In a recent article, I said one of the reasons I came to Mexico is burn-out.  I mentioned how I left before the election, not thinking it would matter who won or lost.  I'd like to clarify why it never mattered who won or lost, and why Trump was never going to save America.

To cut to the chase before the rambling begins:  Trump was America's last chance to repent.  Trump was a gift from God; not because he himself was going to defeat the satanic elements at work in the U.S. government so that America could get back to the business of disregarding God at every opportunity, but because he was buying time for the country to repent.

It hasn't repented, and I don't think it will.  That's another reason I left.  Being told to "get a real job" by people who would never think of demanding a free oil change from the mechanic but think nothing about stealing my livelihood, listening to them call me arrogant for calling out this paradox, listening to them party on the sun deck of the Titanic while I'm splashing around in the bloody shark water.... all of it has a way of creating indifference in a man.  Learning to fistfight with sharks while listening to people laugh and patronize you from on high has a way of making anybody feel unwelcome.

However, what looked like exile has begun to look like priority seating on a lifeboat.

I left America because I have been in cultural exile for a long time.  The indifference has finally become mutual, in spite of my actual disbelief in it, and against every effort I've made to prevent it.  My last attempt to break you out of your self-imposed, preachy, artless stupor was The Poor Man's Nick Cave Tour, in which I toured Latin America in pursuit of the attention of Nick Cave, with the intent of getting my name out of the ruined, smoking tenements of oblivion, and into the limelight, so as to simply make a living.

The ostensible goal of the tour wasn't reached.  The unexpected, unintentional goal I wasn't even aware of, however, was fulfilled and even exceeded any nonexistent expectations I may have had.

I was already interested in Spanish-language music, but what I didn't expect was to feel more at home, more comfortable in my own skin as an obvious foreigner, than I do in the U.S. as a non-obvious one.  It was a visceral, undeniable feeling of relief I didn't see coming.  Walking down the street in Mexico City, this strange, foreign metropolis with people selling jumper cables on blankets on the sidewalk or in the subway station, selling everything on blankets on the sidewalk, me sticking out at 6'6" like a crazy white telephone pole, yet feeling more comfortable, even crushed into the subway so tight that you didn't need to hold on to anything to stand upright, was a side-effect of listening to the self-righteous, patronizing advice of people who TAKE IT FOR GRANTED THAT THEY WILL ALWAYS BE ABLE TO MAKE A LIVING for over 20 years.

Trump was never going to save America.  I'm sure he meant it when he said "Make America Great Again," and that phrase sure pissed off all the right people, and I wasn't into him in 2016 but he won me over by the end of the first year of his term.  He was a real Godsend.  But it wasn't to "Make America Great Again," not in the way he intended.  Like my interest in Spanish-language music and being a fan of Nick Cave led me to book an ambitious tour, the ostensible goal of which was never reached, MAGA was never going to happen the way it was planned. 

The real plan was to get you to repent.

So on this sad, tragic anniversary, put away your hopes in any politician, any dissenting governor Biden is preparing to destroy, and repent.  It's your only hope, the only hope America has.  Your only chance as an infinite soul trapped in a prison of appetite and desire.  Are you going to have to be stripped of everything, before you see the light?  Does your S.O.L. (Standard of Living) have to be completely and entirely S.O.L. before you stop taking it for granted?  You ignored the Musicians in the Coal Mine, and worse, you maligned them for what you arrogantly call "complaining."  Are you going to get off your high horse at long last, and realize that it isn't wise to malign the canary for passing out?  Are you going to realize it's wiser to listen to (and heed) the warning embodied in the moribund, silent songbird?  Are you going to repent, now that the vultures are coming home to roost?  Or are you going to continue to kneel at the altar of self-righteous, arrogant offendedness and mistakenly, ridiculously continue to believe that your opinions about people you've disregarded for decades are still important to them?

I hope not.

This is what your artists have to say, y'know.  This is what you've inspired them to tell you.  It isn't wise to disregard the warning; it is wise to realize you asked for it, and turn away from the iceberg while you still can. You've allowed yourselves to become soft by making your culture need "positivity" like a child needs a teddy bear.  You don't want truth; you want "positivity."  Like a rich kid, you demand milk and stuffed animals in a world of icebergs and rotten meat.  Repent.  Yesterday is too late.  Do it now.

God bless the United States of America.

And for kicks, my campaign poster for Paris Hilton in 2016, which was the only sane response I could muster in a world in which the only solution to a Wicked Witch presidency was The Donald.  I was horrified, and fled into the arms of absurdity until election night.  Aside from having the best economic platform I have ever heard (STOP BEING POOR), she obviously has the Prime Minister of Canada in the palm of her hand:

And for what it's worth, I'm one of those people who thinks Paris Hilton is actually smart, that she's only playing dumb because it's good for business, and probably a lot of fun.  Long live Paris Hilton.