Here we are on the eve of the presidential election, and I’m fairly nonplussed by the drama that’s been building up to this point. Our choices are both devoid of vision aside from holding fast to a withered point of view from a past that no longer holds relevance. We cannot see ourselves in any meaningful global position anymore as we are too enmeshed in studying our own belly buttons. The joy of life found in striking out for the future is a smoldering hunk of death destroyed by our own stupidity. Resting on one’s laurels has come with a price, and for the United States, that translates into having lost our way. The abyss we are dwelling in opens the way for China to continue pushing its vision for the future of its people, where they believe that technology, education, and global collaboration will allow the Chinese to gain influence and prosperity. On the other hand, we have Russia and America wanting to modernize their nuclear stockpiles while shoring up their oil, steel, forestry, and manufacturing capabilities.

We’ve arrived at this juncture to a large degree by our open disdain for things smart. While rich is good, brainy is arrogant, elitist, and generally needs to be mistrusted. Again, rich, no matter how one got there, is good. This seems obviously idiotic, but by and large, this is about exactly where we sit.

There’s a relatively good chance that tomorrow, maybe even tonight, we’ll know who won the presidency. Maybe it’ll be contested, but who gives a shit if it is? The carnival will change gears, but intellectual lethargy will continue to rule the day. While I voted for who I did, there’s a part of me that wants to witness how unhinged we can take things. I have but one life, and to see firsthand the derangement of society compounding centuries of mistakes into a short period of time offers me a front-row seat to the self-immolation of a culture that sits at the precipice of luxury and convenience and yet is oblivious to its true value.

Then, in the middle of the night, during a fitful attempt at sleep, the tension pulls me from the futility so I might look upon the status of things with a glimmer of hope that my sense of gloom was misguided, but here in the dark hours across America, before the sun has started to rise, it looks like we’ve opted for another season of the worse telenovela played before an audience in a stupor of fear and anxiety. Our opportunity to pass from children to adolescents is being eclipsed by a tantrum of not wanting to clean our rooms, we will not conform to the better wills of our parents as they, too, demand to do as they please. Responsibility be damned, and again, who cares as the choices were Blue MAGA and Red MAGA.

I can’t say I don’t have a lump in my throat of dread as we will now see a totally delegitimized media that will look like it seriously colluded to drive a propagandistic attack on the incumbent, claiming his opponent had a better than 85% of winning. The House and Senate are not teetering yet, and looks like another four years of stalemate are at hand. In short, this is mostly fucked, but on the bright side, other players could take advantage of the vacuum opened by a country divided and seize the opportunity to enrich themselves with land and power grabs; then again, most are wise to be leery of a hurt dog snarling in the corner. More likely to happen is we’ll bear witness to a frenzied mania of self-righteous vindictiveness that will play out while the decay of the republic marches on.

What about hope and the 26 million votes yet to be counted, as it’s only 4:00 a.m. in the nation’s capital? That no longer really matters like the color and division in the country is splayed large for all to see; we are truly divided and do not care enough about rationality. We like our sick and twisted shit show and are not ready to change channels. Regardless of the outcome, how does one look at the map above and not realize that too many of us are not satisfied with the dire position we are in due to a shifting landscape of economic uncertainty? The tech revolution has made those able to adapt very wealthy, but those not on that gravy train are out in a digital dust bowl choking on the bits of nonsense thrown off as scrap with about as much value as AOL or MySpace.

Our systemic issues are not being repaired by a popularity contest between two old dudes, and as emotionally irrational as I’d like to position myself and believe that one is better than the other, that would be irresponsible of me if I still hold on to the idea that our problems are seated in an intellectual divide that has created blinders to what is ailing a society without dreams.

Tomorrow will be just one more day that I will rail about our need to wake up, but for now, I must go back to sleep and try to dream of better days.