Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire

Waiting for a Schmo: Theater of the Absurd!
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
19 Jan 2022
🖨️ Print Article
Waiting for a Schmo: Theater of the Absurd!
Waiting for a Schmo: Theater of the Absurd!

Waiting for a Schmo:

Theater of the Absurd!

Waiting for a Schmo

Munchkin—or the other—

is Theater of the Absurd!

Myth of Boer swineherd

of coal, gas, oilbird…Absurd!

Who’s Afraid of West Virginia

Wolf in a Brooks Brothers suit

thickening a thin plot: Millions dying?

Two tramps, frontmen for fossil fools and warlords of Wall Street—

Pentagon pimps—stand center stage projecting corporate power.

The two Lilliputian politicians gesticulate wildly as they move stage Right

for months. Ambient sounds include shareholders oinking gleefully.

One protagonist is Ike, the other Mike.One's good cop, the other

bad. One’s forceful, the other deceptive… They continue babbling

in corporate counterpoint. Their bizarre, disconnected dialogue makes

Absolutely no sense to you! You can’t understand a damn thing they’re

saying— or doing… You see strings from their shoulders orchestrating

stage business— Invisible hands of the market are up their asses making

their mouths move! But, you suspend disbelief every two to four years…

More months moving stage right, blabbering bellicose phrases, farting

cellophane threats at no one in particular… You’ve paid hard-earned money

subscribing to schlock! Your high threshold for pain and terrible theater can

only go so far with dismal dialogue:

“Buzzword” “Platitude” “Buzzword” “High fructose corn syrup slogan” “Build back better”

“…get something done…” “Voting rights” “I cannot support…” “working across the aisle”

“…get something done…” “I cannot support…” “60 vote threshold” “Filibuster” “bipartisan buy

in” “…get something done” “freeze Afghan assets” “bipartisan buy-in” “sanction Iran” “masks”

“tests” “masks” “tests” “too expensive” “I cannot support…” “…get something done” “60 vote

threshold” “bipartisan buy-in” “paid sick leave” “medicare for all” “how will we pay for

it?!” “build back better” “dagger at the throat of our democracy” “how will we pay for

it?!”“$768 billion for war” “NATO” “Guantanamo” “Juan Guaidó” “bipartisan buy-in” begging

the question: When will we storm the stage, slinging shoes and shouting “STOP the

performance!!”??

© 2022. Raymond Nat Turner, The Town Crier. All Rights Reserved.

Political Duopoly

Do you need and appreciate Black Agenda Report articles? Please click on the DONATE icon, and help us out, if you can.


Related Stories

Why Democrats Don't Win The Way They Should
Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
Why Democrats Don't Win The Way They Should
09 November 2022
The people prefer the initiatives which democrtatic party leadership claim to support.
Reagan’s “Shining City on a Hill” Was Really a Mirage
Dr.Wilmer J. Leon, III
Reagan’s “Shining City on a Hill” Was Really a Mirage
26 January 2022
It is best to be wary when American politicians create expressions like "shining city on a hill." One of Reagan's signature phrases has been re
Democrats and Trading People for Political Power
Daniel Melo
Democrats and Trading People for Political Power
26 January 2022
Electoral politics in this country is a cover for oligarchic rule.

More Stories


  • Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
    Hakeem Jeffries, Monkeys, Errand Boys, and Black Misleadership
    09 Sep 2026
    Hakeem Jeffries climbs the political ladder because he engages in dirty deeds with the world’s worst people. Being called a monkey gives him an easy out. The presence of a Black face in a high place…
  • Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    ESSAY: The Midwest and the League of Revolutionary Black Workers, Jim Jacobs, 1972
    09 Sep 2026
    “To seize control of the political economy of the Midwest is to seize control over the political economy of imperialist America.”
  • Las Anod
    Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor
    Somaliland and Sovereignty in the Horn and the Red Sea Region
    09 Sep 2026
    The victory of Somalia’s Northeast State over secessionist Somaliland gives Somalis hope of renewed unity and sovereignty, but Israel attacked that hope by recognizing Somaliland.
  • Anthony Karefa Rogers-Wright
    The Path Black to Socialism: Dispatches from the 2026 Socialism Conference
    09 Sep 2026
    Many in the U.S. "Left" are actually liberal elements that pull socialism toward the Democratic Party. Black organizers must build independent power.
  • Austin Cole
    Attica Lives and Shares Lessons on Abolitionist Internationalism & Anti-Imperialist Solidarity
    09 Sep 2026
    The Attica rebellion was not only about prison "reform." The prison is the most intense expression of a system of imperialist domination that operates at every scale.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us