by Dr. Ellen Brandt
I've spent the past several days - unnecessarily bleak and stress-filled days - removing a particularly nasty cybervirus from my computer system. It was the nastiest, in fact, that I've seen in my years on the Internet - and I was a very early Internet adopter.
Among other things, it transformed all my documents and photos into newly encrypted versions that were not openable without the proper key, a form of "ransomware" that even the world's foremost security experts have not been able to combat successfully. Fortunately, I now know to back up my documents and photos on external flash drives every week or so. So I "only" lost a week's worth of work, meaning it could have been worse.
As is now par for the course on the Internet, no site or company has yet admitted that their own security protocols were at fault. I'm almost certain that the culprit in this case was my darling ISP (Internet service provider), a very large ISP with many millions of users, including all sorts of state and local government agencies.
My darling ISP, which shall be nameless, has been lax in protecting its E-mail system fairly often - and this particular kind of virus attack almost always spreads via E-mail.
So that's what probably happened this time. Another time, though, nasty Malware might enter one's system - and phone - and TV set - and possibly one's blender, toaster oven, and riding lawnmower - via a social media site or a search engine or a news site or a retail order and payment system.
Some of these Malware attacks are criminal in nature - whether the criminals are organized and slick or rogue amateurs working alone. They're trying for a monetary gain of some kind, whether via out-and-out theft of financial data or the original kind of "ransomware," where shady types demand a payment, in return for which they'll send you a decryption key to unlock the files they've locked.
Although the attack I - and almost certainly millions of others - just lived through this week did involve illegally encrypted files, it wasn't classical "ransomware," since no one demanded payment in return for a key, and the kinds of files they went after were clearly targeted in order to gum up one's system, waste one's time, and cause one stress and anguish.
In other words, it was "Malware for Fun" - humorous and entertaining, if one is a Sociopathic Sadist who thinks gratuitous Malice aimed at fellow human beings is as jolly as the proverbial barrel of monkeys.
And alas! this sort of gratuitous, cruel, almost casual Malice has become a commonplace in the current historical era, whether on the Internet, in the media, in the workplace, or pretty much anywhere else.
Which brings us to the ultimate theme of this story, which, Yes, is political.
We believe Americans, in general - and the collective worldview that represents America, in general - think of ourselves as a particularly Moral people, believers in truth, justice, a fair shake for everyone, and special protection for "widows and orphans" - whoever the weakest among us might be in the current period.
Gratuitous Malice - or bullying - or kicking the other fellow when he's down - are decidedly not in the historical American ethos, not part of the American Dream or the American Way.
Yet, all of a sudden, it seems, here they are. An absolute avalanche of Malice and cruelty and sociopathic behavior is not only tolerated, but in some inconceivable way, applauded - in our economy, in our media, in our social institutions - and lately, in our politics.
Many of us are ready to cry out, Enough! Stop disregarding our pain, whether financial, social, or cultural. (In the case of the more than 2 in 5 Americans over age 50, it is now all three).
Stop blaming or trivializing anyone and everyone who has been victimized by the cataclysmic events of past three decades: outsourcing, downsizing, the decimation of middle management, housing crises, market crashes, and the hollowing out of manufacturing, resources, and Main Street small business alike.
Stop characterizing us, as many Elitist media now routinely do - and some politicians are beginning to do - as "losers" or "sheeple" or those who "just couldn't cut it and deserve to suffer."
In calmer times, in more stable times - or, significantly, in periods in which a tiny Thug-ocracy of gazillionaires acting like common criminals is not at the helm of the economy and the Ship of State - the vast majority of the many, many millions teetering on the brink of financial devastation would in no case be ridiculed or bullied in this horrid and astonishing way.
Because they - because WE - are not "losers" and "those who couldn't cut it." WE - individually and collectively - are generally well-educated and skilled and experienced and decent people, from every region, in every profession and trade, who were either directly targeted by financial predators or fell victims, despite our valiant efforts, to one or several of the kinds of devastating economic cataclysms this era has experienced in wave after wave of inexorable chaos and dislocation.
The GOP - Party of Morality
While neither major Party, nor any particular part of the broad American political spectrum, can claim an exclusive ethical or moral superiority to those of different political persuasions, in our current era of economic and social chaos, many of us believe the GOP has a clear edge - an edge that we should exploit.
As we've said in previous stories, the Republican voter Base is more "Gray" than the Democrats' Base - that is, it has more people age 50 and over. And voters 50 and over will comprise fully half of the electorate in 2016.
America's "Grays," as most of us can tell you from personal experience, have been the major victims of the economic and social chaos of the past 30 years - because we've been adults through all of it. And especially during the past seven chaotic - and for many of us, horrendous - years of the Obama administration, a large percentage of us have been direct victims of economic, social, and cultural Malice, some of it verging on absolute cruelty and sadism.
We've been ridiculed. We've been bullied. We've been scorned. And worst of all, we've been roundly ignored.
The GOP has, at least for the past 75 or 80 years, already held the mantle of the "Religious" Party, the one with the largest number of active churchgoers and religious activists.
Now, many of us believe, it is high time to claim the mantle of the Moral Party, as well - the Party which will no longer tolerate meanness or spitefulness or unethical behavior by anyone - including anyone claiming to be a Republican, but acting in ways that diminish or degrade the self-worth of our fellow Americans.
If the GOP refuses to claim the mantle of Morality and Decency and Humane Compassion - particularly towards those in its own (Gray) Base, many of whom are currently downtrodden and need to be helped back on our feet again - other parts of the political spectrum will make their own attempts to claim this Moral mantle.
At this point, Republicans have the clear Moral edge. But it is ours to lose.
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