Opinion/Editorial
AND NOW, THE END IS NEAR…
Sometimes, in the brilliance of certain lyricists, the words braided in with musical melody can be stunningly revealing and so emotionally affecting. Such, in the usage of the first line of a Sinatra song called “I Did It My Way,” is the effect of some of the very well and accurately used words of the English Language. The first two stanzas begin to describe the situation as it slowly unfolds for the President of the United States was truly critical; elections will be held on November the 3rd of this coming month.
Those song stanzas read: “And now, the end is near and so I face the final curtain. My friend, I’ll say it clear, I’ll state my case, of which I’m certain. I’ve lived a life that’s full. I traveled each and every byway, oh, and more, much more than this, I did it my way.” The song’s lyrics were not written by Sinatra, nor was the score. Both came from the 1967 French song “Comme d’habitude”, which had original music by Jacques Revaux and Claude
François, and French lyrics by Gilles Thibaut and Claude François. The lyrics were adapted by Paul Anka in 1968 specifically for Sinatra, whose career was fading fast as he announced his retirement to be in 1971. The applicability of the lyrics to the timing of the President’s last days in office is amazingly coincidental.
Of course, the President is not ‘done’ yet, and history would also inform us all, those of us who have many years on the planet, that Sinatra was not done when Paul Anka converted the French fold song to possibly speed him on his way. Sinatra would come back from retirement several times, as a less capable singer but a more famous person. The President has indicated that he would like to continue in office even though the U.S. Constitution indicates pretty clearly, flatly and legally, that two terms as president are all that are allowed.
The factors leading to the current President’s fading, however slowly, or even violently, into ‘retirement’ or removal from office are significant. His closest Allie has been Benjamin Netanyaho, who is expected to lose his leadership position on October 27 as his popularity is even lower in Israel than the President’s is currently measured in the U.S. Secondly, and this is the truly potentially devastating predicament for the President, is the historic unpopularity of this President’s popularity, not only with his failed economic, war and immigration policies, but of the man and personality of the man himself.
What kind of ‘retirement’ or fade-out does this foretell for this beyond-controversial leader of the United States? One must have an idea about how ‘group think,’ mass mental appeal, or even overly emotional dependence work to comprehend what might follow if Netanyahu is gone, by early November and control of both the House of Representatives and the Senate are lost along with him to the President. The most damaging effect a democratic or even authoritarian leader can experience is to be subject to the reaction of actions of a great body of the population that stops using analytical data in the decision-making process. Civil war is a likely result, as occurred in Rome, Russia, Hungary, China the United States and so many more countries.
The writer of this article experienced the kind of emotional thought process that can result in emotionally directed decision-making when he joined the Nichiren Buddhist Sect in Japan years ago. The chant of ” Nam Myōhō Renge Kyō (also spelled Namu Myōhō Renge Kyō) was immediately taught to be memorized by all new acolytes, like himself. This chant is the central mantra or invocation of all forms of Nichiren Buddhism. He thought it was ridiculous.
Then, days later, he was led to an amphitheater with three thousand other members of the sect. The chant was repeated, all acolytes standing, for an hour, time after time. He was bored senseless, not even knowing what the strange words meant (derived from Sanskrit, meaning to devote, dedicate oneself, or offer homage), but after forty minutes, or so, he became analytically shocked. He was becoming mesmerized by being with such a combined crowd all reciting the same endless mantra. The shocking thing was that he was made to feel good, to feel not alone, to feel better inside and out, even though the analytical side of his brain was telling him the whole thing was ridiculous. As an anthropologist, he came to an understanding that had never penetrated the formality of his training and education as he realized he now understood things that were not understandable to him before: people’s participation in lynchings in the South, membership in the Ku Klux Klan, the Nazi Party, and the whole SS German nightmare.
The MAGA movement has tones of this, as well as some left-wing groups in the United States. They don’t make analytical sense. They run right in opposition to what should be rational thought. A few years later, the author did a big favor for the Zulu nation in South Africa. He was invited to KwaZulu’s capital in Yolunde. When he arrived, he was led to a back valley that was filled with almost ten thousand Zulu tribe members. They all began to chant and did so for about fifteen minutes. The leader of the tribe spoke about what he’d done for the tribe and then was asked what the tribe might do for him. He asked that the tribe only do the whole chant again. They laughed and then did. He was taken back to the shrine and experienced the same hypnotic effect that is happening across the USA as the nation recoils and comes forth. No police or military will stop it. It will be like stationing police and military along a shoreline to stop the inflow of a coming tsunami of unknown size or volume. The emotional water of the country is retreating off that ‘shoreline,’ and now it becomes only a matter of time and size as the wave is forming out there.
