Introducing Estragon
Welcome to Estragon, a newsletter about society, politics, and art. This newsletter is my attempt to grapple with the social upheaval we've witnessed in America over the last decade—and I have had something of a front-row seat to the show. For the last three years, I have been operating various online accounts that go by the name “Nomadic Warriors for Pritzer,” which hinge on the conceit that JB Pritzker is the second coming of Genghis Khan. I began the account as a joke–an absurdist way to capitalize on the low-profile governor of Illinois. In recent months, as Illinois and its governor have become flashpoints in the ongoing assault on our democracy by our own idiot president and his cronies, I have found myself reconsidering the account and the way that it has been positioned. Jokes about one state invading another aren’t as funny when you’re being invaded.
Plus, posts just weren't cutting it for me any more. Like an addict, I needed something harder: long-form prose. I had found myself writing–a lot–without having any outlet for it. It certainly doesn’t fit the theme of the accounts, and you can’t write very much worth saying in 300 characters or less anyway aside from the quippy take. I want to analyze and document this insane moment in time, if not for posterity, then for myself. So I have decided to start this newsletter, Estragon, as an outlet for that material.
This newsletter is named for one of the main characters in the Samuel Beckett's play Waiting for Godot. Like many others, I have felt like the country is stuck with a lunatic taking a huge shit on everybody, while whoever will lead us out of this mess, our Godot, waits in the wings. Maybe that individual is JB Pritzker, for the sake of my followers numbers I certainly hope it is, maybe not. In any case, I have named this newsletter for the feeling of waiting around and occasionally being abused by greedy lunatics—something that also happens to Estragon, and his companion Vladimir, in Godot.
In addition to this newsletter serving as an outlet, I am also looking at is as a chance to develop some thoughts about what our country might look like after it comes out of our current moment. Trumpism won't last forever, and neither will American Liberalism as it is currently constructed. I cannot predict the future, but there are reasons for hope. Last weekend, I marched in the No Kings protest in Chicago alongside 225,000 others. The mood was fun, even carnivalesque, and, despite the incandescent rage that had driven many people to the street (I lost count of the number of "Fuck ICE" and "Fuck Trump" signs), it was remarkably peaceful.
For this country to get past where it is now and to come out the other side, it needs a movement that is peaceful, powerful, and committed to democracy. Furthermore, that moment needs a cohesive, positive vision for what the future looks like. Finally, the movement needs to exert real pressure on political leaders in order to enact that vision—or it needs to be willing to create a new type of political leader that aligns with that vision. That, and more, is what I will be writing about here. I hope you stick around for it.
