in the history was our ne’er-do-well grandfather, Ralph Merritt senior, who apparently had left our dads when they were around five. (That’s why Grandma Mary remarried.) Our dads would never talk about him, so we knew next to nothing. But Russell’s research dug out something. He found an obituary in a New York paper describing a car crash on the highways around New York.

There was a core at the reunions, me, Russell, Karen, Carole, Butch, Al and Linda, but then there were other family members always there as well, my son and his family, my daughter, Carole’s son and granddaughter Ali and for Mike and myself, our wives.

I always enjoyed hearing Russell at the reunions, just the wide range of stuff he was interested in, but for me, one of the biggest highlights was seeing him interact with Carole, laughing at the same jokes, doing the same routines they had as kids — “zip it”— and all with that same twinkle in their eyes I remembered from those years past.

And on a similar note, to see the love he shared with Karen, well it was just a pleasure to be around.

Grandboys

My grand boys were at the reunions as well, Juan, Diego and Miguel. Russell always enjoyed interacting with them, and I’ve since heard they were a highlight of the reunions for him. He shared a love of chess with them.

Film too, maybe it’s in the genes somewhere? but the boys started making movies a while back. The last communication I had with Russell was when I told him Diego was in Italy and taking Italian film classes. Russell sent back an email with all sorts of films that Diego might enjoy watching. Not just a list of films, but films in categories, historically important, good, and maybe of more interest to a younger generation.

Sigh, it would have been great to see that connection grow…

Are Juries a Good Idea?

Let’s think about our trial system, and how it might apply to our democracy itself.

In a criminal trial, there is the “prosecution,” made up of advocates for proving the defendant is guilty, and the “defense,” made up of advocates for proving the defendant is not guilty. These advocates argue their sides of the case, presenting evidence as available to support their stances.

It then goes to the jury, twelve unbiased individuals tasked with weighing the evidence and seeking the best, most fair outcome. The idea is the jury can balance and weigh the arguments pro and con, debate those arguments, and try to reach a consensus on guilty or not, based on the evidence.

Imagine if you will though, that instead of twelve random individuals, each side got to place six advocates. So in the jury room there are six jurors aligned with the prosecution and six with the defense. How would that go? A hung jury.

What if then only a simply majority, rather than a unanimous decision, could decide the case? Well with our six and six, still a hung jury. What’s more, because the jurors are all advocates, they would not put much weight on the evidence provided in the trial.

What if the prosecution had seven members and the other side five? We’d get guilty verdicts all the time. And if the defense had seven? Nobody would ever be found guilty.

Imagine civil trials where each side could “buy” jurors. This is why jury tampering is such a serious crime.

So no, we wouldn’t want to have juries filled with advocates for one side or the other. That would be no way to get a fair and reasoned verdict for any particular case.

Do you see where I’m going with this? The laws of our land are made in Congress. Who makes up Congress? Advocates. Advocates with allegiances to one or the other of our two political parties. This has no better chance of working well than trying to get a fair verdict from jury of advocates.

Why didn’t the founders think of this? They knew you needed jurors for fair trials, but didn’t think elected congress people would be a problem?

Well they hadn’t counted on the rise of political parties. And money being spent to get advocates for some position elected.

Aaron Burr, in the earliest days of our democracy, saw the gain to be had by actively electioneering to get a position he could then use for his personal gain. Shortly thereafter we got the first political parties organized to get advocates for (does this sound familiar) larger or smaller federal government.

Why are such vast sums of money being spent on political campaigns? Because the results are worth it..

Is there a better way? Can this be fixed at this late stage of the game?

Yes. Replacing Congress with a random selection of unelected individuals would be great, but that’s not practical. What is practical is something called a Citizen’s Assembly (CA). Like a jury, the individuals in a CA are selected to reach a decision on a specific issue. They are selected at random, just like a jury. After reaching a decision on an issue, the CA is disbanded.

Congress, or any legislature at any level of our society, could convene a CA to decide on, say, Alaskan oil drilling, or whether to fund a new fire station in town. The advocates would make presentations, experts would be brought in, evidence would be gathered, and the CA would deliberate and make a recommendation. The legislative body could then make the recommendation law.

