Reliving The Great Gatsby


Someone on the web today reviewed for the umpteenth time The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald. 

I don't claim to be knowledgeable about American literature but I had read the book more than a couple of times and watched the movie several times. As most know, it is a story of class and the consequences of those being careless when at the top. I never grow tired of hearing or reading the tale. I even think I can see it play out in real life in real time.

Among today's billionaires there are a few that carefully determine where their money can be given and how they pass out at least a tiny bit of their good fortune. I see this in Bill and Malinda Gates and Warren Buffet. They are not the characters from The Great Gatsby. 

Real life billionaires who leave behind they a trail of damage are the real life characters from that fictional story. Especially good representatives are those who, like the characters in the book, are either unaware of their damage or aware but without concern of any kind. Donald Trump and some of his children fit perfectly. Class is important to them and obstacles to moving up in class are important.

A class war of a different sort is playing out in demonstrations across the world. I live in the downtown of a metro area of 800,000 people. The Governor's mansion is about two blocks away and there was a large demonstration here last night. 

This class war is about race and is fraught with carelessness of those with power like the economic class war. A few police officers have been careless about their racial class status and have gotten away with it just like the wealthy characters in The Great Gatsby. 

The U.S. Civil War was about something that should have been nothing. It's easy to see now that the South should have seen their view of class structure they thought right and proper was absurd and relented without a shot being fired.  

I have high hopes these two kinds of irresponsible class behaviors will be put at least temporarily on hold in the upcoming election. 

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