Newspaper Page Text
VOTE US A
FLAGPOLE (if
FAVORITE "
ftluinich swings
^AMERICAN t/LOCAL BURGER
^/BARTENDER wfPLACE TO WATCH
^ ^ THE DAWGS PLAY
GET YOUR 750 WINGS
EVERY THURSDAY!
SATURDAY & SUNDAY MORNINGS
BLOODY MARY & MIMOSA BAR
Rowwtoww Location only
Eastside© 2501 College Station Rd. • (706)850-4919
512 East Washington St. • (706)548-5442
2440 West Broad St. • (706) 208-7979
www.blindpigtavern.cow
iP'Bi
AV
W
W DRnERRMI
DELIVERY
AVAILABLE
THROUGH
ORDERBULLDAWGFOOD.COM
UGA PERFORMING ARTS CENTER
Vocalosity
Vocalosity is the high energy concert event from the O.UU p.171.
creative mind of artistic producer Deke Sharon (Pitch Perfect)
that takes a cappella to a whole new level. This fast-paced production
features an all-star ensemble singing some of today’s chart-topping hits
in dynamic arrangements with choreography by Sean Curran of STOMP.
HODGSON CONCERT HALL
Call the Box Office: 706-542-4400. Toll Free: 888-289-8497
Order online and print your ticket at home: pac.uga.edu
fm% comment
Burn the Gold
DEMOCRATS MUST REJECT REPUBLICANS’ WORSHIP OF WEALTH
By Russell Gabriel news@flagpole.com
So a rich man has been elected president.
What else is new? One more president, one
more rich guy.
But most of the wealthy have the sense
not to flaunt it, not to hold it up as the
mark of their qualifications, as the evidence
of their acumen. Most hold themselves
out to be much more than the money they
inherited and the profits they collected. At
least as a matter of appearances, this is a
difference. But it is more than that.
It is more than that because Trump does
not merely measure himself by the gold. He
thinks he is the gold. He builds temples of
gold around the world in honor of himself.
These are not temples of gold built to honor
God. These temples do not evoke a higher
being, before whom the individual might be
humbled. Trump’s golden temples are built
to worship Trump,
a Midas of the mod
ern world.
The responsibil
ity for Midas’ elec
tion, however, does
not belong to Midas.
It belongs to the
Republican Party.
Trump could only
have been elected
as a Republican
because, in addition
to the independent
and crossover vot
ers, he needed the
votes of mainstream
Republicans. By and
large, he got them.
This fact is being
lost in the face of Trump’s successful court
ing of America’s passionate discriminations.
The hate-mongering is a show, a diversion.
Like all effective diversions, it must be
taken seriously. But if you strip out the
diversion of divisiveness, for a moment, you
see the real game. The real game is the gold.
Trump—businessman, captain of indus
try—won the traditional Republican vote
because he embodies the foundational eco
nomic theory that is the breastbone of the
modern Republican party. For Republicans,
the mark of riches is the mark of free mar
ket success. Trump, therefore, is a man to
emulate, a model for performance in the
market of the world. For the mainstream
Republican Party covets gold. Faith in
wealth is its core message. The Republican
Party’s most unshakeable political correct
ness is that the free market is the right
market, the accumulation of wealth is the
end game, and those who are wealthy are
simply those who have played the game
well. They are the deserving rich.
Their America is a land where private
profit should govern public policy, where
personal profit should drive the distribu
tion of resources. That wage earners—those
who punch a clock, work for an hourly
wage, don’t get paid if they don’t show
up and have not won the game—voted for
Trump was news precisely because wage
earners are not the traditional Republican
Party.
But it is the Republican Party that has
been voted into office, and the Republican
Party is still about the gold. Trump has sim
ply mastered the currency. If the Republican
Party does not claim every note of Trump’s
song, it certainly provides the harmony for
his tune. He is rich; how wrong can he be?
Let’s see where he leads.
However, if at bottom the Republican
message is “Lust for Gold,” its counter is
equally simple: “Burn the Gold.” America is
not about the accumulation of wealth and
sparkling treasure. It is not about the glam.
The Golden Temple is not the White House.
The Golden Temples are, emphatically, the
wrong God to worship. At heart, the aver
age American knows this. The working-
class American knows it. The middle-class
American knows it. Americans of every
race, creed and gen
der identity know it.
“Burn the Gold”
is not a call to arms.
It is a call to mes
saging. The message
is not burn the flag.
It is not burn the
cross. It is not bum
the corner store. It
is Bum the Gold.
A protest built
around burning
the gold sends the
anti-Trump mes
sage because it is
an anti-Republican
message.
Of course, it
might sound incom
prehensible, senseless and wacko. Why
would anyone burn gold?
But isn’t the better question: “Why
would anyone worship gold?” The working-
class American works for food and family;
works to pay for light and heat; works to
pay for school books and computers; works
to pay for new tires for the car. The work
ing class do not work for gold. You can’t eat
it; you can’t heat with it; it won’t run your
car. The worship of gold is the worship of
emptiness. The closets of the rich may be
full, but you can only wear one pair of shoes
at a time.
This is the message Democrats need to
understand. They are on the verge of los
ing the common man and woman. One
hopes the Democratic Party still wishes
to represent the average American, from
sea to shining sea, from amber waves of
grain to purple mountain majesties. And
if it wishes to stand for the outsider and
the insider, the farmer and the grocer, the
teacher and the cook, the mechanic and the
truck driver, the lawyer and the lawyer’s
client, the doctor and the doctor’s patient,
the adults and the children, they need to
embrace the truth that, for all the fun that
showering in gold might seem, greed for
gold should not define America. To bum the
gold is to burn the greed. ©
Comment is an occasional opinion column. Send
your Comment ideas to news@flagpole.com.
10 FLAGPOLE.COM | JANUARY 25, 2017