TikTok

Given what I’d read about TikTok, the Chinese app that’s captured our country, that it’s silly videos of teenagers lip-syncing and dancing, I didn’t have much interest in it. But I had created some instructional videos on YouTube about chord scales for jazz guitar that I was looking to get wider exposure for, so I thought I’d try TikTok.

How my videos did is one story. Relatively quickly they all had around 400 views. Here is a key point. Those weren’t 400 people who decided to watch, but rather 400 times that the TikTok algorithm decided to put one of my videos in someone’s queue, based on what it thought they might like.

Why 400? And why did it stop there? Well it appears what the algorithm does is pick, say, 10,000 people and use them as a trial group for a new video. Then it watches how they react. It’s not looking for “likes” but rather how long someone looks before swiping to the next video. Clearly, based on those responses, TikTok decided not to expand my audience. Had there been a good response, then it would have increased the viewership.

This is how some videos get a million views very quickly. But notice, those million views are not a million people choosing to watch it, but a million people TikTok decided to send it to, watching, learning, studying how they react.

But that’s not what I want to talk about. Of course I decided to see how it works for me, and started watching. Sure enough, silly videos of teenage lip syncers. I swiped passed them. Then some other stuff, things I had no interest in, but, in very short order, TikTok’s algorithm said, well if you don’t like those, how would you like to see Bob Dylan at the 1963 Newport Folk Festival? When he first went electric.

I doubt anyone much younger than me, 76, really has any clue as to how big that was. Bob Dylan was the star of the folk music rebellion against top 40 hits and glitz, the idol of all us hippies to be. And he trades out his acoustic guitar for an electric?! At the biggest folk festival in the country…

Oh yeah, I want to see that. (I’d never seen footage of it before.)

OK, so I’ll scroll some more. OMG, look at the size of the wave that guy’s surfing! And in very short order TikTok figured out that I like surfing videos, clever chess traps, how to play guitar licks, ladies falling out of their tops (no porn, they never actually fall out), the latest news, stories about how dumb Trump is, really cool poker show downs (like when two players each had pocket aces, but then four hearts showed up in the flop so the guy with the ace of hearts won.) And swing dancing, tango dancing, peaceful scenes with music I like (it never plays anything with rap or techno in it for me), and the news from Iran.

Iran. Lots of current video of this women led revolution against the theocracy. They’re using social media to appeal to us to share the names of those arrested, to make it more awkward for the government to execute them. Heavy, heavy stuff.

All of this is mixed up and presented in a way to just keep you interested in “one more.” I was about done the other day, gonna put it away, and it says, before you go you want to see Secretariat winning the Kentucky Derby? OK, I’ll watch that.

The thing is, I believe the TikTok algorithm knows me better than I know myself. And I’m not a teenager scrolling at my desk in school.

I understand how TikTok is now getting more views than FB or YouTube or anything else. I understand how it’s totally addictive. The problem is, it’s not just wasting my time. I was up-to-date on all the election news through TikTok faster than through my Washington Post or New York Times online accounts. And learned some great chess tricks to use against my grandson, and how to play some classic rock guitar licks. And interesting science facts, like explanations of quantum entanglement. Neil DeGrasse Tyson constantly shows up in my feed. Is it bad the kids are exposed to him? But are they? Or does he just show up to people like me?

I understand how scary this is to those in charge. My TikTok feed totally reinforces my views that the Republicans are bad, Trump is a threat, and the Iranian revolution is a good thing. How hard would it be for it to start to influence me in some other directions? Would they want to? I can’t say as I’ve seen anything about politics in China.

DAnon 5 — Why the letter Q?

If Big Money is indeed the secret source of Q, then what better letter?

Consider that in the early 1900s Millionaires ($M) were Big Money, and then into the end of the century Billionaires ($B) were Big Money, and now we’ve got people close to being Trillionaires ($T).

What’s next? Quadrillionaires. Yes, $Q. Truly Big Money, with a capital Q.

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DAnon 1 — Meta Conspiracy Theory

The question is, who is behind QAnon? Who supports the marketing genius that captured so many people’s hearts and souls?

We can develop a meta-conspiracy theory about QAnon by considering some of the main ideas of QAnon.

