Once more, the match is rigged

A child of the '60s, I was a fervent pro-wrestling afficianado. Those were pre-WWE days. No nationally ballyhooed, pay cable TV spectaculars, no music video celebrities. 

Pro-wrestling was a lowbrow, blue-collar diversion. Its best-two-out-of-three-falls matches and hulking vaudevillian characters were of limited, regional quality, sometimes reflecting WWII sensibilities.

Heroes waged roaring battles against villains. Torment twisted the faces of ponderous grapplers, as they collided, tossed, flopped, and wrenched. All the while, bellowing top-of-lung fury. 

Surely, no more intense adversaries existed. The hatred they felt toward one another also spewed forth in uber aggressive between-match interviews.

So, imagine my surprise when a schoolmate told me the obvious enemies shared beers in the bar across from the TV studio, slapping one another on the back. Buddies, all along.

Welcome to show biz. Or, as carnies called the pretense, "eyewash for the rubes."

I was reminded of those youthful times of naivete when, recently, political forces usually battling one another eagerly locked shoulders.

Karl Rove, Huffington Post, National Review, MoveOn.org, Daily Caller, NPR, George Will, Lawrence O'Donnell -- and a host of others -- have clasped hands in concert against Donald Trump. 

'Protect the establishment' is their unifying cause, the banner 'neath which they rally, these otherwise-pretended combatants.

Genuine philosophical differences doubtless exist. But any such are of less import than safeguarding the shared castle against revolutionary over-throwers.

Indeed, no better evidence of guiding establishmentarian preservation impulse exists than heart-loyal donkey soldiers hefting court trumpets for Paul Ryan and Mitt Romney. 

On 3/4, CNN's Gloria Borger interviewed Romney for The Lead With Jake Tapper. Romney, smiling disquietingly at his unfolding dirty deed, misrepresented several Trump stances. Borger tossed journalistic neutrality to the margin, chiming, "Well, the birther thing was offensive," moving smarmily from reporter's chair to story participant. 

So much for the mythical 'adversarial political press.'

The establishment and its detestable ways has meant considerable riches and power for a relative few. And they are exactly small-charactered enough to fight with big-money tooth and claw all who would threaten it, and who dare to think the people should chart the course of their own government.

The old saw had it wrong. Because for-profit liberals and conservatives never were strange bedfellows. Not for one true moment.

(I believe I hear guillotines being raised.)