Thursday, September 08, 2016

Satori in the Supermarket

An awful epiphany rolled over me as I was on the checkout line with my lunchtime salad just now. If my local supermarket stocks Donald Trump's favorite newspaper every week, then some customers may be doing more than snickering over its ridiculous cover stories. Some people may actually be buying the National Enquirer and taking it home and opening it up. Even worse, some of those people may actually find its incredible stories credible.

Seen at a supermarket on September 8, 2016.

I have obviously been underestimating the level of stupidity surrounding us on a daily basis. I knew theoretically that many Americans claim to not believe in evolution or climate science or the need for using correct English spelling and grammar in conservative tweets; the Republican convention introduced me to a counterculture of reality-television duck hunters and other "celebrities" existing in a parallel cultural universe; I even half-believed that some people watch pro wrestling and NASCAR and the NFL as if they aren't fixed; but today it hit me on a gut level that there are even people who might look at this Photoshopped picture of Hillary Clinton* on today's checkout line and read (skim) the article about "Hillary's FULL MEDICAL FILE!" and believe its lies about her "3 Strokes, Alzheimer's, Liver damage from booze, and Violent rages," and one of those credulous readers might be Donald Trump. 

Millions of other gullible readers might be enthusiastic Trump voters ready to usher in the idiocracy on November 8.



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*Though today's Gaunt Hillary was last month's Fat Hillary.



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