Deep State — The nefarious forces at work in our government and institutions
The Villains — Hollywood and the Democrats
The Storm — The final accounting, where the villains are brought to justice
The Savior — The individual leading to the Storm

Deep State

For any conspiracy theory to appeal, it has to have elements of truth. The idea of a Deep State, nefarious forces controlling our government and institutions, has more than just an element of truth.

It’s real and we all know it’s real. It is Big Money. It is the corporate donors and their lobbyists influencing Congress. It’s the Super PACS and the money used to get their own people elected. It’s the corporations limiting our choices and driving up prices, like for gas, or cable TV, or pharmaceuticals, or… well the list just goes on and on.

Hollywood

Consider, though, how we know it’s real. We read about it in papers, and more important, we see it in the movies and on TV all the time. Hollywood loves telling the store of corporate greed behind some dark deeds, and some hero rising up to take them down.

Hollywood is clearly an enemy of the Big Money behind the Deep State. So the Deep State is true, but Hollywood is not a force behind it, but rather a force that exposes it. Worse, for Big Money, Hollywood tends to drive people towards the Democrats.

Democrats

We have a two party system, where neither party is particularly beholden to the people. The Republicans are clearly aligned with Big Money. The Democrats also get funding from Big Money, but are more likely to put in place legislation that makes it look like they are the people’s party. They might tax the wealthy, and the corporations, and pass laws to protect the environment, or worker safety. They might try to provide social safety nets, like Medicare and Medicaid.

These all cost Big Money money. So the Democrats are clearly enemies of the Big Money behind the Deep State.

QAnon

QAnon is a brilliant conspiracy theory that does what all effective propaganda does. It takes the truth of the Deep State and turns it 180 degrees around. It says, look, it’s not not Big Money that is evil, but Hollywood and the Democrats.

Remember, the Big Money people are the ones that used doctors to advertise cigarettes, that got the government to protect us from cheap Canadian drugs saying it was for our own good, and that got Congress to use our tax dollars to bail out the big banks that caused so many to lose their homes in the mortgage crisis (and do nothing for the people who actually lost their homes).

It’s classic. Take the people’s frustration with the Deep State, and turn that anger against the very forces that fight the Deep State. A piece of cake for the manipulative marketing geniuses working for Big Money.

The Storm

Here’s the exciting part. People are frustrated, and feel powerless against the Big Money behind the Deep State. But, with QAnon, and the Deep State redefined as Hollywood types and Democrats, well then, we can rise up and defeat them.

They call them pedophiles. How much of a fight can pedophiles put up? And who would feel sorry for pedophiles going down in defeat? Much easier to fight them, than say Exxon or Goldman Sachs.

The Savior

All that’s needed is a leader, someone willing to carry the flag into battle, to take down those pedophile Hollywood types and Democrats that make Big Money look bad.

But doesn’t it tell you something that that savior, Donald Trump, leading the charge, is someone who self-identifies as Big Money? Whose signature legislation when president was tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy?

Isn’t it obvious that QAnon is a brilliant marketing effort that inspired a large number of people to, not fight against the Big Money of the Deep State, but to fight Big Money’s enemies and help it tighten its grip on our society?

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DAnon 4 — Links

Stories of Big Money, the real Deep State behind QAnon.

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DAnon 3 — Op-Ed

I encourage others to uses these ideas and get them published in op-eds around the country. Here’s my letter to the local Greenfield Recorder.

Here is 169 word version that can be submitted as a letter to your local paper. Feel free to use it as is, or maybe better to modify it a bit in your own style.

Who is the Q behind QAnon? Here’s a meta-conspiracy theory. Like all propaganda, QAnon is based on a partial truth, a Deep State. We all know it exists, and we know it is Big Money behind many of the wrongs of our government and institutions. How do we know? For one, Hollywood keeps telling stories that illustrate it, making Hollywood an enemy of Big Money. Who else is an enemy? Democrats who tend to raise corporate taxes and regulate Big Money.

How can Big Money fight back? Turn the story around. These are the people who used doctors to sell cigarettes, so no problem creating QAnon that paints Hollywood and Democrats as Deep State evil.

Who will lead the Storm that overthrows them? A man who self-identifies as Big Money. A man whose signature legislation while president was tax cuts for the wealthy. Can there be any question Big Money is behind Q? And Q’s followers have been duped into fighting for, not against, the Deep State they resent?

