This is the article that I never saw myself writing. But it’s one that needs to be done nevertheless.
After twenty-six-plus years of doing online commentary, it’s time for me to bow out.
When I started doing commentary all those years ago, the Internet was a different place. The majority of socio-political commentary was either through newspapers, through text articles online, or else they were on broadcast radio. There was only one news cable channel at the time. MSNBC and Fox News did not exist until just after I started my online weekly column.
Back then the name of the game was to get your words out online and hopefully someone will pay attention to them. That’s how President Bill Clinton’s affair with Monica Lewinsky got leaked out. It was an Internet reporter who dumpster dived and found a story that a publication had “killed” and he posted it on his website. Then those new cable news channels picked it up and ran with it and we all know what happened after that.
Today, of course, everything is slick and streamed online in little snippet videos on TikTok and YouTube and Facebook. You have people doing these things from their basements, or their home offices, or even from their kitchens. And they get far more viewers in one post than this commentator has gotten in all twenty-six years. And, not only that, they get paid.
My decision to step away from the commentary desk, though, has nothing to do with clicks or likes or adapting to the new medium. I’ve done Internet radio and podcasts. I’ve done YouTube videos. I’ve even popped up on TikTok. If it was a matter of views, I would have left a long time ago. I’ve been doing this for over two-and-a-half decades, and I’ve been getting paid for none of it. I haven’t been posting them to get paid, although the lack of monetization has certainly added insult to injury. I’ve wracked my brain and pounded fingers to keys and twisted my literal skills like a stripper on a pole week after week for this long because I felt my views should be out there.
I’m certainly not the same politically jaded online sage that I was way back when. I’ve gotten older. Some might suggest I’ve gotten wiser but that’s debatable. My health is not where it once was. A recent stay at the hospital with a diagnosis of diabetes and a fear of a stroke certainly changed things for me. I’ve also added “caregiver” to my list of responsibilities during the past decade, which have been making things more and more challenging for me. It’s been for these reasons more than the lack likes or of money that I’ve made the decision to bow out.
I wish I could say that I’m stepping back in a world that has been made a little better than when I started all those years ago, but just the opposite has happened. When I started this long journey, the two biggest threats to America were Islamic extremists from the outside and Christian extremists from the inside. We declared war on the former, but we gave lip service to the latter and then watched them get power in our government through a narcissist. We started with grumblings of civil conflict. Now those grumblings are calling for civil war.
Let’s get brutally honest here… the threat of white Christian nationalism is prevalent in America and being championed by people wearing red hats and worshiping a false messiah who claims that he alone can “save” this country. Shades of Germany and Italy from the last century have now eclipsed America. We didn’t learn from the lessons of the past. We didn’t learn from the lives lost then. We didn’t learn from the sacrifices of our grandparents and great-grandparents. We crossed oceans to fight fascism only to watch it get elected once, impeached twice, and now threatens to take power again.
I’ve changed over the decades since I first started this column, originally housed on America Online’s website. I used to be a libertarian idealist. I’ve had to temper my ideals over the years, adopting more of a practical view of libertarianism; one that is far from being completely anti-government, and sure as hell not worshiping the cult of capitalism. Sadly, I’ve also seen those who claim to be libertarian or libertarian-leaning throw their lot with the fascists. Their “claim” of being “anti-government” limited to any government not under their control. Their “support” of freedom limited only to their own.
There is a lot that I had said in the past I would never do that I found myself having to do. I once said that I would never drive a sport utility vehicle. I found myself needed to get one simply because it was getting physically difficult for me to enter and exit a regular vehicle. Of course I made sure it wasn’t a fuel-chugging model and it turns out the “crossover” model is now pretty much commonplace on the road.
I once said I would never vote for a Democrat, but circumstances required me to. I once said that the only incumbent I would consciously vote for would be my mom when she was a public official. This past election and the candidates that were running forced me to reconsider that as well.
So if there is any one piece of advice I would leave with you, it is to never say “never” to anything. Situations and circumstances force people to change. I’ve seen liberals turn into conservatives and libertarians turn into fascists because of events like the September 11 terrorist attack and the January 6 domestic terrorist attack. I’ve seen tried-and-true patriots profane the country they once swore their lives to protect in order to carry out an insurrection on behalf of an orange narcissist. So don’t say that there are things you will “never” say or do. We all hypoctracise ourselves at some point.
There are some things that will still need to be said, so every so often there will be some special article or video made that you’ll find at this column’s website. And you might find a few editorials or quick rants popping up on Facebook. But for the most part, you’ll find me working on my other big production project, which is Battlerock Comics. I started as a writer doing fiction before circumstances steered me towards socio-political commentary, and believe me when I say that the world of fiction is far better than the reality we are forced to deal with. Maybe that’s why conservatives love to fabricate so much fiction for our past. It always sounds a lot better than it really was.
So thank you for putting up with my ramblings and rants over the years, and, to borrow an old saying, see you in the funny papers.
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