For what would be a change of pace,
Check out this unusual place:
Persecuted groups came to create
A place where they could discriminate.
1840s gold rush dreams
Preceded years of get-rich schemes.
Nutty religious cults explore
End-time prophecies galore.
Believe whatever if that's your conviction,
Even if your "facts" are fiction.
You can construct your own reality;
"Whatever goes" is gaining vitality.
Anti-intellectualism
Accompanies attacks on secularism.
Fewer people think it's not odd
For leaders to wait for messages from God.
Satan's causing natural disasters,
For he's out to get us, according to some pastors.
Hustlers hustle the hustled, you see:
Religious theatricality.
Snake oil is sold for a quick fix;
Someone always has a bag of tricks.
Charismatic visionaries
Hope their income never varies.
Though P.T. Barnum is gone, we can say
That humbuggery is here to stay.
Homeopathic cures are widespread.
Devious mediums talk to the dead.
Scare tactics of foreign "invasions"
Keep popping up on numerous occasions.
Some have rewritten the history of the South.
Fake news spread by cyber "word of mouth."
Commingling entertainment and news--
Called "infotainment"--can spread one's views.
Acting out your fantasy makes you feel
That fantasy--NOT reality--is real.
People are duped by made-up scares.
The "National Enquirer" peddles its wares.
Cosmetic surgery transforms features.
People are abducted by strange space creatures.
The fantasy industry proliferates:
Fox News infects all fifty states.
Prosperity-gospel preachers are abounding,
Hoping their spiritual interest is compounding.
The war on the devil is not metaphorical,
For scripture, some say, can't be allegorical.
There are always the paranoid ones
Who fear the confiscation of guns.
Groups attempt to change the rules
So creationism can be taught in the schools.
Anti-establishment's becoming the norm;
Mistrust of experts is taking greater form.
Lies don't matter as long as you
FEEL that what someone says is true.
Some fear "invaders" crossing the border;
Others fear a scary New World Order.
Distrust places the media on trial
And fosters climate change denial.
Some say vaccines do great harm
And GMO foods are cause for alarm.
They say gun laws will only provide
Guns to "bad guys" with something to hide;
That regulations on any level
Of finances are the work of the devil.
A con-man leader will always keep spinning
The fantasy that with him we'll be winning.
That fake news is harmful and only distracts
People entitled to making up facts.
Voter fraud's still the talk of the Right;
Conspiracy theories keep coming to light.
Con artists boldly state:
Conversion therapy makes you straight.
If an alternate universe is in demand,
Then WELCOME, ALL, TO FANTASYLAND!

-by Bob B (11-12-18)

°Inspired by Kurt Andersen's "Fantasyland: How America
Went Haywire"

Here
Is a timely
Noun to consider
From the Merriam-Webster page.

"Trumpery."

Note (at bottom) the list of near-antonyms;
what is the opposite of trumpery?

[Popularity: Bottom 40% of words]

trumpery
noun trum·pery \ˈtrəm-p(ə-)rē\

Definition of trumpery

1
a : worthless nonsense b : trivial or useless articles : junk <a wagon loaded with household trumpery — Washington Irving>

2
archaic : ****** finery

Origin of trumpery

Middle English (Scots) trompery deceit, from Middle French, from tromper to deceive

First Known Use: 15th century

Examples of trumpery

<claims for weight-loss products that are based much more on Madison-Avenue trumpery than on bariatric science>

Related to trumpery

Synonyms
applesauce [slang], balderdash, baloney (also boloney), beans, bilge, blah (also blah-blah), blarney, blather, blatherskite, blither, bosh, bull [slang], bunk, bunkum (or *******), claptrap, codswallop [British], crapola [slang], crock, drivel, drool, fiddle, fiddle-faddle, fiddlesticks, flannel [British], flapdoodle, folderol (also falderal), folly, foolishness, fudge, garbage, guff, hogwash, hokeypokey, hokum, hoodoo, hooey, horsefeathers [slang], humbug, humbuggery, jazz, malarkey (also malarky), moonshine, muck, nerts [slang], nuts, piffle, poppycock, punk, rot, *******, senselessness, silliness, slush, stupidity, taradiddle (or tarradiddle), tommyrot, tosh, trash, nonsense, twaddle

Related Words
absurdity, asininity, fatuity, foolery, idiocy, imbecility, inaneness, inanity, insanity, kookiness, lunacy; absurdness, craziness, madness, senselessness, witlessness; hoity-toity, monkey business, monkeyshine(s), shenanigan(s), tomfoolery; gas, hot air, rigmarole (also rigamarole); double-talk, greek, hocus-pocus

Near Antonyms
levelheadedness, rationality, reasonability, reasonableness, sensibleness; common sense, horse sense, sense; discernment, judgment (or judgement), wisdom
By: Robinson Bolkum

roundabout poem (another poem, another day)

<>

the notion punches into my mouth when
chilling , deleting and wasting time *pro=ductively
(professionally ducking responsibilities)
with no home to go to, but to write with purposeful
meandering, in a roundabout manner,
on a Saturday, luxury~leisurely in bed with runs
for asiago bagels and blue mountain coffee,
and wondering why you would read this, and
losing my debate internal & and infernal if
this is worth my time, nonetheless the urging
is only purging by clicking clacking on a keyboard,
inviting you to join me  under my cozy
floral coverlet, and to enjoy my pastoral view,
of water, women and why not, a trilogy of

factorials (or is it factorals? permutations or combinations) *another poem, another day)

panoramic bleeding view unceasingly changing,
reflecting god’s mood swings or an atheist’s humbuggery)

and women lies beside me, guilty pleasure, mine or hers😉, becoming part, a parcel upon the land/waterscape/escape, with sun rays invisible yet blindingly make me glinting and squinting,
and wet grass, dripping trees,  and going round and round, so
stray thots evolving/revolving and thus
this roundabout poem deserves a decent burial,
so I thank it, thank you, thank her, and the sky
and the glisten of a wet drenched everything,
a Saturday~Sabbath on which a poem was delivered
from me within, in a cesarean eruption,
my child blessed, sent to you with gratitude,
a much underrated emotion, but which occupies
me frequently when your days go dimmer,
and the

mind is sharply focused/used on about
what is value,
valuable, and what shall be valued on this damp
rainfall rainfull wordfull wonderful momentary
escapery into being together with…you, silly!

writ  pre-noon,
Saturday~Sabbath,
(on S.I., by the Sound’s calming waters
where the poems fall from trees on a glider
of wet leaves, or fly by on a modest mph breeze,
looking for human sense to grab aholt of for
canning and preservation…come see for yourself….*)