Cryspus Attucks Was a Chump

In the south, the British were freeing slaves. They were the side of freedom. Admittedly not enough to make a difference, else the British would have won. Up north, Attucks, who was a seaman and used to being treated even was just cutting up. John Adams, defending the British soldiers who fired on the crowd at, their trial, described Attucks as one of a “a motley rabble of saucy boys, negroes and mullatoes, Irish teagues and outlandish jack tarrs". Attucks was upset about impressment and competition for jobs, ignoring slavery. One of the reasons for the revolution that Attucks started was to maintain slavery.

A chump is someone who ignores the big picture: The legendary black sniper who fought for the confederacy or all the slaves who returned with Lee from Gettysburg. The 442^nd infantry regiment of Japanese Americans who fought while their families were interred. All pales in the face of 2.5 million Indians fighting for Britain after repetitive starvation holocausts continuing during World War II.

What is the nature of a chump? How can they ignore the obvious? It is a common human failing to be confused by figure/ground, to view the immediate as the general case. But these are not merely the oblivious. There is a deep vein of hateful cynicism.  These were not circumstances that could be ignored. Rationalization is always possible, but at some level they had to renounce their common humanity and hope for progress. The humor is that they see themselves as opportunists and think that they are the exception.

History seems to praise the chumps. The thinking is that since we are here things must have turned out well. Many of the chumps didn’t make it.

First thing I noticed about the recent so called Baltimore riots was the lack of rifles. Then we all remarked at the rather pitiful attempts at looting. The only people really hurt were the Pakistani store keepers and the elderly. Sorry, that is not a riot. It is a pogrom.

I am leading up to the Republican primary, the party of chumps and Trumps. They don’t seem to realize that cliques are an exclusionary process eventually containing only the null set.

Everyone is upset that we, the American people, took the hit while the banks got away with it. Any candidate who promises to put Goldman Sachs in jail will take the election. Sanders is code talking about:

-equal protection under the law.

Which we all hear as:

-put Goldman Sachs in jail.

Clinton is doing a shimmy.  Trump shimmies a little. Except for fundamentalist Carson, no one else is getting any play.  That is because they are ignoring the major issue of the election:  jail the banks. There was a debate cattle call where the moderator essentially asked:

-Who wants to be president?

And they all took a pass. What he actually asked was how to address the banking scandal.

Chumps are created by privilege, defense of the local maxima while ignoring much larger inequities nearby.

-Why should I pay more taxes for college that my kids aren’t smart enough to get into?

-Why should I pay more in taxes for some dumb old farts colonoscopy?

While completely ignoring the 200 million F35 weapon systems that will eventually be brought down by a $10,000 drone.

Poor Sanders is talking about what could have been done with the money that we used to support the reinsurance industry.  He doesn’t realize that America just wants to see some bankers do the perp walk. We don’t want to actually change anything.