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| Laura Ingraham |
By Deji Fashola (Contributing Editor)
One of the most consistent things in life is time. Time never fails to tell the story. The story of the day, the story of your life and the events that have shaped that very life; but even more importantly, time never fails to remind us of our past, with historical and poignant markers that speak to how our past actions ultimately determine where and who we are, or will become.
For Laura Ingraham, a talk show host of Fox News and someone whom I had never heard of until she name dropped basketball superstar, Lebron James, a few years ago by telling him to shut up and dribble, time has essentially encapsulated the very essence of her being, as it relates to her place in the evolving but contentious conversation about Americas contract with people of African descent, in particular.
One of the most consistent things in life is time. Time never fails to tell the story. The story of the day, the story of your life and the events that have shaped that very life; but even more importantly, time never fails to remind us of our past, with historical and poignant markers that speak to how our past actions ultimately determine where and who we are, or will become.
For Laura Ingraham, a talk show host of Fox News and someone whom I had never heard of until she name dropped basketball superstar, Lebron James, a few years ago by telling him to shut up and dribble, time has essentially encapsulated the very essence of her being, as it relates to her place in the evolving but contentious conversation about Americas contract with people of African descent, in particular.
I am not a consumer of American news as a matter of principle, be it CNN, Fox, MSNBC or any other alphabet news organization, but one thing I will say having had a glimpse of Fox news in particular, is that the latter (Fox news) is the most brazen attempt at instituting State-run TV in a country that is supposed to be the very epitome of democracy.
Time and time again, we are inundated with the Republican mantra that seemingly serves to eschew the tenets and principles of so-called conservative values. But, what exactly do these values entail.
According to Laura Ingraham et al, conservative values seek to:
a) Preserve the sanctity of life pre-birth but seemingly abuse and devalue it after birth, especially if the life in question is of the wrong hue.
b) Promote avaricious greed that encourages limitless profit by a very limited few to the detriment of the overwhelming majority.
c) Encourage and promote governmental interference in the lives of others with the exception of those who profess a divine following of a God, whose commandments and ordinances they (the so-called conservatives) never abide by, but project and force on others who merely seek to live and let live.
d) Bully, vilify, slander, defame, abuse and in some cases, seek to intimidate with threats of violence those they disagree with, including defying constituted authority even though the latter's conduct and ordinances are within the framework of the laws and statutes of the land.
A perfect example of this vilification is the Republican messaging of referring to those who ask why the wealthiest nation on earth has more than half of its population without basic healthcare, as socialists.
These same conservatives (Republicans) have no problems though with the government giving away billions of dollars in corporate welfare to big corporations, deemed too big to fail. To them, the average American is too irrelevant and too small to succeed or be cared for, so long as Mitch McConnell, Lindsey Graham, Tom "call in the troops" Cotton, Josh "inordinate ambition" Hawley and the always opportunistic Rafael Ted Cruz line their pockets and those of their corporate benefactors.
e) Extol the virtues of democracy and civility when in the majority or win elections but then turn the same institution on its head, refusing to concede when you lose, and then seek to undermine and subvert the will of the people by judicial fiat. And when the latter fails, incite a violent insurrection against the duly elected leadership of the country, namely the Vice President and Congress, a co-equal branch of government, by a sitting President of the United States of America.
The four years of the Trump misrule of incompetence, laced with brazen nepotism, cronyism and racism, as well as unbridled corruption, was undoubtedly egged on by State TV (Fox News), with Sean Hannity (the former construction worker and high school dropout) and Laura Ingraham as the unofficial spokespersons of the Trump-led civilian junta.
It remains to be seen if the resulting socio-political scars remain embedded in the mental and institutional psyche of the nation, for decades or even generations to come.
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