(This is the Long Green Table used for staff meetings. It is normally more vibrant, but Legal gave the opinion that having the people who sit at the LGT in the picture could be used by others to identify potential non-linear thinkers, militia members or other threats to good order and discipline. A training unit was proposed by HR to ensure compliance).
As you may have noticed, the Editorial Board at Socotra House LLC has been tied in the same knots that you are. The agenda this morning was knotted up as well. Some wanted to discuss the $80 Billion dollars going to augment the considerable staff of the Internal Revenue System. Since those evil top 1 percent of taxpayers paid more than the bottom 90 percent (combined), the 5,000 new agents to be hired will presumably ensure new fairness in wealth distribution. Or something.
We were not sure about that, since hiring a bunch of new Feds has not worked out that way before. Plus, the Content and Production people were eager to talk about some of the other curious events underway in our society. One was about the hundreds of thousands of ‘migrants’ that are ‘welcomed’ to the country after bypassing the legal means to do so. You know the term that used to be used to describe them. Now, of course they are called ‘Migrants,’ and the Legal staff are anxious that the new term be used rather than the one that could trip an algorithm in some commercial web application which could highlight us for some sort of Government action by all those new agents they are hiring.
This particular morning there was actual caterwauling at the conference table. We all agree that the death of any citizen is a tragedy that can range from unfortunate to scandalous- but the idea that the family of the guy who died while in police custody would be welcomed to the White House is strange. The cop largely responsible for the incident is facing 40 years in the clink, and the individual is dead. There was discussion about how to characterize the whole thing.
One of the interns was intemperate, but she has been accused of cis-gendered non-binary commentary before. She asserted that the deceased was a career criminal, already convicted of assault on a pregnant woman, possessed of a gun in previous acts of violence, apparently guilty of passing counterfeit currency while high as a kite on a variety of substances including fentanyl, and hanging out with a drug dealer the evening of the activity that resulted in his death.
She was shushed by the Chief of Legal, whose position has assumed new importance after the troublesome matter of mentioning that the migrants are housed in hotels at taxpayer expense, while actual citizens are left on the streets. We have corrected that issue by not mentioning it again. The Legal Beagle cleared their throat (pronoun control is still new here) and said: “It is controversial. As of this morning, of every known deadly police shooting in America since 2015, some 6,211 people have been shot and killed by law enforcement officers. 2,883 were white, while 1,496 total were persons of color. Virtually all were armed.” There was silence after that, since it wasn’t reflective of any particular narrative and not that funny.
The next news item was the one about the BLM flag being authorized to be flown from US Embassies and Consulates worldwide. As often happens in these times in the morning line-up, the rational response was silence. Another intern suggested it was a simple honorific act to demonstrate our collective guilt for 500 years of systemic racial oppression. There was again silence at the long green table, and then laughter. The Kings of England, France, Spain and the Czar of Russia all had their say about what was going on here for nearly half of that time. If you include Russia’s time in Alaska, most of it. But we agreed the logo should only be associated with laughter, not actual history. It is like, you know: Symbolic.
That it is coming so close to an actual holiday made it weird. Memorial Day was a celebration passed after debate by elected representatives celebrating the sacrifice of hundreds of thousands of young people. The gave their lives for, rather than against, this nation. Chairman Socotra opined we should drop the matter and not become a target, since at the moment, symbolism is a much more important commodity than objective truth.
Normally that would have ended the discussion, but there were two words that actually closed it out. We thought it came from HR, but the table was crowded and hard to tell who it was.
“Whose truth?” There was another one of those awkward silences as the group paused to see what the consensus reaction might be, or who might be bold enough to claim it. Then there was more laughter, and someone from Legal suggested we talk about lunch.
Copyright 2021 Vic Socotra
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