It’s the e-CON-OH-ME, Stupid!

by Andrew Lidden Pate, Jr.

Put me down as the first to be taken in. The very idea that a loud-mouthed billionaire obsessed with the chicanery of World-Wide-Wrestling, while possessing on his résumé a mere 15 plus minutes, give or take, of Grade C TV fame, that such a man could ever become a serious candidate for the presidency of the United States?  Ridiculous! When hell freezes over! Never!

Wow! Was I ever wrong and so guilty of wishful ignorance that no one would have ever thought it  too severe a judgment upon me to be sentenced to a permanent residency in an Alabama asylum for the mentally deranged.

Little did I know in 2016: The Con was on. "Ridiculous" was the appeal itself, precisely what unhappy Americans were looking for. To hell with Refinement, Experience, Grace Under Pressure, Logic and a Superb Education, these and other traits historically considered the necessary criteria for selecting our nation's chief executive officer, they no longer mattered.  And I didn't see the change in the making, not in the slightest.

But enough American voters did. They didn't just recognize the Con, the Con was their heart's most intense desire. And the Con worked.

So it is today, that people like myself are being laughed at and constantly bombarded by vulgarities previously reserved for hardened criminals and other morons. We have become "@#$%!@#$ fools!"

Oh, Me!  Oh, Me!

My sole defense is my upbringing. Mom and Dad overprotected me. Consequently, my Con exposure growing up measured zero on the awareness scale. I did okay for a long while, up to and including all the months in my life leading to November 2016, when I was awakened from my stupidity slumber way too late.

Thus, I hereby stand up, and make my personal confession, acknowledging to the world that I am totally unable by myself to conquer my illness: My name is Andrew Lidden Pate and I am an e-Con-O-Holic.

Oh, Me!  Oh, Me!