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DAnon 2 — A Hollywood Story

Who’s behind QAnon? Maybe looking at a story Hollywood loves to tell can provide the answer.

It’s a story of dark conspiracies, behind evil doings, that a brave individual, or band of individuals, uncovers and battles to overcome.

It’s not a new story. It’s Robin Hood and his Merry Men fighting the Sheriff of Nottingham, stealing from the rich (this is key point) and giving to the poor. The back story there was that the Sheriff had stolen lands from individuals, like Robin Hood, while they were away at war in the Crusades.

It’s James Bond fighting dark hidden international crime syndicates, it’s Batman and Robin against, yes more crime syndicates, it’s countless TV and movie detectives working some case only to discover there’s some powerful politicians and money interests behind the evil doings.

It’s the lovable Sully in Monsters Inc., up against the evil CEO, Waternoose, who will kidnap children to make a profit. Here’s how Hollywood (Disney in this case) pictures Waternoose:

It’s not very flattering.

Not all the movies are fiction. It’s “The Big Short” uncovering the financial institutions behind the sub-prime mortgage crisis (which, on a personal note, caused me to lose about 1/3 of my retirement funds), it’s “Erin Brockovich” taking down the PG&E utility company hiding the health risks it caused, and more recently “No Sudden Moves,” an excellent Netflix flic based on a true story of a consortium of car companies suppressing fuel efficient technology for it’s own financial gain.

These stories are so common, they are ingrained in our consciousness. We all know of the influence of money in our politics. How the military-industrial complex made all that money in Iraq (our tax dollars), how the financial companies were too big to fail in the mortgage crisis (but not the people who lost their homes), and how Congress continually protects the financial interests of the health care industry as it remains the largest cause of personal bankruptcies.

These are not well-kept secrets.

So when QAnon says there is a Deep State running our government and other institutions, it rings true. In fact, it is true if you consider that the ultra-wealthy and large corporations are the ones behind a government that does NOT work for the people. Let’s call them Big Money.

Do you see the problem? Big Money does not like Hollywood telling the story, over and over, of its corrupting influence on our institutions. It is bad PR.

Worse, it gets people to want to vote for Democrats. I’m not saying the Democrats work for the people, they are just as much bought and controlled by Big Money. It was, after all, the Democrats who failed to give us nationalized health as they catered to the world’s most profitable health-care industry.

But they do give more back to the people. The Democrats are more likely than the Republicans to raise taxes on Big Money, and put in government regulations protecting the environment, ensuring work place safety, and providing safety nets like Medicare and Social Security. All of these programs cost Big Money money.

So there’s the problem for Big Money. There is a Deep State, and it is Big Money. And people know about it because of Hollywood, and government reacts to it because of Democrats. How can poor, unfairly treated, Big Money fight back? To get Hollywood and the Democrats off its back?

QAnon. It’s absolutely brilliant. It takes that story that is so ingrained in our psyches and turns it upside down. It tells the powerless that there is a Deep State and that they can fight it.

It says there are powerful interests at work, but it’s not Big Money, it’s despicable sex offenders. And who are these sex offenders secretly controlling our institutions? Hollywood types and Democrats.

And who is going to root them out? And bring them to justice? Yup, Big Money.

It’s brilliant! The Deep State isn’t Big Money, but despicable sex offenders. And it’s not brave individuals who battle them, it’s, yes, Big Money!

The Sheriff of Nottingham is the good guy! Fighting that bandit Robin Hood (and his Merry? wink-wink men!) The Joker is the good guy, taking down the evil Batman (and what’s with him and Robin?)

Can there be any doubt that Big Money is behind QAnon? That it’s a brilliant spin to get Hollywood and the Democrats off its back? To let the Sheriff of Nottingham keep the land he stole from the people, to protect the Joker’s criminal enterprises? To bail out the big investment banks, the car companies, to protect the drug companies, to….

Consider their savior. The man who will lead QAnon’s “The Storm.”

A man who self identifies as the epitome of Big Money. The man behind the Trump Tower (which kind of looks like a Hollywood prop for an evil corporate headquarters.)

Readers, if this rings true, spread the idea, let your QAnon friends know that they’ve been had, that they’ve been tricked into fighting, not against, but FOR the very Deep State / Big Money conspiracy they fear.

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